By Joel Beall
The PGA Tour has responded to the LIV Golf members who are seeking a temporary restraining order to play in the FedEx Cup Playoffs, which begin this week, with the tour stating the suspended players knew they were breaking the tour’s rules.
In a 32-page response to TRO motions filed last week by Talor Gooch, Matt Jones and Hudson Swafford as part of the ‘Mickelson, et al v PGA TOUR, Inc’ lawsuit, the PGA Tour says the TRO plaintiffs waited nearly two months to seek relief from the court, “fabricating an ‘emergency’ they now maintain requires immediate action”.
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“Despite knowing full well that they would breach Tour Regulations and be suspended for doing so, plaintiffs have joined competing golf league LIV Golf, which has paid them tens and hundreds of millions of dollars in guaranteed money supplied by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund to procure their breaches,” reads the tour response. “TRO plaintiffs now run into court seeking a mandatory injunction to force their way into the Tour’s season-ending FedExCup Playoffs, an action that would harm all Tour members that follow the rules. The antitrust laws do not allow Plaintiffs to have their cake and eat it too.”
The TRO hearing is scheduled for Tuesday at 1pm local time in San Jose (midnight UAE). The first FedEx Cup Playoff event — the FedEx St Jude Championship — begins Thursday morning at TPC Southwind in Memphis.
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