Jon Rahm to leave LIV Golf, dealing massive blow to league's future
Augusta National
Jon Rahm is officially leaving LIV Golf.
During a legal hearing Wednesday regarding the league’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing, Rahm’s lawyer, John Beck, informed a New Jersey judge that his client had reviewed the proposals for “LIV 2.0” and had no interest in being part of the league’s next iteration. A separation agreement is expected to be finalized next week.
The move ends a turbulent three-year stretch for the 31-year-old Spaniard, a two-time major winner, with the upstart league. After repeatedly denying any interest in LIV when it launched in 2022—at one point declaring his “fealty” to the PGA Tour and insisting he did not need the money—Rahm reversed course in December 2023, unveiling his move to the Saudi-backed circuit while wearing a LIV letterman jacket. The perceived hypocrisy of the decision damaged Rahm’s standing among many golf fans, the former World No. 1 seeming to reignite golf’s civil war while the PGA Tour and Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund were discussing an agreement. That he joined a league already dogged by criticism of the kingdom’s human-rights record only deepened the backlash.
For LIV, however, Rahm represented something the league had spent two years searching for. Its early rosters were criticized as a collection of aging stars, journeymen, injured players and figures with considerable baggage. Rahm was different, a superstar still in his prime, universally respected by fans and peers, and one of the few players whose arrival could give LIV a measure of legitimacy and competitive weight.
Rahm won four times during his LIV tenure and captured the season-long individual title in all three of his years with the league. Yet those accomplishments were overshadowed by his major performance in this span. Before joining LIV, Rahm had won the 2021 U.S. Open, 2023 Masters and posted 12 top-10 finishes in golf’s four biggest events. After his defection, he rarely threatened on those stages, with a runner-up finish at this year’s PGA Championship at Aronimink and a T-8 at the 2025 PGA at Quail Hollow his lone serious runs at another major title.
Just as damaging for LIV, no other stars followed him, and his presence did little to improve the league’s meager American audience.
Rumors that Rahm wanted out intensified in the weeks after Saudi Arabia withdrew its financial backing from LIV this April. Those who remained with the league following its mass layoffs had increasingly come to view his departure as inevitable. Although Rahm was believed to have several years remaining on his contract, LIV’s bankruptcy filing asked the court to terminate its player agreements, clearing a path for both sides to separate.
Where Rahm goes from here is less certain. In early 2026, the PGA Tour offered a returning-member exemption to LIV players who had won a major since 2022—a group that included Rahm, Bryson DeChambeau, Brooks Koepka and Cameron Smith. Only Koepka accepted. PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp has repeatedly said the tour will not extend the offer again, particularly now that the circumstances have changed. Koepka chose to leave a functioning LIV Golf. Rahm, DeChambeau and Smith would be seeking a return only after the league’s future became uncertain at best.
That may leave the DP World Tour as Rahm’s most realistic option, though his relationship with the European circuit has hardly been smooth. Rahm spent months challenging the fines imposed on players who competed in LIV events before the two sides eventually reached an agreement. To maintain his DP World Tour membership, Rahm agreed to play in five tournaments this year. He has played three to date, and was supposed to play in this week's Spanish Open, but withdrew from the tournament with his wife Kelley due with their fourth child any day.
LIV has now lost two of its three biggest stars in Rahm and Koepka. DeChambeau, the most valuable player left, was already expected to become a free agent at the end of 2026. Earlier this week LIV's new investor made the first of a $4 million commitment to the league's future, but whatever “LIV 2.0” becomes, it will begin without most of the players who made the first version matter.