Amid LIV Golf shutdown buzz, The Cardinal still planning to host

Is LIV Golf shutting down?

The buzz about the potential demise of LIV Golf reached a fever pitch last Wednesday, when Ryan French, a golf insider from Alpena, Mich., who runs the popular Monday Q Info account on X (formerly Twitter), reported a "bombshell announcement on LIV's future is imminent."

That quickly caught the attention of the national golf media, with reports surfacing about an imminent funding cutoff and an emergency staff meeting in New York City. All of that was coming out as LIV Golf was in Mexico City for a tournament, as reporters waited to see if tee times would be ever come out.

The tournament in Mexico City went on (Jon Rahm won), while O'Neil, who took over for Greg Norman as LIV Golf CEO in January 2025, spent much of his week trying to assure fans and league stakeholders that the tour is going nowhere, six tournaments into its 14-event schedule for 2026.

O'Neil, however, did not deny LIV Golf is in search of new and additional funding sources, amid reports that the PIF is ready to cut off LIV Golf.

LIV Golf launched in 2022 with the PIF's limitless financial support, as the league spent more $1 billion poaching some of the game's biggest stars from the PGA Tour, including Rahm, Bryson DeChambeau, Brooks Koepka, Phil Mickelson and Dustin Johnson. While in-person crowds have spiked significantly for many LIV Golf tournaments over the past couple of years, and while sponsorships have seen modest growth, TV ratings have been awful as the team element of LIV Golf has yet to catch on, and momentum on player addition has stalled big-time recently.

LIV Golf hasn't added a marquee name to its player roster since Rahm and Tyrrell Hatton joined in 2024, and this year, Koepka left his LIV Golf contract early and rejoined the PGA Tour (at a stiff financial penalty in the millions), and Patrick Reed left LIV Golf, to set up a return to the PGA Tour in 2027. There has been speculation that DeChambeau, by far LIV Golf's biggest star, is positioning an exit when his contract is up at the end of 2026.

Golf.com has report LIV Golf has suffered $1.1 billion in losses since the league launched in 2022.

In the months after LIV Golf launched, it proved a major disruptor to the pro golf tour landscape, and in June 2023, there were early talks about a potential merger with the PGA Tour, those conversations playing out while the Rocket Classic was taking place in Detroit. But the merger never materialized, as the PGA Tour forged ahead with its own changes, including larger prize purses, the introduction of a regular-season tournament hierarchy, and more player equity. The PGA Tour even hired its own new CEO, Brian Rolapp, who is in the process of rolling out plans for a new slimmed-down schedule that will see the best players in the world play against each other more often, perhaps as soon as soon as 2027, possibly signaling the end is near for tournaments like the Rocket.

While LIV Golf play at The Cardinal?

LIV Golf made its Michigan debut in August 2025, with The Cardinal, a new championship course on the grounds of Saint John's Resort, hosting the season-ending team championship.

The event was a huge success in terms of galleries, with an estimated 40,000 fans attending over the three days of competition. LIV Golf launched as a 54-hole tournament (hence, the LIV), but this year, it has expanded to a traditional 72 holes, in its ultimately successful effort to begin earning Official World Golf Ranking points.

The crowds and atmosphere at The Cardinal were starkly different than what had been seen weeks earlier at the PGA Tour's Rocket Classic at Detroit Golf Club, where galleries were their lowest in tournament (excluding the fanless 2020 COVID year). The Cardinal crowds were large, loud and, in many cases, lubed. There were pyrotechnics, constant music, post-round concerts and few dirty looks if you accidentally sneezed in a backswing.

Fans at The Cardinal were treated to an exciting finish, with Rahm and Hatton beating DeChambeau and Paul Casey in a two-hole sudden-death playoff, as Rahm's Legion XIII won the season championship and the $14-million first prize.

The tournament opened so many eyes, that many golf courses in the Metro Detroit area expressed interest in hosting a LIV Golf tournament if the tour decided to return to Michigan, but few of the courses could afford the hosting fee — believed to be at a cost in the $3 million range for 2025, and at least twice as much as 2026. Saint John's considers it a worthwhile marketing expense to fuel its bigger business (banquets, weddings, conferences, etc.). The Cardinal was announced in December as the host again for LIV Golf's team championship in 2026.

At the time, Kevin Doyle, chief operating officer of The Pulte Family Charitable Foundation, which is funded by the Saint John's revenues, said the 2026 LIV tournament will be "bigger and better" than 2025. Doyle declined to comment for this article amid the speculation and reports of LIV Golf's future.

The 2026 LIV Golf team championship is scheduled for Aug. 27-30. Tickets are on sale at LIVGolf.com.

Michigan pro golf schedule for 2026

▶ Dow Championship (LPGA): June 11-14, at Midland Country Club

▶ Meijer LPGA Classic: June 18-21, at Blythefield Country Club, Belmont

▶ Rocket Classic (PGA Tour): July 30-Aug. 2, at Detroit Golf Club

▶ U.S. Senior Women's Open: Aug. 20-23, at Barton Hills Country Club, Ann Arbor

▶ LIV Golf team championship: Aug. 27-30, at The Cardinal at Saint John's Resort, Plymouth Township

▶ Ally Challenge (PGA Tour Champions): Aug. 28-30, at Warwick Hills Golf & Country Club, Grand Blanc

tpaul@detroitnews.com

@tonypaul1984

This article originally appeared on The Detroit News: LIV Golf shutdown buzz isn't impacting Saint John's Resort's plans