Former Masters champion Sergio Garcia was one of the first golfers to join the LIV series, resigning his PGA Tour membership immediately after joining the new tour. The 42-year-old has since weathered the controversy — and sometimes criticism — that has followed.
Garcia spoke over Zoom last week about when he first began thinking about joining up with LIV, the hardest part of leaving the PGA Tour and his widely viewed argument with an official at the Wells Fargo Championship that alluded to his impending switch. Here’s what’s he had to say.
Michael Collins: When did you start thinking about LIV? Take me through that timeline for you personally.
Sergio Garcia: Well, there was talk about it, I think it was in 2021, but we weren’t in it at the beginning. They didn’t contact us or anything like that. The first real contact was at the 2022 Saudi International Open. They started talking to us, showed us what they were doing. A possible proposal. That’s when we started thinking about it.
Then what happened at Riviera happened, and everything got put on hold. We weren’t sure if it was gonna get back on it or not. But then once we started playing golf it was like, “OK. We’re here, this is for real.” That’s when everyone started to realize it I guess.
