NEED TO KNOW
Rory McIlroy took a shaded shot at Bryson DeChambeau
While speaking to reporters about LIV Golf, McIlroy said that the PGA Tour was more competitive
The rival golfers had a famous back-and-forth last year at the Masters
One year after their infamous Masters pairing, Rory McIlroy and Bryson DeChambeau are no closer to seeing eye to eye, it appears.
While at the Truist Championship over the weekend, the two-time Masters champ, 37, spoke out about LIV Golf, whose future remains uncertain amid funding woes.
“If you want to be the most competitive golfer you can be, this [the PGA Tour] is the place to be,” McIlroy told reporters. “And if you don’t want to play here, I think that says something about you.”
DeChambeau, 32, who is in his final year of his contract with LIV, is said to be entertaining talks about returning to the PGA Tour, and has previously told ESPN and SI, that he might focus on growing his YouTube channel while playing in the tournaments that “want him” if LIV goes away.
Rory McIlroy at the 2026 Masters
Credit: Hector Vivas/Getty
Yet McIlroy — who has been vocal in the past about LIV — is dialing back his previous criticism of the tour and remaining optimistic about the future should the league fold.
“It all depends on what happens to LIV,” he said. “But if it is a scenario where they have the option to come back and play on the traditional tours, you know, I think [PGA Tour CEO] Brian Rolapp has said anything that makes this Tour stronger, anything that makes the DP World Tour stronger, I think everyone should be open to that.”
Follow your favorite athletes on and off the field with PEOPLE’s free sports newsletter — sign up now!
He added, “That’s just good business practice.”
McIlroy and DeChambeau previously were involved in a controversy regarding their play in the 2024 Masters.
The two rivals, who were paired together during the final round of the major, had a heated back-and-forth on the 9th green— and McIlroy says their disagreement helped fuel him to go on to win and finally clinch the career Grand Slam.
“I thought it very clearly was my putt,” McIlroy says in a new documentary Rory McIlroy: The Masters Wait, while discussing how the two players both had similar length birdie putts. “I thought his putt was slightly closer to mine. We sort of look at each other and I’m like, ‘I think it’s me to go.’ And he’s like ‘I think it’s me to go.’ ”
McIlroy continues, “It’s very gamesmanship-y, match play thing. Really, both of us want to putt first because if you can hole that before your opponent it puts pressure on them. He goes, ‘Why don’t we just throw a tee up for it to see who goes first.’ And I’m like no, this is the final round of the Masters. This isn’t some like game on a Tuesday afternoon somewhere. I’m like, no. I wasn’t going to wilt in that situation. I’m going to stand firm.”
Later, DeChambeau told reporters that McIlroy “wouldn’t talk to me.”
“[He] didn’t talk to me once all day,” DeChambeau said at the time.
Read the original article on People