11/03/2026 11:18:00
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11/03 11:16 CST Rahm says he would be willing to pay the same price as Koepka.
Still missing is a PGA Tour offer
Rahm says he would be willing to pay the same price as Koepka. Still missing is
a PGA Tour offer
By DOUG FERGUSON
AP Golf Writer
Jon Rahm can only hope peaceful times are ahead, except it's not that simple.
He lives in Arizona and for now is planning a schedule of tournaments that are
between seven and 11 time zones away from home. Rahm said Tuesday he is willing
to pay the same penalties as Brooks Koepka when he returned to the PGA Tour
from LIV, only he doesn't know if he'll get that offer.
"I really don't know what 2027 is going to look like for me," he said.
The Spaniard has resurfaced this week in the United Arab Emirates for the
two-week conclusion to the European tour season. This is his first tournament
in nearly two months, following two significant moments that had been weighing
on him.
At home, he filled out his own foursome when his wife gave birth to their
second daughter. Their fourth child, who they thought might arrive early,
instead came later than expected.
At work, Rahm filed for legal separation from LIV Golf, which still requires
formal approval from a bankruptcy judge later this week.
Rahm is giving up millions that was owed him from signing with the Saudi-funded
rival league at the end of a 2023 season filled with celebration and
controversy. He twice reached No. 1 in the world. He won the Masters. He was
unbeaten in another Ryder Cup victory for Team Europe.
But that image of Rahm in a Masters green jacket in April was overshadowed by
him posing in a black letterman's LIV jacket in December. It's hard to believe
that was three years ago.
Rahm has not won a major or anything else except for four LIV Golf titles since
defecting at a time when he was a serious threat to Scottie Scheffler. No one,
except for Rory McIlroy briefly, has been particularly close to No. 1 since
then.
And now it's time for Rahm to move forward, to put the pieces of his career
back together, all the while the road ahead is not entirely clear.
The PGA Tour has banned LIV players for one year since their last appearance,
which for Rahm was Aug. 23 when he finished second at LIV Golf Indianapolis.
Then again, the tour has been known to change its rules (see Koepka). For all
of Bryson DeChambeau's self-promoting, Rahm is the top LIV player the tour
should want back.
"I have yet to have a discussion with the PGA Tour to see if there's any path
back for next year," Rahm said in Abu Dhabi. "So I don't know, as of right now."
Until he gets any clarity, his plan is spend the entire year on the
commercially known DP World Tour. And he said he is looking forward to it.
Never mind that Rahm, who earned a PGA Tour card in just four tournaments after
he turned pro in 2016, has never played more than six regular European tour
events in a year. That was in 2019.
"Currently looking at the schedule to see how I can organize it to play the
events I want to play, maybe have a chance to have a bit of a different year to
what I have in the past," he said. "But I haven't really gone too deeply into
it just because there's still a question mark."
Koepka still had a year left on his LIV contract when he negotiated his way out
of it at end of 2025, and PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp quickly found a reentry for
the five-time major champion. It came with a cost, of course. Koepka has no
access to equity for five years. He had to pay $5 million to charity. And he
had to earn his way into signature events in order to play them (he didn't).
PGA Tour math put the penalty value at $50 million or more. Is that a price
Rahm is willing to pay?
"Most likely, yeah. Why not?" Rahm said. "But it's a big if. I seriously doubt
I get offered the same deal that Brooks did."
Rolapp made that clear in January when Koepka returned. He offered the same
deal to major champions from 2022 --- Rahm, DeChambeau and Cameron Smith. Saudi
cash was still filling LIV's coffers, with no indication that was going to
stop, and no one took the bait.
Rolapp has been guided by what makes the PGA Tour better. Having Rahm on the
roster would do that. He also has to answer to players still "butt-hurt" ---
McIlroy's words --- over defectors who took the absurd amounts of money they
turned down to stay loyal.
Rolapp never said the January offer to Rahm and others would be off the table,
rather "there is no promise that this path will be available again."
"Obviously Brooks was able to go back through certain circumstances. I don't
know if the possibility of that would be open for me or not," Rahm said. "But
if I have to fulfill a one-year suspension, I think it's a pretty good position
to be that a worst-case scenario I get to play on a wonderful tour for a whole
year."
That would mean playing more than six regular tournaments to go along with the
four majors.
The European tour starts in the Middle East for a month, Africa the next month,
Asia in the spring wrapped around the Masters and then continental Europe from
May through September.
It's the road more traveled. But based on what he saw from LIV 2.0, it beats
the alternative.
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