When LIV Golf launched in 2022, it snatched some of the DP World Tour’s best-known players. Those who stayed had to decide how openly to speak about the situation. Four years on, LIV Golf is now dealing with bankruptcy proceedings, and one of the breakaway league’s most consistent critics has returned to the subject—this time in far more direct terms. Eddie Pepperell, the two-time DP World Tour winner, has called out the players he blames, described the room he sat in when the divide became real, and explained why no offer would have moved him to LIV Golf.
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Speaking to Charlie Stebbings on the Business of Sport podcast, Pepperell was asked how he balances the reality of declining a huge offer against his own sense of what is right. To that, Pepperell explained,
“I don’t agree with the idea that everybody will always make a decision for money. You know, I fundamentally don’t agree with that…I’ve always pushed back a bit on that notion. Uh, and I would maintain there was no amount of money that could ever have enticed me to go and play LIV Golf because I fundamentally thought that it was so bad for professional golf. Arguably more so than it turned out to be.”
He further added, “The characters initially that were involved with LIV, I thought, were quite flawed individuals. I think time may have borne that out to be true. I’m not trying to be overly pious when I say that. I just think if you go back and look at Greg Norman and Phil Mickelson, you know, greed kind of rules the day with those guys. They had a vengeance against other parties.”
While the Englishman’s words read blunt, it’s not the first time he has held his stance on LIV. In July 2022, he was asked on the Drop Zone podcast whether he would take a hypothetical offer, and he said he was almost certain he would decline a $20 million four-year deal. He added a line that has followed him since, “I don’t play golf for money.”
Notably for Pepperell, the integrity of the sport matters more than the league organizing it. LIV brought in 54 holes instead of the usual 72 by featuring smaller fields, and nobody was cut after the second round. It felt like the places came through contracts instead of qualification.
“Primarily because of the effect that it was having on formatting, whether it be shorter events, shorter fields, lack of cuts, or the disregard of the meritocratic entry system, which I think is integral to a game like golf,” he said.
Furthermore, Pepperell has criticized the lack of cuts before. When the PGA Tour cut field sizes and removed the cut at some elevated events for 2024, he called it “one of the worst things to happen in the game in the previous 12 months.” His complaint even then was about the structure of professional golf as much as about LIV itself.
That said, LIV Golf has since moved a long way from the confident lodge Pepperell watched in 2022. The league now sits in a stack of bankruptcy cases in the U.S., with reports saying its players are still owed money. Moreover, many of them remain unsure if they want to further continue with the rebuilt LIV 2.0.
Pepperell has made it clear he is not attacking any golfer’s ability. He said he admires Lee Westwood “as much as any other golfer.” The difference, however, is that he disagrees with him “fundamentally,” as he decided to join LIV. Pepperell said the same line in 2022 as well when he was asked how Westwood, Ian Poulter, and Sergio Garcia would feel if LIV were later judged to have damaged the European Tour.
He also recalls a players’ meeting on Tuesday in Wentworth in 2022. That’s where DP World Tour chief executive Keith Pelley had to explain the tour’s position to a group that included Poulter, Garcia, Westwood, and every LIV player.
“It was acrimonious, to say the very least. I was sandwiched between some of these players, and it felt awful. And that’s one of the biggest tournaments of our year, and that’s the environment on a Tuesday.”
Naturally, it became one of the reasons for strained friendships between the players. Pepperell admits the environment in the rival league is what bothers him the most to date.
Ultimately, Eddie Pepperell’s stance has not changed. Four years later, he remains firm in his belief that no amount of money would have changed his decision.