LIV Golfers Are Set for the 2023 Masters, but Future Majors Aren’t Guaranteed
Fred Ridley took the high road, leaving the qualification criteria for the 2023 Masters in place, assuring that all who earned an invitation through various means since Scottie Scheffler slipped into the green jacket will be at Augusta National in April.
But that road is not without twists and turns as it applies to those who jumped to the LIV Golf League. Ridley’s words suggest they in no way should feel secure about their standing in the Masters—or any of the major championships—beyond the coming year.
While never mentioning LIV by name, Ridley made it clear he’s not thrilled with the current landscape created by LIV Golf’s disruption. The Masters chairman joined the leaders of the other majors—two have been played since LIV Golf launched—who expressed their own concerns in different ways.
When you start a sentence with “regrettably” and go on to say that the divide has “diminished the virtues of the game,” that’s clearly not an endorsement of the current path, however clear he made it for 2023.
The Masters was never going to change its criteria for the upcoming tournament. As Ridley noted, the year’s first major almost always announces any changes to its structure at the chairman’s pretournament news conference. And the fact that its traditions include inviting past champions for life, it is difficult to envision the likes of Phil Mickelson, Dustin Johnson, Bubba Watson and Sergio Garcia not being afforded that unique status until they can no longer make it down Magnolia Lane.
But that doesn’t mean Ridley or the Masters has to keep in place its other invitation criteria, which have changed numerous times since the tournament’s inception in 1934.
For example, it can increase or decrease the number of players who qualify (now the top 12 and ties) from the previous year's tournament. It is not obligated to give spots to high finishers in other major championships, a category that will mean Brooks Koepka and Bryson DeChambeau will see their invitations in the mailbox soon.
And it doesn't have to use the Official World Golf Ranking as a criteria at all, the one that saw the likes of Abraham Ancer, Kevin Na and Louis Oosthuizen dreaming of Masters glory.
Perhaps one of the biggest issues to face LIV Golf after months of lobbying following its application for OWGR points is whether the upstart league will get them. It’s become such a huge talking point because the OWGR is governed by the very majors—as well as the PGA Tour and DP World Tour—that are seemingly trying to keep them out, or at least making it harder.
If you eliminate the OWGR as qualifying criteria, then what?
Despite pleas from LIV Golf supporters that the majors will “do right” and create an exemption category for LIV, there is no guarantee that will happen. The three U.S.-based majors have all been very U.S.-centric (i.e., PGA Tour) for a majority of their existence.
For example, while the Masters invites PGA Tour winners and those who qualify for the season-ending Tour Championship by finishing among the top 30 in FedEx Cup points (LIV golfer Talor Gooch made it this way despite being ineligible for any of the playoff events), it has never afforded spots in such a way to the European Tour (now DP World Tour).
So you think it will carve out spots from a LIV Golf points list? Seems highly unlikely.
The other majors also have criteria that skew toward the PGA Tour. The PGA Championship keeps a yearlong PGA points list from the week prior to the PGA of one year until two weeks before its championship—based on PGA Tour play. Winners also get in. There is no such category for the DP World Tour or any other Tour.
Aside from spots earned in other majors, the PGA of America then invites players “at its discretion”—typically via the OWGR. In its recent past, it has strived to have every player from the top 100 in the world. If it wants to keep its status as the deepest of the major fields, it will continued to do that, even if it means inviting LIV golfers who are in that category. But is under no obligation. It can simply go off its points list as far down as it deems necessary, which means a LIV player could be left out.
The U.S. Open and the British Open each invite the leading money winners from various tours such as the Sunshine Tour, Australasian Tour and the Japan Tour. The U.S. Open invites the top money earner from the Asian Tour; the Open rescinded that stipulation for 2023.
Both invite the top 30 from the previous year’s FedEx Cup list, and both the U.S. Open and British Open provide avenues via the DP World Tour. Would they add one for LIV Golf? If their attitude about the circuit remains as it is, that doesn’t seem likely.
The easiest way for the major championships to deal with LIV Golf has always been to do nothing. Invite players as you’ve always invited them. Allow the world rankings to help you establish your fields. Let the system play out.
This has always been the Tour’s fight—both the PGA and DP World—because both see a threat to their product and a breaking of their membership rules. The PGA Tour took strict and harsh action, suspending all who participated in a LIV event and now revoking membership. The DP World Tour has a February court date that will determine whether it can keep LIV golfers from its circuit.
The majors have no such allegiance. And even if they absolutely hate what is going on with LIV Golf, do they really want to diminish their own tournaments to keep players out?
There’s no guarantee players would get in, anyway. Even if LIV Golf gets world ranking points, a 48-player field in the current landscape of points allocations is not going to allow for easy access to the top 50 in the world. Points for a LIV Golf event would be no more than half of what the winner of a PGA Tour event receives, probably less.
“We have reached a seminal point in the history of our sport,” Ridley said. “At Augusta National, we have faith that golf, which has overcome many challenges through the years, will endure again.”
For LIV Golf, that doesn’t suggest a smooth road into the future.