ORLANDO, Fla. — Rory McIlroy says it\u2019s \u201ca shame\u201d that Jon Rahm is the only LIV Golf player unwilling to accept the terms of a DP World Tour deal to eliminate future fines, and he brushed off concerns the Spaniard might not be eligible for the Ryder Cup team.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Ryder Cup is bigger than any one person,\u201d McIlroy said Wednesday.<\/p>\n
Rahm\u2019s future in the matches was placed in doubt this week when he refused the terms of the European tour\u2019s offer — pay previous fines for not getting a release to play LIV Golf events, drop any appeals and add two tournaments to the minimum four required for DP World Tour membership.<\/p>\n
Rahm said at LIV Golf Hong Kong on Tuesday that the DP World Tour was \u201cextorting players\u201d by forcing them to play two additional tournaments. Rahm said if the deal was to pay fines, drop appeals and play the minimum four events, he would have signed.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just don\u2019t like the situation,\u201d Rahm said. \u201cI think we should be able to freely play where we want and have the choice to play where we want and not be dictated what we do.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tyrrell Hatton and seven other Europeans who play for Saudi-funded LIV Golf agreed to the conditions. The DP World Tour would help decide which tournaments to play in an effort to boost the tournaments on the schedule.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn my opinion, it\u2019s a really generous deal,\u201d McIlroy said, adding that it was \u201cmuch softer\u201d than what the PGA Tour required of Brooks Koepka to return.<\/p>\n
Koepka had to pay $5 million to charity, was ineligible for PGA Tour equity shares for five years and did not have access to FedEx Cup bonus money this year. He also could not play in the $20 million signature events unless he qualified.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe European tour can only do so much to accommodate these guys,\u201d McIlroy said. \u201cIf you want to play on the Ryder Cup, you have to be a member of the DP World Tour. … You have to abide by the rules and regulations.\u201d<\/p>\n
He said those rules meant being subject to fines if players don\u2019t get a release to play LIV Golf events when the DP World Tour has a tournament that week.<\/p>\n
The European deal would end the fines for LIV Golf players.<\/p>\n
\u201cLook, there\u2019s a reason eight of the nine guys took that deal, right?\u201d McIlroy said. \u201cI think it\u2019s a really good deal. Yeah, obviously Jon doesn\u2019t think so, and he\u2019s obviously well within his rights to think that way, but I just don\u2019t see what more the European tour can do to accommodate these guys to retain their membership.\u201d<\/p>\n
As for the DP World Tour having a say in which additional tournaments to play, McIlroy needled Rahm by saying, \u201cI\u2019m sure Jon doesn\u2019t want to go to South Africa next week\u201d for a LIV event.<\/p>\n
LIV players have to play every event on the schedule instead of going elsewhere — Graeme McDowell would not have been excused to play the Irish Open when LIV Golf played in Oregon the same week in 2022.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe signed a contract for LIV and he plays 14 events and the whole thing,\u201d McIlroy said. \u201cBut the DP World Tour is well within its rights to protect itself as a members organization and as a business. And if you asked any DP World Tour member about the deal that they have cut with the LIV guys, I think they would all say that it was pretty generous.<\/p>\n
\u201cAgain, there\u2019s a reason that eight of the nine took it, because they probably think the same thing. And one guy thinks a little differently, and that\u2019s a shame.\u201d<\/p>\n
McIlroy spoke at the Arnold Palmer Invitational on the same day Luke Donald was selected as European captain for the Ryder Cup a third straight time. Rahm has been on every Ryder Cup team since his debut in 2018.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s great to see the clarity amongst the other players that have signed the conditional releases and understand that they are available [for the Ryder Cup],\u201d Donald said. \u201cObviously, I haven\u2019t talked to Jon, so I don\u2019t really want to comment on that yet. I know he has his own reasons. But I look forward to catching up with him and really hope that he\u2019s available.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rahm\u2019s future with Europe, barring a change of mind, depends on a U.K. arbitration panel that is hearing his appeals. The panel in 2023 ruled in favor of the DP World Tour that it had the right to impose fines as a membership organization. If it rules in the tour\u2019s favor in the Rahm case, his membership — and Ryder Cup eligibility — would be at risk.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think we should all be grateful that we have a platform like the Ryder Cup that we can play on and that we can showcase our skills and be a part of something that\u2019s obviously way bigger than ourselves,\u201d McIlroy said. \u201cSo, at the end of the day, it\u2019s about the team, and no one player is bigger than the team.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ORLANDO, Fla. — Rory McIlroy says it\u2019s \u201ca shame\u201d that Jon Rahm is the only LIV Golf player…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":516248,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[443],"tags":[49,48,622,82],"class_list":["post-516247","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\/516247","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=516247"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/516247\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/516248"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=516247"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=516247"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=516247"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}