Jordan Spieth Expects PGA Tour PIP Bonuses Will Be Eliminated amid LIV Merger Talks

Jordan Spieth thinks one of the key changes the PGA Tour made in an attempt to prevent players from joining LIV Golf will go away if the merger between the two companies goes through.

Speaking to reporters on Wednesday from the site of the Hero World Challenge, Spieth explained the Player Impact Program will likely go away at some point.

"I think that its goal was to help prevent players from accepting high-dollar Saudi offers, LIV offers," Spieth said. "I think that's the goal. If you're going to see numbers that are thrown out at players now, a couple specific players, it doesn't really do that."

The Player Impact Program was introduced by the PGA Tour in April 2021. Its purpose was to reward 10 players judged to drive fan support and sponsorship engagement, regardless of how they played in tournaments, with money divided from a pool of what was initially $40 million.

Dan Rapaport of Golf Digest noted people who didn't like PIP criticized it as "concrete evidence of professional golf's impending shift away from meritocracy and toward guaranteed money."

There's been some speculation that part of the Brooks Koepka-Bryson DeChambeau feud was being carried on by DeChambeau because of PIP.

"I'm happy that there's more conversation about me, because of the PIP fund," DeChambeau said in June 2021 after Koepka attempted to troll him by offering free beer to fans who were kicked out of the Memorial Tournament for chanting his name toward Bryson.

Koepka said earlier this year that he and DeChambeau have "squashed" their feud. But PIP has continued to be a factor on the PGA Tour. The money expanded to $100 million for the 2022-23 season, with Rory McIlroy surpassing Tiger Woods atop the earnings list for the first time with $15 million in earnings. Woods still made $12 million despite playing in just two tournaments.

The PGA Tour announced in March the PIP fund for the 2023-24 season would be reduced to $50 million to the top 10 players, with the remaining $50 million being distributed to the FedEx Cup Bonus Program and top-10 finishers on the Comcast Business Tour.

In June, the PGA Tour, LIV Golf and DP World Tour entered into an agreement to form one single organization. The PGA Tour and LIV Golf had hoped to finalize the deal by the end of this year, but Bloomberg's Malathi Nayak and Giles Turner reported in October the merger was likely to be delayed due to the ongoing antitrust probe from the United States Justice Department and players seeking a stake in the organization.