Brooks Koepka applies for PGA Tour membership again
Five-time major champion Brooks Koepka, just over two weeks after defecting from Saudi-funded LIV Golf, has applied to have his PGA Tour membership reinstated. The next step belongs to the tour, which has suspended players for joining the rival league, even if they never had PGA Tour membership.
Two people with knowledge of Koepka’s application confirmed Friday he has started the process to rejoin the tour. They spoke on condition of anonymity because it has not been made public. Koepka’s manager at Hambric Sports, Blake Smith, said he would not have a comment at this time.
ESPN first reported Koepka’s application. With one year left on his LIV contract, the Saudi-backed league announced Dec. 23 that he would no longer be part of the LIV Golf League and his captaincy of Smash had been turned over to Talor Gooch. “Brooks is prioritizing the needs of his family and staying closer to home,” said Scott O’Neil, the CEO of LIV Golf, who described the departure as amicable and mutual.
The tour policy has been players having to sit out one year from their last LIV appearance, but that was only for nonmembers, such as Laurie Canter. The Englishman was a part-time LIV player, and he qualified for The Players Championship last March one year and a month after last playing a LIV event in Las Vegas. Brian Rolapp, who took over as CEO of PGA Tour Enterprises last summer, will face one of his first early decisions on a pathway back for LIV Golf players wanting to return. His case will be reviewed by Rolapp, along with the policy board and player directors. That includes Tiger Woods, who chairs the Future Competition Committee.
Koepka, and other PGA Tour members who left for LIV and were seen as damaging the tour, presumably would face any number of penalties. But the tour’s longtime policy has been to never publicize discipline. The application comes one day after Rolapp sent a memo to players that the Player Equity Program is being expanded to include current year performance. Koepka already was with LIV when the tour began its first-of-a-kind program, with equity grants first being awarded in April 2024.
Koepka’s departure in June 2022 was one of the biggest surprises, mainly because he was at a corporate function the week before he bolted for LIV encouraging the top players to rally around support for the PGA Tour. But he also was at a crossroads in his career, hampered by injuries in his knees and his left hip. Koepka got his health in order and he won in Saudi Arabia later in 2022, then became the first LIV player to win a major at the 2023 PGA Championship.
He has suggested he might not have joined LIV if he were more certain of his health. Koepka also expressed frustration last year the rival league wasn’t as far along as he had hoped. A statement that accompanied his departure from LIV said, “Family has always guided Brooks’s decisions, and he feels this is the right moment to spend more time at home.” His wife, Jenna, announced on social media in October that she had suffered a miscarriage. They have a 2-year-old son.
The PGA Tour offers a five-year exemption to players who win a major, and if the 2023 PGA Championship title is honored, that would make him exempt through 2028. Still to be determined is what kind of punishment the tour will dispense. The PGA Tour season starts next week at the Sony Open, followed by The American Express in the California desert and the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines. The next event would be the Phoenix Open, which Koepka won for his first PGA Tour title in 2015.
