The three most prominent golf tours—the PGA Tour, the LIV Golf, and the DP World Tour—made an announcement on Tuesday that they are merging in a move that sent shockwaves throughout the world of golf.
Announcing the merger, PGA Tour called it a “landmark agreement to unify men’s professional golf”.
The PGA Tour and the DP World Tour were previously engaged in a widely publicized legal battle with LIV Golf after the Saudi Arabia-backed tour plucked away some of the best golf players with lucrative contracts. The merger will now bring to an end all the legal proceedings and allow LIV Golf members to become part of the PGA Tour and DP World Tour again.
According to PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan, the decision was made with the goal to improve golf as a sport and take it to another level.
“There’s been a lot of tension in our sport over the last couple of years,” Monahan said in a chat with CNBC. “What we’re talking about today is coming together to unify the game of golf and to do so under one umbrella.”
The details of the merger are still being worked out, but the tours said it will result in a “new, collectively owned, for-profit entity to ensure that all stakeholders benefit from a model that delivers maximum excitement and competition among the game’s best players.”
