Multiple PGA Tour winner: In an effort to stop losing players we became LIV Golf

Multiple PGA Tour winner Peter Jacobsen says LIV Golf would never have been created had Arnold Palmer been alive. 

The PIF-backed league began competition in June 2022 and immediately positioned itself against the established European and PGA Tour. 

Former Open champion Greg Norman was crucial in persuading several major champions and high-profile players to decamp with the allure of exorbitant $25m prize purses and guaranteed contracts. 

Jacobsen and the late Palmer were in the room when Norman, famously, touted his idea for a world tour at Sherwood Country Club in 1994. 

The Australian's idea enraged the likes of Palmer and Jack Nicklaus, with the former storming out of the room saying he wanted nothing to do with it. 

In an interview with The Golf Show 2.0, Jacobsen said elite men's professional golf today would be much different if The King were alive. 

"Look at it this way," he said. "If Arnold had still been alive, we never would have seen the LIV tour created. Period."

Jacobsen said he harbours no animosity against the players that were recruited by LIV. 

Major champions Phil Mickelson, Brooks Koepka, Bryson DeChambeau, Dustin Johnson, Cameron Smith, Patrick Reed and Jon Rahm are among the notables still on LIV's roster, although several players' contracts are due to expire in 2026. 

DeChambeau has said he wants to stay while some figures in the sport, such as former Masters champ Fred Couples, have claimed Koepka would like to return. 

"I would never criticise any of those players that left taking the money because that's generational wealth," he said. 

"You can't criticise somebody for changing jobs. But once you change your job, you can't do both jobs at the same time."

In June 2023, the PGA Tour, DP World Tour and LIV's financiers announced a framework agreement. 

Three years later, the deal is yet to be consummated and sources close to each side suggest nothing will ever come to pass. 

Jacobsen added: "If anybody wants to come back to the PGA Tour, there are rules and stipulations and maybe penalties that the players are going to have to adhere to to be able to get their card back.

"I'm really curious to see what's going to happen in the next two to three years."

The PGA Tour's big mistake

Rory McIlroy and Tiger Woods led the charge against LIV and, at the height of the schism between the circuits in 2022, corralled the top talent to discuss the PGA Tour's response. 

Soon after the players' only meeting in Delaware, the Tour announced the creation of elevated (now signature) events. 

The $20m tournaments are reserved for the leading players in the FedEx Cup standings, with limited fields. Critics suggest they are too exclusive. 

Jacobsen agreed, adding: "The one thing is that in an effort to avoid losing players to LIV, we became LIV."

There is now an A and B Tour, Jacobsen explained. 

"That's the wrong direction," he said "The one thing Arnold always talked about was open competition. 

"And if you close your shop like LIV has, you see the same players over and over and over. There's no opportunity for a player to emerge on the world stage.

"Players come and players go. But what remains is the strength of the organisation. 

"An organisation that has always had a focus on raising money for charities in various towns and cities across the country."