Controversial PGA Tour Leader is expected to return this month

Jay Monahan, the PGA Tour commissioner who went on medical leave last month when he and his organization became outraged over a planned alliance with Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, is expected to return to power on July 17.

While Monahan, the commissioner since 2017, did not detail his condition in a brief memo to the tour’s board on Friday, he noted that the past few years had been “grueling for all of us” and that he had “taken that toll personally.” had experienced in the days following “the announcement of our framework agreement and experienced adverse effects on my health.”

He said his health had “improved dramatically” since he went on leave on June 13. But Monahan’s timeline for his return means he will miss a Senate hearing in Washington in six days to discuss the preliminary deal with the wealth fund.

When Monahan’s future was publicly uncertain, the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations had agreed to allow two other witnesses to represent the tour: the chief operating officer, Ron Price, and a board member, James J. Dunne III, who involved in the negotiations. that led to the agreement.

Price and another senior tour manager, Tyler Dennis, have overseen day-to-day operations for the tour since June 13, when Monahan and the board issued a brief statement that the commissioner was “recovering from a medical condition.” In the following weeks, tour officials repeatedly declined to describe Monahan’s condition or the circumstances leading up to his transfer of power in one of the most turbulent moments in professional golf.

But by the time Monahan stepped away, he had absorbed days of harsh criticism for the pact with the wealth fund, whose money had previously labeled his tour as tainted, and a turnaround that he acknowledged would draw accusations of hypocrisy.

The final details of the alliance have not yet been negotiated, but the outline of the tentative deal calls for the PGA Tour, the wealth fund and the DP World Tour, formerly known as the European Tour, to convert their golf business into a new, profitable company. company. Tour executives have argued that the deal, if completed, will allow the Florida-based circuit to retain control of the sport, as Monahan will be the CEO of the new company and the tour will control the majority of board seats.

But Yasir al-Rumayyan, the governor of the wealth fund and one of the leading forces behind the LIV Golf circuit that broke the PGA Tour, will be the chairman of the new company. In addition, the wealth fund is expected to have extensive investment rights in the new company, promising the Saudis significant leverage.

Before June 6, when the tour and endowment fund deal was announced, Monahan was one of the most ruthless critics of Saudi Arabia’s foray into professional golf.

“The PGA Tour, an American institution, cannot compete with a foreign monarchy that spends billions of dollars buying the game of golf,” Monahan said in June 2022. “We welcome good, healthy competition. The LIV Saudi golf league is not. It’s an irrational threat; one that is not concerned with the return on investment or real growth of the game.

Last month, hours after sitting next to al-Rumayyan for a televised interview, he took a decidedly different tone, in part because tour guides had effectively concluded that their battle with the wealth fund was unsustainable.

“I recognize that people are going to call me a hypocrite,” Monahan said last month. “Every time I said something, I said it with the information I had at the time, and I said it based on someone trying to compete for the PGA Tour and our players. I accept that criticism. But circumstances are changing .”

And the deal, he stressed, would allow the tour to work with the wealth fund in “a constructive and productive way.”

Either way, the criticism poured in.