![\"LIV](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/GettyImages-2227004213-e1755191663264.jpg\")
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tGetty\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
Ian Poulter is in danger of being relegated from LIV despite being one of its first players. <\/p>\n
The next couple of months could be particularly unpleasant for former European Ryder Cup star<\/a> and LIV Golf renegade Ian Poulter<\/a>.<\/p>\n The Englishman, who reached as high as No. 5 in the world at the peak of his powers, is now in risk of being relegated<\/a> from LIV. A poor showing at the tour\u2019s regular-season finale in Indianapolis could leave the 49-year-old without a golf home in 2026.<\/p>\n Ian Poulter Needs Huge Rebound to Avoid LIV Relegation<\/p>\n For Poulter, it\u2019s simple. LIV\u2019s rules, at least for now<\/a>, state that players who finish 49th or below in the points are relegated from the league for the upcoming season. Poulter currently finds himself No. 52 on the list, sandwiched between golf giants like Luis Masaveau and Yubin Jang. Adding to the potential embarrassment is the fact that Masaveu is a reserve player, meaning he doesn\u2019t have a team and doesn\u2019t get nearly as many starts.<\/p>\n What that means for Poulter this week, is that he has to at least finish 24th in the individual competition in order to gain points in an attempt to rid himself from the aptly named \u201cdrop zone.\u201d<\/p>\n As it stands right now, Poulter is a full point out from safety, so he\u2019d have to get on his horse and maybe get some help with just one point up for grabs for Nos. 21 through 24 in a single tournament. The odds are not great. Poulter has just one finish inside the top 30 this season.<\/p>\n He\u2019s not alone, either. Poulter\u2019s team, the Majesticks, has three co-captains. The 2016 Open Championship winner Henrik Stenson is barely safe, for now, and he could be in risk of falling out of the safe zone. The same could be said for Lee Westwood, although he\u2019s probably safe.<\/p>\n Another Ryder Cup Without Poulter<\/p>\n Adding to Poulter\u2019s golf misery is the looming Ryder Cup. His longtime European comrades once again will go into battle without Poulter, one of the greatest players in the competition\u2019s storied history. Just two years ago, Golf.com put Poulter on its list of best Ryder Cup players in history<\/a> alongside the likes of Seve Ballesteros and Arnold Palmer.<\/p>\n Golf.com writer Josh Sens even made this point about Poulter vs. Tiger Woods, and quite frankly, it\u2019s hard to argue:<\/p>\n \u201cIf you were a team captain, rounding out your roster,\u201d Sens wrote in 2023, \u201cwould you take Poulter or Tiger Woods? It speaks to the uniqueness of the Ryder Cup that every stat would point you toward the Englishman, who frightened almost no one in PGA Tour events but, when it came to biennial match play, was born to be a thorn in the Americans\u2019 side.\u201d<\/p>\n Yet, Poulter\u2019s decision to leave the PGA Tour to join LIV has cost him at least two Ryder Cup playing opportunities. After making six teams between 2004 and 2018, Poulter has just one appearance (2021) in the last few years. When he left the Tour for LIV in 2022, the loss of world ranking points hurt his ability to get in as an automatic qualifier, and he simply hasn\u2019t performed well enough to warrant a captain\u2019s pick, despite his historic resume.<\/p>\n Poulter Relegation Could Be Major Blow for LIV<\/p>\n In a vacuum, Poulter\u2019s absence from full-time status on LIV wouldn\u2019t affect the tour much if at all. However, if he were to be relegated, he would become the highest-profile player to suffer that fate, a distinction even more pronounced by his status as one of the original LIV defectors. Having to send him packing over poor play wouldn\u2019t be the greatest reflection of the league\u2019s competition.<\/p>\n Poulter did quite all right for himself in the process, though. Reports indicated the Saudi-backed league gave Poulter up to $30 million to join the league. Poulter also scooped up an additional $10 million in on-course earnings over the last few years, so it\u2019s a pretty good consolation prize for an eventual banishment to golf Siberia.<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tMike Cole<\/a> Mike Cole covers golf as well as the Baltimore Ravens and Tennessee Titans for Heavy.com. He previously worked at NESN where he covered Boston sports (and much more) for 15 years. More about Mike Cole<\/a>\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\tMore Heavy on Golf\n\t\t<\/p>\n \n\t\t\t\tLoading more stories\n\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Getty Ian Poulter is in danger of being relegated from LIV despite being one of its first players.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":68164,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[566],"tags":[64,63,755,85],"class_list":["post-68163","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-golf","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68163","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68163"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68163\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}