Jon Rahm has moved from the PGA Tour to LIV Golf for the 2024 season as part of a multi-year, nine-figure deal that saw the reigning Masters champion move to the Saudi-owned circuit.
Rahm was immediately suspended by the PGA Tour when his signing was announced on December 6, 2023, and that made him ineligible to play in any PGA Tour events going forward. Since he was ineligible to play on the PGA Tour, he was unable to defend two titles he won last year at The Sentry in Hawaii and the American Express in California.
He was also unable to play in the Farmers Insurance Open, at Torrey Pines, where he won the PGA Tour event and his US Open title in 2021. He is not playing at this week's Waste Management Phoenix Open, near where he lives, to represent Arizona State University, where he went to college and met his wife.
Instead, Rahm is playing in LIV Golf's Las Vegas event, which starts Thursday amidst the city hosting Super Bowl LXIII. Rahm acknowledged Tuesday that he misses the opportunity to play at Torrey Pines and TPC Scottsdale.
"It was a lot harder to be at home (in the Phoenix area) not competing and know that those events were going on. Palm Springs and Torrey, those weeks were hard," he said Tuesday. "I've explained so many times how important Torrey is for me. And driving by Phoenix (host TPC Scottsdale) as often as I had to and knowing that I wasn't going to play there, it's definitely emotional. That's one of the things that I'm going to miss."
Rahm said he would like to one day return to play the PGA Tour events that mean the most to him.
"I'm hoping that in the near future I can be back playing some of those events. I would certainly love to go back and play some of them," he said.
The Masters champion said he won't have the Phoenix Open on his mind, however, when the LIV Golf tournament starts.
"Now, when the tournament starts, we're here to compete, so whatever else is going on, whatever tournament is going on doesn't really matter," he said. "We're here to hopefully perform well and win. It's a lot easier while we're playing."
Asked if he regretted his decision to move to LIV Golf, he, along with teammate Tyrrell Hatton, said no.
"I'm not typically a person that's going to regret any decisions," Rahm said. "I made as educated a decision as I could get with the full support of the people around me and confident that it was the right thing for me, so no, I'm not going to regret it."
