Even for the most ardent believer in karma, Friday\u2019s report in the\u00a0Financial Times<\/a>\u00a0seems too sweet to be wholesome. The\u00a0FT \u2014 which was among the first to reveal in April that the Saudi Public Investment Fund would cease financing LIV Golf \u2014 cited sources saying the decision by PIF\u2019s governor, Yasir Al-Rumayyan, to defund the league was influenced by Sergio Garcia busting a club during a childish snit fit at the Masters<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cPeople familiar with the matter say Rumayyan\u2019s embarrassment at the sequence of events helped lead to his decision to pull the plug on PIF\u2019s financing \u2026 ,\u201d\u00a0the newspaper noted.\u00a0<\/p>\n Like claims of papal infallibility or presidential genius,\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0the kind of report for which\u00a0there\u2019s\u00a0no shortage of eager believers, though innate credulousness\u00a0isn\u2019t\u00a0a necessity in the case of Garcia. After all, this is the man who screamed,\u00a0\u201cYou\u2019re all f\u2014\u2014-d, you should have taken the Saudi money!\u201d\u00a0at fellow players in a European locker room in 2022. Around the same time, he was caught on a hot mic in the U.S. muttering,\u00a0\u201cI can\u2019t wait to leave this tour,\u201d\u00a0the lone example in his near 30-year career of Garcia cheering the hearts of luckless rules officials.\u00a0<\/p>\n Garcia Lorca couldn\u2019t have authored a more poetic comeuppance than to have this lesser Garcia be, well, f\u2014\u2014-d because he took the Saudi money, and to be left wondering if he can wriggle back to the PGA Tour he couldn\u2019t wait to depart. But on the fatalistic logic that\u00a0never before\u00a0in human history have so many been so fortunate, we ought to treat the report as wishful thinking. Leave it as fodder for unemployable jock sniffers on the fringe of golf media to castigate LIV Golf\u2019s many critics for trafficking in rumor by sharing the report on social media.\u00a0<\/p>\n If conduct unbecoming is a red line for Al-Rumayyan \u2014 a generous grant since he works for a dictator who had a dissident journalist dismembered<\/a> \u2014 then he already had a book of evidence on Garcia long before the incident at Augusta National. The Spaniard was disqualified from the Saudi\u2019s tournament in 2019 for defacing five greens in a mid-round tantrum<\/a>. If he was embarrassed that the antics happened at Augusta National,\u00a0that\u2019s\u00a0understandable, especially if he still harbors the dream of his own green jacket one day.\u00a0<\/p>\n Explore how to live where you love to play Access community guides, golf real estate insights, trusted agent connections, and content built for passionate golfers.<\/a><\/p>\n But it seems altogether more probable that Al-Rumayyan\u2019s reasons for getting out of the golf business have little to do with what\u2019s actually happened in golf.\u00a0It\u2019s been a contributing factor, to be sure \u2014 he squandered billions for zero return because he was suckered by washed-up players, greedy agents and assorted grifters \u2014 but it\u2019s myopic to assume the lack of commercial and audience traction LIV won was the driver of the decision. The catalog of comedic missteps by the league\u2019s executives and apologists\u00a0has\u00a0been but one of the plausible influences on the PIF\u2019s exit.\u00a0<\/p>\n A\u00a0$900 billion\u00a0sovereign wealth fund shifts priorities without a backward glance. PIF\u2019s five-year strategic plan<\/a>, announced one week before the LIV shiv was delivered in April,\u00a0didn\u2019t\u00a0mention sports, a significant departure from the\u00a0previous\u00a0investment plan. Add in a multitude of other considerations for the Saudis \u2014 a Mideast war, infrastructure being destroyed by Iran and its proxies, the difficulty of getting oil to market, the Noem project fiasco that has torched over\u00a0$50 billion, Al-Rumayyan\u00a0serving at the whim of a mercurial dictator who imprisoned his own family \u2014 and one might conclude that geopolitics had more to do with LIV\u2019s funding disappearing than Sergio Garcia\u2019s petulance, or anything else specific to the golf space.\u00a0<\/p>\n But\u00a0it\u2019s\u00a0hardly just LIV\u2019s critics who are keen to knit one loose, convenient thread into a comforter.\u00a0<\/p>\n![\"Apr](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/golf\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/89540744007-usatsi-28691658.jpg\")
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