Sergio Garcia involved in another tense reporter exchange at 2024 Masters
LIV Golf's Sergio Garcia was involved in another tense exchange with a reporter before the 2024 Masters at Augusta National.
Sergio Garcia was involved in a tense exchange with a reporter at the Masters for the second year in a row.
The 2023 edition represented the first Masters since LIV Golf's noisy introduction into the world of men's professional golf.
Questions about the rival league were asked and answered at Augusta National last year.
At times, things got a bit prickly. For evidence of that, remind yourself of Garcia's heated exchange after round one.
"You guys need to stop," Garcia told scribes after his opening 74 when he was asked questions about LIV.
It was clear Garcia believed the PGA Tour-LIV Golf divide, for the most part, was constructed by the media.
Things haven't changed 12 months later and the 2017 Masters champion placed blame on the media once again.
This time, Garcia was involved in a heated back-and-forth with Sky Sports Jamie Weir.
On Wednesday, Garcia claimed the men's game is in a 'perfect spot', adding: "Maybe it's a little more separated.
"Mostly because of the media, not so much because of the players. But I think the game itself is in a great spot.
“I think that we have the most amount of people playing the game, which is great, and people have to realise one thing, that the future of the game isn’t us.
"We’re not the future of the game. Neither me or Rory, no. We’re not the future. We’re the present of the game.”
Pressed further about the ramifications of a niche sport that could remained divided, Garcia offered: "Obviously the more togetherness that you get, the better it is for everyone.
"There’s no doubt about that. But there’s room for everyone. I don’t think that’s a problem at all.
“The same way that I love watching Real Madrid and La Liga, you like to watch the [English] Premiership and whoever your team is. Everybody can support whoever they have, and there’s plenty of people to support it.”
Garcia is one of 13 LIV players teeing it up at the 2024 Masters.
His comments come as Augusta National chairman Fred Ridley all-but ruled out the prospects LIV players gaining entry to the Masters via their own order of merit.
Ridley said it was 'problematic' the LIV Golf League was a closed shop.
Some LIV players have expressed their wish for the major championships hand out spots to players based on performance.
But Ridley wasn't having any of it.
“I think it will be difficult to establish any type of point system that had any connection to the rest of the world of golf because they’re basically, not totally, but for the most part, a closed shop,” Ridley said of the breakaway tour.
“There is some relegation, but not very much. It all really depends on what new player they sign. Those concerns were expressed by the OWGR.
“I don’t think that that prevents us from giving subjective consideration based on talent, based on performance, to those players. Our goal is to have, to the greatest extent possible, the best field in golf, the best players in the world.
“I will say that if we felt that there were a player or players, whether they played on the LIV tour or any other tour, who were deserving of an invitation to the Masters, that we would exercise that discretion with regard to special invitations.”
Garcia is playing the first two rounds of the Masters with Ryan Fox and Chris Kirk.
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Related:
- LIV Golf CEO Greg Norman rocks up at The Masters as a 'ticketed patron'
- Tiger Woods offers unsurprising answer to Rory McIlroy Masters question
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