The LIV Golf League doesn’t have a season climax to match the PGA Tour’s FedEx Cup Playoffs, but it does have a two-tournament wrapup to its third season, the first of which tees off Friday (SEPT. 13) at Bolingbrook Golf Club.
It’s both the climax to Chicago’s golf season and the LIV Individual Championship. Suspense might be lacking, since only Jon Rahm or Joaquin Neimann can win hefty bonus for taking the season-long point competition. No one else is mathematically eligible – not even Bryson DeChambeau. He’s no stranger to Chicago and the defending champion in LIV’s Chicago stop, having won last year at Rich Harvest Farms in Sugar Grove.
DeChambeau is down in ninth place in the individual point race but the team he captains, the Crushers, are the leaders going into LIV’s season-ending Team Championship coming up Sept. 20-23 at Maridoe in Dallas.
The Crushers, who won the Chicago stop and league team title last year, hold a narrow lead over Rahm’s Legion XIII in this year’s team standings. DeChambeau has the same three teammates – Paul Casey, Charles Howell III and Anirban Lahiri – who formed the winning team in 2023 at Rich Harvest.
DeChambeau gave the best individual performance since LIV’s founding when he finished 61-58 on the weekend to win the Greenbrier tournament last year. This year he’s without a win but has six top-10 finishes in 12 starts.
Playing away from the Saudi-backed LIV circuit in golf’s major championships, however, he’s been quite good. He won the U.S. Open at North Carolina’s Pinehurst, holding off Rory McIlroy in a stirring duel on the final nine holes, and finished as the runner-up to Xander Schauffele in the PGA Championship.
Those are the kinds of finishes that have made DeChambeau LIV’s most popular player, and his results on Illinois courses in recent years is rivaled only by the now retired Hale Irwin.
DeChambeau’s Illinois success extends beyond his playoff victory over teammate Lahiri last year at Rich Harvest. Shortly after winning the 2015 NCAA title for Southern Methodist he followed up by capturing the U.S. Amateur at Olympia Fields. And, his first PGA tour win came at the 2017 John Deere Classic in downstate Silvis.
His play got only better after he joined the players exiting the PGA Tour for the more lucrative, though controversial, LIV circuit. In fact, he’s become one of LIV’s best spokesmen.
“We’ve changed the vision of the game of golf,’’ he said in the lead-up to LIV’s final two stops of this campaign. “There is so much opportunity now moving forward than there previously was. Golf was a bit stagnant. There was more to be done and things weren’t necessarily done in the way that some of the players thought they could have been done.
“LIV came around, and we all saw this opportunity of team golf and being partial owners of teams and creating business value across the world. That was a big decision for me, to be part of something like that.’’
Like many LIV players, he’s broadened his interests beyond tournament play.
“What we can do with building academies, creating driving ranges, education centers,’’ he said. “There’s just so much we can do when we bring people together to help grow this game globally.’’
David Feherty, one of the TV voices for LIV after having previously worked for The Golf Channel on PGA Tour events, said DeChambeau “has really blossomed at LIV, especially with how (he) deals with people.’’
“Just getting a little bit older,’’ said DeChambeau. “I’m about to turn 31. Being a little more understanding of others and understanding what the game of golf needs is a huge component for me…. LIV has been a gigantic platform for me.’’
The professional game remains in turmoil, and DeChambeau doesn’t see a quick end to that.
“The game of golf is in an interesting place right now,’’ he said. “It’s going to get figured out. I know that. I have zero doubt it will get figured out, but it’s going to take some time.’’