LOS ANGELES – The reporter couldn’t even finish the question.
“Are you tired of talking about it and—”
“Oh, I’m so sick of it,” Rory McIlroy said.
The Super League. The Saudis. The startling sums of cold, hard cash.
The whole thing.
Here McIlroy was on the eve of the Genesis Invitational, one of the elevated-status events on the PGA Tour. The tournament is being hosted by his boyhood idol, Tiger Woods, and carries a hefty $12 million purse. It's being held at Riviera, considered by most players as the best they play all year. And the stars have shown up, 19 of the top 25, creating the strongest field in six months.
And yet all seemingly anyone wanted to talk about was a breakaway circuit that, despite all of the rumors and speculation about an existential threat, remains nothing more than an ongoing recruiting effort.
Thus the frustration, the annoyance, the exasperation – at least for those siding with the Tour.
“We just want something to be said,” Collin Morikawa said. “We don’t know what’s going on. We’re all just hypothesizing and guessing – when’s this, when’s that, what date. It’s all unknown. I think that’s what we’re sick of. It sucks to not know things and it's just an unknown, so why keep talking about it until something is actually said.”
And so for those with SGL fatigue, Thursday should have been a welcome antidote.
The weather was ideal: 66 degrees, radiant sunshine, a mild breeze that made this masterpiece play even firmer and faster and crustier.
The leaderboard was tasty: Until Joaquin Niemann fired a late-afternoon 63, Jordan Spieth, bona fide PIP needle-mover, had shared the early lead with Scottie Scheffler, last week’s winner and a fellow Texan with whom he’s battled dozens of times. Another shot back was Morikawa, the two-time major champion with yet another chance to ascend to world No. 1, at age 24. Also ’round in 66 was Justin Thomas, reigning Players champion.
All of those guys are 28 or younger.
All have spurned the advances of the Saudis. (Niemann, however, said he didn't want to talk about any potential discussions.)
All have committed, long term, to the PGA Tour.
Full-field scores from The Genesis Invitational
They’ve made their decision, planted their flag. Their next decade in the sport seems full of legacy-defining opportunity and earning potential. And so for them, it’s easy to see the bigger picture as they get underway in the first glittery event of the year.
“If I could pick one non-major or Players Championship to win on the PGA Tour, it would be here,” Spieth said.
He’s taking into account that it’s Riviera – “in the conversation as the best golf course in the world.” And that it’s an invitational, drawing the very best in the world. And that, of course, Woods is involved.
“But you all know I love Tiger as much as anybody else, and no offense to him,” Thomas said, “but I don’t think it’s him that people come here for.”
Lynch: Mickelson's SGL comments 'morally bankrupt'
Spieth and Thomas were just coming off the course and, with pre-8 a.m. tee times, hadn’t seen the latest bombshell report, the one in which Phil Mickelson told golf writer and author Alan Shipnuck that the Tour is, among other things, “manipulative” and a “dictatorship,” and that here, finally, was a unique opportunity to reshape the entire operation.
A reporter tried to give Thomas the gist of the story, but he’d already heard enough. Thomas seems to share McIlroy’s disgust for the current landscape: the bickering, the blustering, the bluffing. “I’ve heard too much talk about a lot of players that are so done with everything, but they keep hanging around,” he said. “So clearly, they’re not too done.”
Thomas’ tone made it clear: He won’t fret any would-be defections.
“I’m very, very content with what’s going on,” he said. “The reason I play golf is to create a legacy and win as many times as I can on the PGA Tour.”
To Thomas, this week presents another opportunity at an iconic course where he’s always wanted to win, and in front of a host he’s always been eager to impress. All that matters to him is that he's locked in on that task, fully, and that those distracted few don’t stand much of a chance.
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Marquee players at Riviera express SGL frustration, annoyance and exasperation - Golf Channel
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