Rory McIlroy says his ‘future’ is with PGA Tour after LIV offer report

Rahm is thought to have received a contract worth well into nine figures to join the Saudi Arabia-backed league. According to a report Sunday from City A.M., a business-focused media platform based in London, McIlroy was offered $850 million to leave the PGA Tour.

City A.M. reported that McIlroy also was offered 2 percent equity in LIV. The 34-year-old native of Northern Ireland, who has softened his stance on LIV after initially being its most vocal critic among PGA players, said Tuesday he did not “know how these things get started.”

“I’ve never been offered a number from LIV, and I’ve never contemplated going to LIV,” he said. “Again, 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 who have went and played over there,” McIlroy continued. “I think one of the things that I have realized 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?”

The PGA Tour in June announced plans to partner with Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, which owns LIV Golf. But the circuits are still conducting their business separately. A Dec. 31 deadline for details to be ratified was extended as talks continue, but amid little sign of a deal, players from both sides have expressed concern that golf fans are becoming increasingly disenchanted with the current state of affairs.

After McIlroy said recently that it was “unsustainable” for golf’s highest level to run on parallel tracks, LIV’s Bryson DeChambeau asserted that an alliance between the circuits needed to happen “quicker rather than later just for the good of the sport.”

With 13 LIV players participating in the Masters, DeChambeau had the lead after the first round and finished tied for sixth with another LIV star, Cameron Smith. They were among just eight players to post a total score below par in a tournament won convincingly by the PGA Tour’s Scottie Scheffler, who was described Tuesday by McIlroy as “hands down the best player in the game right now.”

Of the rival circuit’s roster, McIlroy told Golf Channel that there were “obviously some really good players on LIV who would be a great…