Cameron Smith on Tuesday led a chorus of discontent over LIV Golf’s standing with the peak world ranking body, saying a landmark OWGR ruling is merely a positive step that falls short of total justice.
Speaking at The Grange ahead of LIV Golf’s showpiece event in Adelaide this week, several of the rebel tour’s stars reacted to the call to hand only top-10 finishers world rankings points.
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The decision saw last week’s winner in Riyadh, Elvis Smylie, jump from 134th in the world to 77th, while second-placed Jon Rahm moved from 97th to 67th.
But the OWGR’s decision neglects LIV finishers from 11th to 57th, while the points that are awarded are only a fraction of those received at full-field events on the PGA Tour.
As such, Smith – the former No.2 who is now 227th – lamented that LIV Golf has still fallen short of gaining full recognition despite starting its fifth season, and despite expanding to four-round events.
“It’s been a long time coming so it’s nice to get that recognition. It’s so hard out there and I don’t think we get the respect from the golfing world that maybe we deserve sometimes because of what it is, and how we play,” Smith said.
“I think it’s a work in progress but a step in the right direction nonetheless.”
Referring to Smylie’s stunning win on debut over Rahm, he added: “It’s unfortunate that the golfing world doesn’t see it how I see it.
“I see it as a great performance and he held off probably one of the best golfers of our generation to win a golf tournament.
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“That’s just how it is, unfortunately. I think we’re getting places, it’s getting better.”
It’s clear from interviews in Adelaide on Tuesday that widespread unrest remains.
Smith was far from the only player during the warm-up day to express a level of dissatisfaction with the world rankings state of play, despite the improvement.
The former Open champion was backed up by his Ripper GC teammate Lucas Herbert, who shot down the credibility of the OWGR in strong terms.
Herbert – once a world No.40, and now 223rd – said that until last week he hadn’t even visited the OWGR website in two years.
“Ultimately, the goal of the system I assume would be to rank the best golfers in the world,” he started. “And if they’re going to have Cam Smith outside the top 100, I don’t know if that’s necessarily a fair system.
“Once I went to LIV I think my interest with where I was ranked was pretty low. And, to be honest, where anyone was ranked. It seemed like it wasn’t doing it the best way it could have.”
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Even so, interest in pushing for more OWGR points clearly remains high for some LIV stars, even if there are attacks to its credibility.
Last week’s big mover Smylie, an Australian young gun who is in his debut LIV season, made it no secret that his career ambitions largely hinge on playing the majors.
And, off the back of his 57-place jump in Riyadh, he’s so close to a berth at this year’s Masters – he must be inside the top 50 – that he can taste it.
Speaking of his world ranking goals, he said: “Definitely (to be) top 50 in the world, which I’m very close to achieving.
“It’s great we do get recognition. At the end of the day, good golf takes care of itself so, so I will try win a few more times and, ultimately, the Masters is something that’s on my mind now.
“That’s a conversation I can start to have, and it’s fuel to the fire for me. So let’s see what happens these next few weeks.”
‘CAN HURT A LOT’
Earlier, former Masters champion Sergio Garcia weighed in on the debate, saying the league’s qualified success still “feels” unfair.
“It’s definitely a step forward,” Garcia said.
“Is it fair? I guess time will tell us. It doesn’t feel like it’s totally fair…
“When one of us is winning, obviously that guy will make a jump and that’s great. But every time you’re 11th or worse, you’re getting a zero and you’re getting an extra event on your divisor. So that … can hurt a lot.”
He added: “It’s positive. I think that at the end of the day, it’s going to help some of these kids performing well to move up the rankings. Hopefully they play really well.
“But unfortunately only 10 guys can finish in the top 10. It would be nice if it was expanded a little bit farther as we probably think it should. But hopefully it’ll come soon.”
Garcia is ranked 369th in the world – having once been as high as No.2 – although as the 2017 Masters champion, he has lifetime exemption at Augusta.
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The Spaniard has previously slammed OWGR rankings points as irrelevant to the majority of LIV players, given how far many of them have plummeted.
It’s worth noting his exemptions at the other three majors have expired.
A key change that saw the OWGR finally recognise LIV Golf after nearly four years was the decision to move events from three rounds to four.
The move has caused a stir within the tour after star recruit Bryson DeChambeau made veiled comments last week about the conditions not being what players “signed up for”.
His comments came amid the bombshell departures of Brooks Koepka and Patrick Reed from the tour.
Talor Gooch pushed back on fears of more players leaving, saying that “everyone” he has spoken to is “over the moon” to be on the LIV tour.
“With the world ranking and majors, and things kind of softening up on all of those fronts, and the ecosystem starting to accept us slowly but surely, I think it’s going to continue to make this place more and more enticing for people,” he said.
“Everyone is excited. There’s obviously some frustrations with us not getting the whole pie, let’s just say. But you know what, at least we got some pie and let’s keep trying to get some more pie.”
Garcia, however, was less enthusiastic when speaking about the change to four-round tournaments.
He said the shift is “fine”, but added other grumbles.
“When it comes down to prep, obviously it’s an extra day, so it makes the weeks a tiny bit longer,” he said.
“With travelling so much overseas, it becomes a little bit tougher to be able to get there with enough time to do prep as well as you might want to.
“But we’ve done it our whole lives, so we know how it is. But it’s good. It’s fine.”
His Fireballs teammate David Puig, however, was more positive about the shift, saying it better allows the cream of the field to rise to the top.
“Personally, I think for the better players of that week, I think it’s definitely better because you’ve got to perform better for an extra day to actually win the tournament or finish high,” Puig said.
“I think (with) the three-day, that first round was really important. If you started really well, you obviously had a chance to win, but you weren’t guaranteed to finish high. But obviously the chances of you finishing pretty high was easier.
“On the other hand, if you had a pretty poor first round, then you were kind of battling the next two days to crack the top 10 or top 15, whatever. I think it’s more fair and it’s just better.”
‘I’D TAKE ANOTHER’
Meanwhile, Garcia was asked for his view on renewed commentary about the PGA Tour’s Players Championship being the world’s ‘fifth major’, and how it stacks up to similar claims about Australia being worthy of its own elevated event.
This week, Golf Channel analyst Brandel Chamblee caused a stir by saying the Players Championship at TPC Sawgrass might be the greatest tournament in the world.
“In every single way that a metric could be used to measure whether something is a major, the Players, to me, stands alone and above the other four major championships as not just a major. It is, in my estimation, the best major,” he said.
Garcia’s LIV Golf colleague Lee Westwood was stunned by the comment, posting on X: “I’m worried about Brandel. Someone check on him please”.
Asked for his own reaction, Garcia, a champion at Sawgrass in 2008, said he was hesitant to comment on other tours.
Nonetheless, he added with a smile: “I’ll be happy to claim a second major, obviously, if that happens.”
Pressed on whether Australia deserves more recognition off the back of successful LIV tournaments in Adelaide, and last year’s bumper Australian Open at Royal Melbourne, where Garcia featured, the Spanish great was unequivocal.
“I mean, definitely, without a doubt,” he said.
“There’s so many places in the world that you have a great golf following. Obviously Australia is one of them. They’ve shown us the excitement and how much they love the game of golf.”
He added: “I feel like this event is a great event. You have some amazing young players (with) great potential. You have some stars that have been in the game for a while. You have some that are playing at a great level like Jon (Rahm) and some others.
“I think that the Australians should be super, super happy about what they have at the moment.
“Unfortunately, I don’t think they’ve had a consistent field like this one year in, year out, like (LIV’s) been doing for the past four years. That’s nice to have.”
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