Rory McIlroy could be poised to make a return to the PGA Tour’s Policy Board along with becoming a board member of the PGA Tour Enterprises according to a number of sources including Sky Sports.
And it’s a fellow US Open champion in Webb Simpson seemingly leading the push for McIlroy’s return to both boards after Simpson tendered his resignation and called for McIlroy be the person to take his place.
It was late last year that McIlroy dramatically stood down from the PGA Tour’s Policy Board indicating shortly before the formal announcement that it was: “Not what I signed for when I went on the board.
“But the game of professional golf has been in flux for the last two years.”
If re-elected at Wednesday’s meeting, McIlroy would replace Simpson and join fellow PGA Tour Player Directors Patrick Cantlay, Peter Malnati, Adam Scott, Jordan Spieth and Tiger Woods.
McIlroy joined the Player Advisory Council in 2019 and then served on the PGA Tour’s policy board from 2021 to last November, when he resigned after citing concerns over his time and energy he had to commit to the role.
“I just think I’ve got a lot going on in my life between my golf game, my family and my growing investment portfolio, my involvement in TGL, and I just felt like something had to give,” McIlroy said at the DP World Tour Championship.
“I don’t mind being busy, but I just like being busy doing my own stuff. Something had to give and there’s guys that are on that board that are spending a lot more time and a lot more energy on it than I am. It’s in good hands and I felt like it was the right time to step off.”
McIlroy admitted at the start of the year that he’d been “too judgemental” with his views on players who switched to LIV Golf, having previously spoken out in support of the PGA Tour and DP World Tour since the Saudi-backed circuit launched in 2022.
The Northern Irishman said ahead of February’s AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am that there should be a punishment-free pathway for players back to the PGA Tour, should they wish to, with McIlroy accepting in an interview last month that the fractured nature of the sport is “unsustainable.”
McIlroy’s softened stance on LIV Golf led to speculation that he may be next to switch, a report his manager Sean O’Flaherty described as “fake news”, with the 34-year-old quickly quashing those rumours and insisting his future lied with the PGA Tour.
“I honestly don’t know how these things get started,” McIlroy said in an interview with Golf Channel at the RBC Heritage. “I think I’ve made it clear over the past two years that I don’t think it’s something for me. It doesn’t mean that I judge people that went and played over there,
“I think one of the things that I’ve realised over the past two years is people can make their own decisions for whatever they think is best for themselves and who are we to judge them for that? But personally for me, my future is here on the PGA Tour and it’s never been any different.”
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