LPGA Commissioner Mollie Marcoux Says She Would ‘Engage in Conversation’ with LIV

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While the PGA Tour is competing against LIV Golf, the Ladies Professional Golf Association would at least consider doing business with the Saudi Arabia-backed league, LPGA commissioner Mollie Marcoux Samaan said Saturday.

“It’s my responsibility to evaluate every opportunity,” Marcoux Samaan told Cathy Harris of the London Times (h/t Beth Ann Nichols of Golfweek). “I would engage in a conversation if it would achieve our aim of promoting women’s golf, but there needs to be input from players and sponsors. There’s a lot of factors to consider before we do business with LIV Golf.”

Marcoux Samaan’s comments come after LIV Golf CEO Greg Norman told the Palm Beach Post (h/t Golfweek) that he was “100 percent confident” about starting a women’s golf league.

“We have discussed it internally, the opportunity is there,” Norman said. “Aramco is already the largest sponsor of women’s golf in the world. Aramco, a Saudi company.”

Aramco, a Saudi oil company, sponsors six events on the Ladies European Tour with prize money totaling $6 million.

A number of top players on the PGA Tour have already joined the LIV Golf Invitational Series. The breakaway circuit has offered some players more than $100 million to move on from the PGA Tour, and the league’s purse sizes, with the winner of each event receiving $4 million, have also been enticing.

As for the women’s game, 20-time LPGA Tour winner Cristie Kerr said last month that “almost the entire tour” would make the jump to LIV Golf if it were in a similar situation to the men’s game.