‘Still Sucks’: Joaquin Niemann Confesses ‘Frustrating’ Major Concerns That Haunts LIV Golf Drastically

LIV Golf and major championships—these are two things that just don’t seem to intersect. However, there’s nothing to fear for Joaquin Niemann. A while back, the Chilean golfer surprisingly received a special invitation to the 2024 Masters Tournament to be held in April, which he accepted. Despite that, however, he couldn’t help but share his concerns recently.

The 25-year-old recently took to talking about the current status of LIV Golf pros when it comes to major championships and ranking points. Pointing out that his situation “sucks,” Niemann couldn’t help but take a quick jab at the OWGR!

Joaquin Niemann is not pleased with the OWGR

“It’s frustrating,” said the Chilean professional in an exclusive interview with Bunkered, shedding light on the fact that he was still “far away” from getting onto the field of all the majors despite recently getting a good amount of OWGR points. “It got a little bit tastier getting that invite from the Masters,” he added, confessing how getting into the first major of the year was definitely his aim before he moved on to eye the second—the U.S. Open—via its qualifiers. “You can qualify. That still sucks to do that though but I do have a chance to get in.”

Niemann admitted that he knew this was coming from the start, thanks to the fact that the Saudi-backed league was not getting any world ranking points; however, that certainly didn’t make it any less bitter. “When we signed for LIV, we knew this is what was going to happen,” he said. “At the end of the day, the majors are supposed to host the best players in the world.”

The 2-time PGA Tour champ further added that everyone knew who the best in the world were, even without rankings. “Taking out the Official World Golf Ranking – which I think is not really a ranking – you can figure out who they are easily.”

Joaquin Niemann currently stands 81st, as per the OWGR. His rank has seen a constant dip since February 2023, thanks to LIV’s lack of ranking points. Despite that, he managed to stay in the top 100 via events on other tours that he was permitted to play on. And thanks to his recent scintillating display of golf at the ISPS Handa Australian Open, which helped him seal his entry into the Open Championship at Royal Troon Golf Club this year, and in events that followed, he not only saw his rank rise but also earned an Augusta Invite!

Niemann’s remarkable display of golf helped him rake in two major entries

The young LIV Golf pro registered a score of 14-under 271 at The Lakes GC and The Australian GC, the two courses that hosted the Australian tournament. He did so with figures of 66-69-70-66 over the four days of play while raking in a winner’s cut of AUD $270,000 ($178,000) from the total prize pool of AUD$1.7 million (approximately $1.1 million).

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Moreover, following the victory, he also finished T4 at the Hero Dubai Desert Classic and went ahead to win the LIV Golf event in Mayakoba. Although the latter did not help him get any points on the OWGR board, his amazing 59 on the last day would have surely turned some heads. Well, it seems the golfer finally got some recognition he deserved with the Masters invite, didn’t he?

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