There could be an exodus of LIV Golf players in 2027 – but these former stars are already closing on PGA Tour moves…

It’s now seven months since Patrick Reed walked out on LIV Golf and several of the league’s other former players are now queueing up behind the American in the race for the PGA Tour.

Reed will make an imminent return at the US circuit’s upcoming Fall Series after he was suspended for 12 months following the date of his final LIV start last August. Reed has spent the intervening months enjoying time on the DP World Tour and building up a lead at the summit of the Race to Dubai standings.

He is soon going to return across the Atlantic for a long stint in Europe as he attempts to pull clear from Rory McIlroy in his bid to win the season-long crown in November. The prospect of a winter showdown between Reed and McIlroy – who is chasing a record-equalling eighth Order of Merit title – in the Middle East is tantalizing.

Reed, meanwhile, has already done enough with wins in Dubai and Qatar to secure one of the 10 PGA Tour cards offered to non-exempt players on the DP World Tour. He will be reunited on his former domain next season with Brooks Koepka, who described his own return to the circuit as “pathetic” after the five-time major champion failed to make it to the FedEx Cup Playoffs.

It is unclear whether other high-profile LIV players will follow Koepka to the PGA Tour at the end of the season – and if indeed there is a pathway to do so. When Bryson DeChambeau and Jon Rahm turned down an offer to rejoin the circuit via the contrived Returning Members Program which facilitated Koepka’s return, the Saudi Public Investment Fund was still committed to the league.

DeChambeau has outlined an idealist wish to play on both LIV and the PGA Tour, while Rahm has stayed conspicuously quiet over his own future as the beleaguered league battles for survival.

Elsewhere, though, a handful of players who once resided on the lucrative LIV series are closing in on meritocratic routes to the US circuit. Behind Reed and McIlroy in the Race to Dubai is Eugenio Chacarra, the Spaniard who joined LIV as an amateur an left three years later citing his wish to fulfil his childhood dreams of winning majors and Ryder Cups.

In an interview with TG in May, Chacarra boldly outlined his desire to become the best player in the world. Since then, he won back-to-back DP World Tour events in the Netherlands and Italy and is poised to challenge Reed and McIlroy for the Race to Dubai title.

An eclectic mix of players currently hold the other eight cards as we reach the final months of the season. Bernd Wiesberger, the resurgent former European Ryder Cup player who won for the first time in almost five years at the Volvo China Open, could become the latest former LIV man to head Stateside.

The Austrian told TG that “the rhythm of my seasons was cut a little bit by going to LIV” and he has rebuilt his career after his contract expired at the end of the 2023 season following a series of poor performance. Wiesberger, 40, gave the impression he is content in Europe, but will have a decision to make if he is still clinging on to one of those golden tickets come November.

Like Wiesberger, tour veterans Shaun Norris and Hennie Du Plessis would not face any kind of suspension if they progress to the PGA Tour, despite their LIV past. The South African duo played in the league’s inaugural tournament at the Centurion Club near London in 2022.

Du Plessis earned over $3 million in Hemel Hempstead – $2.4 million for finishing second behind Charl Schwartzel and an extra $750,000 in team earnings. Both Du Plessis and Norris, however, only lasted one season as LIV players.

They have both had impressive seasons in Europe and could be part of a South African takeover on the PGA Tour in 2027, with young talents Casey Jarvis and Jayden Schaper also occupying the positions to secure cards next season. The race for the 10 cards, as ever, will be an intriguing subplot as we approach the DP World Tour’s thrilling autumn period.

But the fascination around new names on the PGA Tour will understandably focus on those superstars with uncertain futures at LIV Golf.