By:
James Colgan
November 15, 2022
Even by Rory’s open-book requirements, Tuesday was candid.
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Even by Rory McIlroy’s notoriously clear requirements, Tuesday’s press convention on the DP World Tour Championship certified as an outlier.
There have been so some ways for McIlroy to reply the query. What do golf’s warring excursions — the PGA Tour and LIV — want to search out peace? He may have answered diplomatically about charting a path ahead. He may have bandied about optimistically about the way forward for the sport and golf’s youngest crop of expertise. He may have carried the corporate line on the significance of unity and the scourge of greed. However the four-time main champ didn’t try this.
No, as an alternative, he went for the pinnacle.
“So I feel there’s a number of issues that have to occur,” he mentioned. “So there’s clearly two lawsuits occurring on the minute, there’s PGA Tour versus LIV and there’s this one which’s developing with the DP World Tour in February. Nothing will occur if these two issues are nonetheless occurring. You’re restricted in what you are able to do.”
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“I feel Greg [Norman] must go. I feel he simply must exit stage left,” McIlroy mentioned. “He’s made his mark however I feel now’s the appropriate time to type of say, look, you’ve acquired this factor off the bottom however nobody goes to speak until there’s an grownup within the room that may truly attempt to mend fences.”
Exit stage left.
Even for McIlroy, who has lengthy been one in all Norman and LIV’s most vocal critics, the feedback mark a shocking rebuke. His criticism of Norman speaks to the rift the LIV CEO has fashioned with the remainder of skilled golf, and to animus stoked by Norman on each side of the LIV Golf debate.
Rory McIlroy requires Greg Norman to depart LIV Golf (!) for the nice of the game:”I feel Greg must go. I feel he simply must exit stage left.” pic.twitter.com/nVuMmOI98J— James Colgan (@jamescolgan26) November 15, 2022
“If these two issues occur, then issues can occur,” he mentioned. “However proper now, it’s a stalemate as a result of there can’t be another manner.”
Norman, for his half, has seen his keep atop golf’s Saudi-backed tour fall into uncertainty in latest weeks. Studies have advised LIV’s high backer, Saudi Golf Federation head Yasir Al-Ramayyan, is contemplating different choices to guide the tour, together with former TaylorMade CEO Mark King. (LIV has denied these studies.)
The previous main champ and present face of LIV has been motivated by what some have referred to as a “private vendetta” in opposition to the PGA Tour stemming again to his enjoying days. Norman’s mocking of PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan in LIV’s earliest days — and LIV’s subsequent lawsuits in opposition to the Tour — solely additional entrenched the divide.
Norman’s tone has softened some just lately. He has taken time in a number of of his latest press conferences to foyer for peace on this planet of professional golf, stressing that LIV doesn’t want to destroy the PGA Tour.
“We’re right here for the sport of golf,” he mentioned Monday. “We’re right here for the betterment of the sport of golf. We’re the power for good within the sport of golf. “
However his phrases solely journey to date with no shift in his tour’s outwardly hostile strategy — a shift that might be welcomed by lots of his tour’s personal gamers.
“Hopefully one thing can occur, who is aware of?” McIlroy echoed. “However proper now, I feel the separate entities the PGA Tour, European Tour and LIV are each going to be — one is a really totally different product to the opposite. It looks like it’s a little bit of a stalemate.”
There are various paths ahead for the way forward for skilled golf. For Rory McIlroy and undoubtedly many others on the PGA Tour aspect, although, there is just one path to peace.
Right here’s a touch: it doesn’t contain Greg Norman.
James Colgan
Golf.com Editor
James Colgan is an assistant editor at GOLF, contributing tales for the web site and journal. He writes the Sizzling Mic, GOLF’s weekly media column, and makes use of his broadcast expertise throughout the model’s social media and video platforms. A 2019 graduate of Syracuse College, James — and evidently, his golf sport — remains to be defrosting from 4 years within the snow. Previous to becoming a member of GOLF, James was a caddie scholarship recipient (and astute looper) on Lengthy Island, the place he’s from. He might be reached at [email protected]