Rory McIlroy Focused on His Game, Not the PGA Tour/LIV Golf Battle: 'I'm Done Trying to Change People's Minds'
PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. — Rory McIlroy no longer has a night job and is totally focused on his day gig: his golf game.
The Ulsterman's night job was a position as one of the four PGA Tour policy board playing members that, as the minority of the board, had a say over competition issues but not any of the business issues. Those were left to the five non-playing members of the board.
For almost two years McIlroy provided advice and seemingly drank the Kool-Aid of the PGA Tour and its fight against LIV Golf, at times being essentially the Tour's spokesperson against the Saudi-backed circuit.
When it became clear he would not be able to create the changes he’d hoped for, McIlroy resigned his position and became a full-time golfer again.
Rory McIlroy won two weeks ago in Dubai on the DP World Tour.
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Now he is free to express his unvarnished opinions and provide advice about the world of professional golf.
“I just didn't feel like I could influence things the way I wanted to, and I felt like I was just banging my head against the wall and it was time for me to step off and kind of concentrate on my own stuff," McIlroy said.
Today McIlroy is not only playing better golf, having just won two weeks ago in Dubai after a disappointing finish the week before where he entered the final round one shot off the lead of Tommy Fleetwood and lost by a stroke.
While no longer involved in board discussions, McIlroy is also advising his friends from a viewpoint he didn’t have just a year ago.
Both Jon Rahm and Tyrrell Hatton talked with McIlroy before jumping to LIV Golf.
“I said to him just like I said to Jon, like I'm totally supportive of your decision if that's what you feel is the right thing for you,” McIlroy said of advice offered to Hatton in Dubai. “Look, these are guys that I've spent a lot of time with, and I guess I've said this before, but I've come to the realization I'm not here to change people's minds, I'm here to just try—especially when I was at the board level, trying to give them the full picture of where things are at and hopefully where things are going to go. They can do with that information what they want.”
McIlroy understands that LIV and the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia are no longer the enemy but potentially friends, depending on where negotiations go.
“At the end of the day I think I'm done with trying to change people's minds and trying to get them to see things a certain way or try to see things through my lens because that's ultimately not the way the world works,” McIlroy said. “You know, these are guys that I respect and that I've spent a lot of time with and if that's what they feel is the best decision for them, then I'm going to, you know, be supportive of that decision and let them go and do their own thing.”
McIlroy knows that over the last three years a lot of mistakes have been made, money wasted, and uneducated answers offered to complex problems.
He even understands that when the players got together on Aug. 16, 2022, for a player-only meeting that mistakes were made.
The meeting in Wilmington, Del., was the first where the players finally got a say in the decision-making process of the Tour, and to stave off the talent drain to LIV Golf, the players recommended stronger events with larger purses.
McIlroy looks back and sees that day as when the players put the Tour on an unsustainable path that was not viable financially.
The purse growth forced the Tour to go after additional money from sponsors, tournaments and networks to pay larger purses, but providing nothing additional in return.
Now an investor in the Strategic Sports Group appears close to signing a deal with the Tour and infusing up to $3 billion, the question that many have, including McIlroy, is what are they buying and how will they get a return on this investment?
“I just hope they get it done,” McIlroy said. “I know that they were supposed to vote on it Sunday night and there was a delay, they were supposed to vote on it last night and there was a delay. I feel like this thing could have been over and done with months ago. I think just for all of our sakes that the sooner that we sort of get out of it and we have a path forward, the better.”
