“You have 3 of the 4 Majors in the US” - Jon Rahm talks about LIV Golf’s global objective and entertaining ‘golf hungry’ crowd
Jon Rahm is all in for golf growing to become a global sport. That has been part of the mission of LIV Golf, the tour he recently joined. They have tried to play in locations that Major tournaments often do not go to, and the Spaniard believes this is positive for the sport at large.
Via the Howie Games podcast, Rahm opened up about the sport's global aspirations:
“I think it’s one of the big objectives of LIV Golf, playing golf in places that we haven’t played before. It’s very simple. There’s a lot of golf communities that deserve a bigger level of golf that they never got to see."
He continued:
"I mean, you have 3 of the 4 Majors in the US. And before you had WGC’s, some of them were outside, but for the most part you’re playing in some countries in Europe and the US, you never really get out of that."
He said for golf fans and players to be able to enjoy Saudi Arabia, Hong Kong, Adelaide, Singapore and other places is "amazing" and added:
"You expose golf to a crowd that maybe hasn’t seen it before or a crowd that is hungry for golf.”
What the future of golf holds is anyone's guess right now, but the prevailing sentiment for a lot of people is that it should have a much more global focus than it does right now.
Jon Rahm's global vision for golf is shared widely
Jon Rahm isn't the only one who likes this trend in golf. Cameron Smith cited the ability to play in his home country of Australia, where both he and CEO Greg Norman are from, as a big reason for his transition from the PGA Tour.
On the other side of things, Rory McIlroy has also expressed that he wants the sport to get more globally inclined. He said via Golfweek:
“I think you would just create a tour for the top 80 players in the world. Everything sort of feeds up into that one. You know, the way I look at it, it would be like Champions League in European football. It sort of sits above the rest of the leagues and then all those leagues sort of feed up into that and the best of the best play against each other in the Champions League is the way I would think about it.”
Mcllroy envisions a global tour with the 80 best players in the world which would allow them all to compete against one another in high-level competitions. It's sort of like what the Majors do, but it would be a lot more streamlined and have a lot more accessibility.
This is another sentiment that Jon Rahm himself has shared. He recently admitted that he would like to come back to play against his old tour mates, and he's interested in playing certain PGA Tour events again. Mostly, he wants to see the world's best compete regardless of the tour.