PLAYER SPOTLIGHTS<\/p>\n
Ian Poulter: Poulter narrowly avoided the Drop Zone last season, making some clutch birdies at Chatham Hills to sneak into the Open Zone. This year, Poulter will need to get off to a much better start to the season to steer clear of the relegation drama. With LIV Golf\u2019s roster improved from last season, things won\u2019t get any easier for the 50-year-old.<\/p>\n
Lee Westwood:\u00a0Westwood outperformed both Stenson and Poulter last year, but not by much. The veteran can still hang with most of the league when he\u2019s in form but he\u2019ll need to find that form more often in 2026. The pressure is on for the Majesticks, and Westwood will need to perform.<\/p>\n
Sam Horsfield:\u00a0Horsfield is the youngest player on the Majesticks and they\u2019ll need to rely on a bounce-back year from him if the team is to improve in 2026. He made a few starts in the offseason but is still searching for some positive results. Horsfield may be the X-factor for the Majesticks going forward.<\/p>\n
Laurie Canter: Canter now joins the Majesticks as the clear best player on the team. The upgrade will certainly help the team, but Canter will have to have an exceptional season for the team to significantly improve. He\u2019s still in his prime and has the upside to finish in the top 20 of the LIV Golf standings.\u00a0<\/p>\n
WHAT THE STATS SUGGEST<\/p>\n
Last year, the Majesticks were the most accurate team in the league off the tee, hitting 62.1% of their fairways. The accurate but short recipe did not work well for the team but the addition of Canter should help a bit.\u00a0<\/p>\n
WHERE CAN THEY IMPROVE?<\/p>\n
The Majesticks ranked 10th or worse in every major statistical category with the exception of driving accuracy. They ranked last in the league in birdies and second-to-last in driving distance and putting. The clearest path for improvement for the Majesticks is with their flat sticks. It isn\u2019t realistic to expect them to drive it as far as the other teams in the league, but a hot putting season would go a long way towards a better year in 2026.\u00a0<\/p>\n
KEY QUOTES<\/p>\n
Ian Poulter on avoiding relegation in 2026:\u00a0\u201cI don’t want to be in that relegation position come the end of August, and obviously unfortunately there will be a few guys, and I don’t want to be one of them.”<\/p>\n
Ian Poulter on LIV Golf\u2019s quest for OWGR points: “I think the league has done an amazing job to structure things in the right way to put pressure on OWGR points. We’ve ticked pretty much every single box. I don’t know what else is going to be left.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lee Westwood on the Majesticks\u2019 rebrand:\u00a0\u201cIt feels very fresh. There has been a few changes with personnel and equipment. I think we’ve all been working hard during the offseason, so we’re all looking forward to getting going in Riyadh and getting off to a fast start for the year because the first seven weeks of the year there’s five events there.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
BOTTOM LINE<\/p>\n
The addition of Canter undoubtedly makes the team more competitive, but by just how much? The Majesticks will need a lot more production from their aging co-captains if they are to make a meaningful move in the standings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PLAYER SPOTLIGHTS Ian Poulter: Poulter narrowly avoided the Drop Zone last season, making some clutch birdies at Chatham…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":447263,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[443],"tags":[49,48,622,82],"class_list":["post-447262","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-golf","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/447262","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=447262"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/447262\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/447263"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=447262"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=447262"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=447262"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}