Phil Mickelson on Saturday during the LIV Golf event in Nashville.
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Phil Mickelson, a six-time major winner and golf hall of famer, believes he will be best remembered for LIV Golf, the controversial tour that has been in the news for the past two years.
We are talking this week on Fairway to Heaven On the podcast, LIV’s golf-backed show, Mickelson was answering a question from co-host Jerry Foltz about the legacy. Significantly, after the answer, Foltz then asked the same question.
For clarity, below is the first exchange, initiated by Foltz:
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“I did a recent podcast in Houston — I think you saw a clip of it — with a guy named Will Kunkel. Great questions he asked, nothing was out of line,” Foltz said on the podcast. “And he asked me: What are Phil Mickelson’s — what are they going to be? his flowers at his funeral? What will your legacy be when all is said and done? WHAT DO YOU THINK?”
“Well, I mean I think about LIV Golf,” Mickelson said, “and helping the game reach a younger crowd, helping the game reach the younger players and giving them the infrastructure to be good, help grow the game globally. Like, all the things made by LIV Golf. I feel very connected to the success.”
Undoubtedly, LIV Golf has had an impact on professional golf. The headlines seemed innumerable. In 2022, LIV, providing guaranteed money after billions of Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund (PIF), was launched, and players from the PGA Tour, an established brand, were arrested. A year later, the Tour and the PIF shook hands on a sponsorship arrangement. But the sides are still talking – and in January, the Tour took another deal, from a group of professional sports owners who call themselves the Strategic Sports Group. Notably over the past two years, the Tour has made several changes to entice its pros to stay – among them, player parity and “signing events” that feature limited fields and large purses – while LIV plays with 54 players, undecided. fields.
The questions are still there. Will the tours stay separate? Will more Tour pros join LIV? Can the parties meet? What does integration look like? Progress on an agreement between the PIF and the Tour has been made, the Tour said, but details have been scarce.
For Mickelson’s part, he has been one of the PGA Tour’s biggest stars, thanks to big wins and a devil-may-care style of play. But, in an interview published in early 2022, while discussing the benefits of the yet-to-be-launched LIV league, he also commented on Saudi finances, and has been among the experts playing with LIV since its inception.
You are Fairway to Heaven podcast, after Mickelson’s initial response to a question about his legacy, Foltz asked this:
“You think [LIV Golf] will it be your eternal inheritance?”
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Mickelson said yes.
“I hope so,” he said on the podcast, “because it wasn’t an option – like the top events and the equity on the tour wasn’t an option for the guys who came to LIV. And then the fact that we’re invested and involved and integrated into the success of LIV – and I’m happy for the guys on Tour that now they have all those things because they have to.
“But where we are, we attract a different crowd. And we attract a global crowd. And that’s important to the long-term success of the game. And it’s something that the old model of the Tour couldn’t go through because you couldn’t get all the guys from the world to go play there and also attract non-golfers to want to watch it. So I think that LIV Golf does that and I hope that my association with LIV and I hope that the success of LIV will be what I am known for. “
Editor’s note: To listen to the entire Fairway to Heaven podcast with Mickelson, please click here.
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