LIV Golf star on verge of axe had to own up after Dustin Johnson statement

After the LIV event in Adelaide last year, it was alleged that Johnson had said: “We [LIV Golf ] don’t give a damn how he [Monahan] feels. We know how he feels about us, so it’s mutual.”

Johnson then had to issue a statement claiming he did not say those comments and that he still holds a huge amount of respect for Monahan. Soon after, Perez had to own up and make it clear that he and he alone made those comments.

While speaking to Sports Illustrated, Perez admitted: “DJ said nothing, it was all me. I said we don’t care what Jay thinks cause we know how he feels about us and when I say WE, I mean me. I can’t speak for the whole group.”

As well as making headlines for the wrong reasons with his comments, Perez’s campaign has been a real struggle both personally and for his 4Aces team. They are currently languishing in ninth position in the overall rankings.

To make matters even worse for him, Perez is now in 47th place in the leader board and is flirting with the drop zone. With three games left to play, the 48-year-old is in serious danger of dropping out of the lucrative series.

His performance at LIV Nashville, which saw him finish joint 14th at the event, has managed to give him some much-needed breathing space from the relegation spots, heading into the final three events in Spain, the UK and West Virginia. However, his comments about Woods may have piled more unneeded pressure and attention on him at a crucial time.

The 15-time Major winner criticised the competitive spirit and ‘incentive’ of the LIV setup due to its generous pay-outs for players who finish in the lower echelons of the leader board. Perez furiously responded: “That’s the stupidest **** I have ever heard of in my life. That’s one of the stupidest things I think he has said,” he vented on the Son of a Butch podcast.

“The incentive is the fact that last place is $120,000, first place is $4million. You cannot win $4million on the PGA Tour. Now, next year you might; they finally got the perks. But last time I checked, he signed a $40million deal right out of college and was flying on the Nike jet. He found incentive. He could have shut it down right then. He had a lot of guarantees. You know what, and he was the hottest thing.

“He’s made so much money off the course, he found incentive to go. But again, he only played how many tournaments. He didn’t go – I never saw him at John Deere, never saw him supporting all these events. He played in the majors, he played in the WGCs and that was it.”

Join our new WhatsApp community and receive your daily dose of Mirror Football content. We also treat our community members to special offers, promotions, and adverts from us and our partners. If you don’t like our community, you can check out any time you like. If you’re curious, you can read our Privacy Notice.