Richard Bland Fails to Win Fans’ Hearts as PGA Tour’s ‘Petty’ Move Snubs the LIV Golf Pro Yet Again

Despite, the KitchenAid Senior PGA Championship, Richard Bland was made ineligible for any one-year exemption into the Tour, all thanks to his affiliation with LIV Golf. It was not the only snub made by the PGA Tour towards the 51-year-old. The American circuit’s recent actions were even dubbed ‘petty’ by one of the journalists of the sport.

A tweet shared by Doug Ferguson, mentioned how there is just “one story from the Senior PGA Championship,” that of Jason Caron as a low club professional. He also pointed out, “There’s a link to Bland winning, but in that story, all references to LIV have been removed. (No mention of Cleeks, either).”

The story about the KitchenAid Senior PGA Championship winner that was shared by the PGA Tour talks of how he won his senior major debut with a three-stroke lead over Richard Green. It also highlights the scores of the champ as well as the golfers tailing behind him before jumping to Bland’s emotional reaction to winning the tourney and dedicating the same to his sick brother; “I just wanted to win for him so bad.”

The piece on Caron, who had finished tied for T4 with Scott Hend, called attention to the fact that he had the best finish by a club professional. Moreover, it also shone a light on his older achievements in the sport before alluding to his performance in the recently concluded senior major championship. The golfer finished a 12-under 272 by carding 22 birdies and an eagle on the par-4, 7th hole, on Saturday while raking in a cut of $154,000 at the end of the tournament.

The golf world, however, seemed to agree with the men’s circuit. They did not agree with the journalist, who dubbed the whole action of not mentioning LIV and Cleeks GC as a narrow-minded one. Many enthusiasts of the game, as a result, went ahead to comment against the LIV golfer under the post as soon as it was posted.

Netizens don’t find anything wrong with the Richard Bland snub

The Senior PGA Championship is not run by the PGA Tour nor does Richard Bland have a membership on the Jay Monahan-led circuit owing to him being part of the Saudi-backed league. Many of the users on X, thus, came forward to comment how the snub wasn’t a bad thing; “Doug u are my favorite follow on X for golf by far. But I don’t understand where the pettiness is that u are referring to? Maybe I’m missing something”, The senior professional had received the exemption to play at the major due to his win at the 2021 British Masters. But emerging victorious at the same time did not make him eligible for any of the TOUR-affiliated events owing to him being a LIV golfer.

The format of LIV Golf is very different from the PGA Tour in that it consists of 13 teams of four athletes duking it out alongside each other on the course over three days. And Bland, being a part of the Cleeks GC, prompted Ferguson to hint at how nothing on the squad was mentioned. A couple of fans didn’t agree, as they commented, “There shouldn’t be anything,” and “No reason to mention Cleeks at all.” 

There were a number of articles done by the PIF-funded circuit on Bland during his journey of triumph at his senior debut. They went ahead to report on how he shot a final round 63 to win the event as well as how he had led the tournament by one stroke at the halfway point among many others. Drawing on the same, a couple of followers pointed out, “Just don’t see issue…PGAT writes when one of their players does well, DPWT writes when one of their players does well, LIV writes when one of their players does well,” 

The Saudi-backed league had covered extensively on how Bryson DeChambeau had exhilaratingly eyed the Sunday charge at the PGA Championship and how he managed to place T2 on the major at 20-under overall. However, they did not report on the champ Xander Schauffele even once despite emerging victorious at 21-under overall. “Please show me the glowing story of Xander winning the PGA Championship on the LIV website (other than the one that is all about Bryson and has no mention of the tour Xander represents).” 

The whole incident does paint a pretty clear picture of the divide that the game of golf currently suffers from. The fans can only wait and watch as the two Tours duke it out as well as try to work with each other in hopes of unification of the sport.