BROOKLINE, Mass. — Wednesday at the U.S. Open is traditionally when the leadership of (North American) golf descends from its fabled ivory tower to deliver a state of the nation and field inquiries about its premier championship. At the 122nd Open, the USGA’s preamble was so ponderous that another handful of over-the-hill competitors could have hobbled over to LIV Golf before the assembled media posed questions, some of which were even about the tournament.
The result was a Triple ‘A’ day at The Country Club.
The first ‘A’ was affability, as Mike Whan — in his first Open as CEO of the USGA — used his trademark enthusiasm and good humor to convey a fresher image of his outfit, one less stuffy, less prone to choking on its cravat. Whan has a lot of progressive ideas and he summarized them, if not briefly, then with commendable conviction.
The second ‘A’ was alliance-building, specifically as it relates to the process around the distance debate, which in a more nostalgic era was considered golf’s thorniest topic.
“It’s slow and deliberate and designed to make sure we aren’t sneaking up on anybody,” Whan said 30 minutes into a slow and deliberate press conference, marking the moment when he first brushed against a subject his audience wanted to hear about. “It’s designed to make sure we have to stop at every step and actually create a listening period.”
The most recurrent ‘A’ of the day was avoidance, manifested in Whan’s obvious reluctance to be dragged too early into a war not of his making, or to be pinned down on actions he might take when inevitably conscripted into combat.
In explaining his decision to allow golfers allied with the Saudi-funded LIV Golf series (and subsequently suspended by the PGA Tour) to compete in the U.S. Open, Whan deflected with the consummate skill of a veteran political candidate. “In February, 30 guys played for the same promoter in Saudi Arabia with an acceptable release from the PGA Tour, and for years the DP World Tour has had an event there, same promoter,” he said.
“We also had to ask the question, if you’re going to put that kind of clause in, who gets in, we’ve got to go back to 9,300 people. It becomes a pretty slippery slope to try to apply that across 9,300 people,” he added, referencing the number of entrants who originally signed up for the championship.
It was artful evasion. The dilemma doesn’t involve 9,300 people, nor even the 156 who actually made it to this Boston suburb, but only the 15 LIV players in the field. And the “promoter,” to use Whan’s anodyne term, is a subsidiary of a sovereign wealth fund that’s financing a hostile takeover of the professional game. Whan worked gamely to create an impression that a decision to eject the Saudi 15 was simply too administratively challenging when, in fact, it was merely too controversial and legally precarious.
Any attempt to bounce MBS’s boys would have been, in the argot of Ian Poulter, a little previous. Whan knows the sands are shifting quickly on the Saudi question, that others are better positioned to act first, and that the time when the USGA can be most effective is not quite at hand.
“To be honest with you, what we’re talking about was different two years ago, and it was different two months ago than it is today,” he said. “We’re not going to be a knee-jerk reaction.”
Interested parties in Riyadh and Ponte Vedra were surely anxiously parsing Whan’s words for signals of support, and there was some. If and when the USGA circles its wagon behind Jay Monahan and the PGA Tour, it will be in the form of making it more difficult for LIV golfers to compete in the U.S. Open — significant since the Saudis have assured any potential recruits that they can continue to compete in majors. Whan confirmed that he was open to revising the parameters used to qualify (or disqualify) competitors from future Opens, just not for the ‘22 edition, the criteria for which had already been published and executed.
“As we would do any year, we’re going to definitely reevaluate field criteria. We would any year. We will take a look at what the landscape looks like,” he said.
And will PGA Tour suspensions get his attention in drafting that criteria?
“They already did,” he replied. “It got our attention for this championship.”
Whan’s comments provided scant succor for the Saudis, but also left an unmistakable sense that the professional game might have disappeared beneath the waves of whataboutism and sportswashing before any USGA life raft launches. The next crest in this crisis lies just beyond the close of this championship, so today demanded something more than ambiguous hints about future solidarity. Golf fans opposed to seeing the sport auctioned to MBS needed a strong voice to ring clear today. It was not heard.
