LIV Golf is celebrating its penultimate tournament of the season this week. It is played from this Friday at The Greenbrier, on the The Old White course, in West Virginia, a classic par 70 that usually yields results as low as the 58 that Bryson DeChambeau signed off on a year ago to win.
The Saudi league arrives at this penultimate individual stop of the season in the midst of a Spanish golf boom, which has just won the last two tournaments, with Sergio García in Valderrama and Jon Rahm in the United Kingdom. Eugenio Chacarra needs to join this summer’s Spanish express, which already started with a good performance from Rahm in Nashville, just after withdrawing from the US Open due to injury. The Madrid native is the most in need of our players in terms of ranking.
Let’s remember that the top 24 ranked players in the LIV Golf ranking at the end of the season have their continuity guaranteed next year no matter what. From position 25 to 48 they can continue in LIV, but they already depend on their team renewing them or signing for another team that wants their services. That is, they are in the hands of others. From position 49 onwards they are out of the league for 2025, unless, as you already know, they have a contract in force.
Chacarra does not have a contract in force next year and therefore does not have his continuity guaranteed. He needs to earn it on the field to avoid depending on the captains to continue in LIV. He arrives at Greenbrier in 37th place in the overall ranking, 16.26 points behind the 24th place currently held by Sam Horsfield. In the next two tournaments he should do very well to remove uncertainty about his future. Specifically, to have a mathematical chance this same week of getting into 24th place he would have to finish at least tied for fourth with only one player. Those are his tasks.
David Puig is also outside the top 24, but only two points from the cut. In addition, as Ten Golf has learned, the young man from La Garriga will have no problem continuing in LIV Golf because there are several captains who want to count on him in 2025, starting with Sergio García, his current ‘boss’, and continuing with Jon Rahm, with whom he has an excellent relationship.
On the other hand, Jon Rahm has the mathematical option of becoming the leader of the LIV ranking. To do this, he needs to win or finish second alone in West Virginia and Joaco Niemann finish sixth or worse or fourteenth or worse, respectively. At the same time, Sergio García, currently fourth in the ranking, still has the mathematical option of winning the overall, although he would need at least to win one tournament and finish second alone in the other. Let’s remember that the top three ranked players will receive a juicy bonus: 18 million for the first, 8 for the second and 4 for the third. It’s not a small feat.
The players who would currently be out of LIV in 2025, forced to attend school to regain their position, are Scott Vincent, Kalle Samooja, Branden Grace, Kieran Vincent, Hudson Swafford and Anthony Kim, although in Kim’s case it is not known for sure if he has a contract secured next year.
The tournament has the absence of Graeme McDowell, sanctioned for doping. In his place enters John Catlin in the team of Bryson DeChambeau.
