LIV Golf players will never be eligible for an equity stake in the PGA Tour's newly formed for-profit subsidiary, PGA Tour Enterprises.
PGA Tour Policy Board player director Peter Malnati confirmed Saturday at The Players Championship that players who left the PGA Tour to go to LIV Golf cannot ever take part in the equity program that was recently created to dole out ownership stake to some 200 members based on their on-course accomplishments and relevancy to the PGA Tour.
While Malnati doesn't have a full understanding of the nearly $1 billion offering secured through the investment of Strategic Sports Group, he knows LIV Golf players are excluded.
"It's going to make players owners of the Tour, and guys who violated our policies aren't ever going to be eligible for that. That's a big deal. Like, that's a big, big deal," Malnati said, emphasizing the importance of rewarding PGA Tour player loyalty.
"So I think, if we do find a pathway for guys to come back, there will certainly be safeguards in place to protect the members of the Tour who stayed here."
Malnati does recognize, however, that eventually the PGA Tour will have to find a way to make LIV Golf players eligible for at least their biggest owned event, The Players, and perhaps more fully.
"I'm definitely of the mind that, some way, shape, or form, we need to give our fans a product where, when we have events like this, at the best venues, with the best everything, we have the best players in the world playing. We need to find a way to give that to our fans. Because that's what they deserve for being loyal to us."
He added, "It's not like I need better players to come play against, but whoever wins this golf tournament is going to have achieved the most incredible accomplishment, to win on this golf course, against this field, but it would be even better if we had Jon Rahm here. I'll just say it. It would be even better. It would be an even better win.
"So that's something that we as a membership and as leaders of the membership, we need to figure that out, how do we make this happen for people to come back, and do it in a way that has some semblance of fairness."