Things looking very grim for LIV Golf returning to Michigan next month

Plymouth Township — Things are looking increasingly grim for the LIV Golf tournament in Metro Detroit next month.

LIV Golf’s season-ending team championship officially remains on the schedule for Aug. 27-30, but amid the league’s major funding crisis, that might not remain in the case for long.

There has been no infrastructure buildout at The Cardinal at Saint John’s Resort as of Wednesday night, with a Detroit News reporter spotting no hospitality suites on the 18th hole, no stage for the post-round concerts and championship celebration, no player walking bridge across the signature pond, no visible signage — no nothing to suggest a significant golf tournament will be played here five weeks from Thursday.

Buildout for golf tournaments of this magnitude typically takes multiple months.

Meanwhile, earlier Wednesday, a LIV Golf player, two-time major champion Martin Kaymer, cast serious doubt on the likelihood that the championship in Michigan will take place.

“Michigan, highly unlikely,” Kaymer told U.K.-based Today’s Golfer in an interview Wednesday.

Kaymer made those comments after a players’ meeting with LIV Golf CEO Scott O’Neil on Tuesday at JCB Golf & Country Club in the United Kingdom, where O’Neil updated captains on the search for emergency investor funding.

Kaymer pegged Michigan’s chances of hosting the LIV Golf team championship at 5%.

“Of course, we are disappointed,” Kaymer told Today’s Golfer.

LIV Golf, the 5-year-old rival golf league to the PGA Tour, has been scrambling to find at least $300 million in investor funding, after its original cash spigot, the Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund, cut off its support earlier this year. LIV Golf already canceled a tournament that was scheduled to take place in New Orleans. It has four tournaments left on the 2026 schedule, including this week’s tournament in the U.K., then tournaments in New Jersey and Indianapolis before it was scheduled to wrap things up with the team championship at The Cardinal for a second consecutive year.

Kevin Doyle, COO of the Pulte Family Charitable Foundation, which oversees The Cardinal, declined to comment on the state of the buildout for the LIV Golf tournament. He said the resort remains in regular contact with LIV Golf.

“Nothing new right now,” Doyle told The News this week. “LIV’s planning is ongoing and the Saint John’s team continues to work closely with them on it.”

LIV Golf’s future has been in serious jeopardy for months, and especially after the PIF pulled funding in late April after the league reportedly lost billions. LIV Golf hasn’t signed a huge-name golfer since Jon Rahm in 2024, and then earlier this year, Brooks Koepka paid millions in penalties to return to the PGA Tour in 2026 and Patrick Reed left LIV Golf in positioning himself to return to the PGA Tour in 2027.

LIV Golf’s first foray into Michigan in 2025 was a big hit with fans, with tens of thousands attending the team championship, where Rahm’s team beat Bryson DeChambeau’s team in a sudden-death playoff. The Cardinal, an 18-hole championship course designed by Michigan’s Ray Hearn, opened in 2024, and landed a marquee tournament quickly, with Saint John’s paying a multi-million hosting fee, believed to be $3 million, to LIV Golf. Saint John’s is believed to have paid LIV even more to host the team championship again in 2026.

LIV Golf promised the 2026 tournament in Michigan would be “bigger and better,” but in a June interview on CNBC, O’Neil wouldn’t answer the question about whether the remaining 2026 tournaments would be played.

“What I can guarantee,” said O’Neil, “is a heck of a return if you come invest in this business.”

Michigan’s major pro-golf scene is taking some serious hits lately, with the PGA Tour’s Rocket Classic set to end its eight-year run after next week’s tournament after Detroit Golf Club. The Ally Challenge, a PGA Tour Champions tournament at Warwick Hils Golf & Country Club, is set to be played the same weekend as the LIV Golf team championship, and the Ally Challenge is under contract only through 2026.

tpaul@detroitnews.com

@tonypaul1984

This article originally appeared on The Detroit News: Things looking very grim for LIV Golf returning to Michigan next month