Bryson DeChambeau’s LIV Golf statement reflects badly on PGA Tour

Bryson DeChambeau has paid tribute to LIV Golf for making him a better golfer and healthier person since defecting from the PGA Tour.

DeChambeau joined LIV Golf in June 2022 after the Saudi Arabian-backed breakaway organization ripped golf in two as the PGA Tour saw a host of their top players brave the media and supporter backlash to pursue a new challenge.

The 30-year-old explained how the switch to LIV Golf had transformed his reputation into one of a villain by joining the breakaway organization. But it gave him the chance to escape and reset. “It would have been impossible for me to have come this far again without LIV,” DeChambeau told the Telegraph.

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“It gave me the time to get healthy and develop. I came to LIV and suddenly there were players in the same boat as me. Because they were getting stick as well – not from the LIV fans but seemingly everywhere else. I was not alone in being disliked and could share these feelings with my team-mates and my colleagues.

“But slowly that has changed and whether it was the thing with the PGA Tour [the ‘framework agreement’] people are coming around to what we are all about. It’s about moving an inch and ideating a mile. We have come a long way and we continue to move progressively in small incremental amounts. It’s just going to domino at some point.”

As well as dealing with any backlash, DeChambeau went through a life-changing moment when his dad Jon DeChambeau, a former PGA Tour pro, died at the age of 63 due to complications with diabetes just before joining LIV. The U.S. Open champion added: “When my father passed, as it is for everyone, that was a huge deal to me and I started to realise the eminence of life like, at some point, it’s all going to end,” he said “So yeah, you’ve got to be gracious with the time you have.

“You know, I’m always going to be a person that wears my emotions on my sleeve and yeah, I try to continue to do better with that. It made me see that at some point in time, you have to be ok with failing and messing up and you can laugh at yourself once in a while. There’s more important things.”

DeChambeau won his second major in June when he lifted the U.S. Open for the second time after a final-hole victory over Rory McIlroy. An emotional DeChambeau paid tribute to his late father, dedicating the trophy to his dad. “First off, I wanna say Happy Father’s Day to every father out there,” DeChambeau said. “Unfortunately, my dad passed [away] a couple years ago, and this one’s for him.”