When asked recently whether Brooks Koepka would play for LIV in 2026, CEO Scott O’Neil gave a lukewarm non-answer: “He is signed for 2026.” That carefully hedged response sent a signal—and the PGA Tour has no formal plan for what comes next.

Golfweek columnist Eamon Lynch torched that ambiguity on December 20, arguing the Tour needs a codified readmission policy before a LIV star comes knocking. The path back, Lynch wrote, “isn’t complicated.” But the Tour’s current posture, an unwritten rule forged in the heat of 2022’s defections, offers nothing but silence and suspension threats.

That emotional response won’t survive the 2027 overhaul that Tiger Woods and Brian Rolapp are building. Woods now chairs the Future Competition Committee, a nine-member panel redesigning the PGA Tour’s competitive model. Rolapp, the former NFL executive who became CEO in June, set three guiding principles: parity, scarcity, and simplicity. Together, they’re motivated to replace punishment with pragmatism—because a premium television product cannot succeed without elite stars.

“The goal is not incremental change,” Rolapp declared at the Tour Championship in August. “The goal is significant change.”

Woods has embraced the mandate with characteristic intensity. The committee has met three times, with members talking daily. At the Hero World Challenge in December, Woods offered a glimpse of the blank-slate approach driving their work.

“There’s going to be some eggs that are spilled and crushed and broken,” he said, “but I think that in the end we’re going to have a product that is far better than what we have now for everyone involved.”

That product-first logic collides directly with the Tour’s culture-war posture toward LIV defectors. Rolapp spent 22 years in the NFL, where talent plays if it improves the show. His philosophy strips sentimentality from the equation: “You get the product right, you get the right partners, your fans will reward you with their time.” The NFL doesn’t exile players for disloyalty; it manages them as competitive assets. Rolapp views golf through the same lens.

Lynch’s column crystallizes why the unwritten rule cannot hold. Only recent major winners—Koepka, Bryson DeChambeau, Jon Rahm, Cameron Smith—could realistically argue they still have status. The Tour wouldn’t “waste the effort on seat-warmers,” Lynch wrote. It would have to be “someone of stature whose defection would be a clear plus for the PGA Tour.”

Koepka fits that profile—and his 2025 struggles sharpen the stakes. The five-time major winner went winless on LIV Golf this year, finishing 30th in the individual standings, a recent report noted. He missed the cut at the Masters, PGA Championship, and Open Championship, with his best major result a T12 at the U.S. Open. His form has cratered, but his ceiling remains elite. DeChambeau, meanwhile, delivered a T5 at Augusta and a T2 at Quail Hollow. Both represent inventory that the Tour’s premium product desperately needs.

And LIV’s declining leverage only strengthens the Tour’s hand.

Why the PGA Tour holds all the cards on LIV Golf readmission

Lynch painted a damning portrait of the Saudi-backed league’s trajectory. Two years have passed since LIV’s last newsworthy signing in Jon Rahm. Viewership remains “stubbornly meager.” Sponsor support is “virtually absent outside of companies protecting an existing Saudi relationship.”

That decline reshapes the calculus entirely. When LIV posed an existential threat, the unwritten ban served as a loyalty test. Now, with the league listing, readmitting a Koepka or DeChambeau wouldn’t signal capitulation—it would signal strategic acquisition. LIV paid for their development; the Tour collects the upside.

The locker room remains divided. One Tour veteran told Lynch his reaction to a potential returnee:

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“F*** them. They made their choice.”

But others have softened. The player-directors on the policy board will ultimately decide, and Tiger Woods—a pragmatist who prizes winning above all—carries enormous weight in that room.

Fans, meanwhile, are exhausted by the politics. They want matchups, not morality plays. Woods himself framed the 2027 overhaul as “fan-based,” designed to deliver “the best product we possibly can.” A formal readmission policy—merit-based, written, stripped of emotional residue—fits that vision cleanly.

Lynch is right that the Tour needs a plan. He may not need to worry. Tiger Woods is likely already writing it.