(Los Angeles) American Phil Mickelson, winner of six Grand Slam tournaments, has explained that he wants to join the Saudi-funded Super League of golf, despite their human rights violations, to force the northern circuit American PGA to “reshape its operation”.
Posted at 7:49 p.m.
“It is difficult to get involved with them… They killed (the journalist from washington post) Jamal Khashoggi, they have a horrible human rights record, they execute people there for being gay,” Mickelson told author Alan Shipnuck who quoted the remarks, appearing in a biography to be published, on the site Fire Pit Collective Thursday.
“Knowing all of this, why would I consider getting involved? Because it’s a unique opportunity to reshape the way the PGA works,” said the 51-year-old golfer.
In the wake of the Australian Greg Norman, who carries this dissident circuit project, financed by the Public Investment Fund of Saudi Arabia, whose value is estimated at 500 billion dollars, Mickelson is one of the stars most prominent of the PGA to have lent its support.
The latter, who last year became the oldest Major winner in history by winning the PGA Championship, says the American Tour “was able to get away with manipulative, coercive and tough because we, the players, had no recourse”.
“Even though Jay Monahan, the PGA commissioner, seems like a good person, he won’t do the right thing if you don’t have the leverage. And Saudi money eventually gave us that leverage,” he explained.
“I’m not even sure I want (the Super League) to succeed, but the very idea of this project allows us to move things forward with the PGA,” said Mickelson, who participated earlier this month in the Saudi International.
In recent weeks, Mickelson has lambasted the “odious greed” of the PGA Tour which owns players’ media rights. “They’re sitting on hundreds of millions of dollars worth of digital content that we could use. The players have to make all of this their own. We played those shots, we created those moments, we should be the ones to profit from that,” he said in his forthcoming biography.