At his PGA Tour peak, Abraham Ancer climbed all the way to 11th in the Official World Golf Ranking. He won a World Golf Championship, amassed 25 top-10 finishes (including two in the majors) and made over $15 million. He even threatened at the 2020 Masters, playing in the final group on Sunday but ultimately finishing T-13.

For some reason, that success hasn’t translated to LIV, which Ancer joined in June of 2022 following the U.S. Open at Brookline. The 32-year-old has yet to register a victory on the Saudi-backed tour, something no one would have predicted given the run of form he was on between 2020 and 2022. Even early in 2023, Ancer won the Asian Tour’s PIF Saudi International, a tournament that was loaded with fellow LIV players and even a number of well-known PGA Tour names.

“I played really good [that week], and maybe my expectations got really high,” Ancer told us on this week’s episode of The Loop podcast. “It’s tough to pinpoint what it was. Definitely was a season that was very frustrating not having the finishes I was looking for or felt I was capable of. Mentally it was very frustrating because it was probably the season that I practiced the most. Maybe I was trying too hard.”

Ancer will have his first chance to get back to his winning ways this week at Mayakoba, where the LIV season will begin in his home country of Mexico. It’s been one of the longest off-seasons of his golf career, as LIV has not held an event since the 2023 season finale in Miami this past October. Safe to say, he’s itching to get going again.

“I’ve never had three months off, which has been amazing,” he said. “The body feels good, I’m hungry to go and compete. Before it was really short and I felt like ‘man, I really need to get going again.’ Didn’t really have time to spend with the family and do stuff you want to do outside the golf course. It’s nice to get that feeling of wanting to compete and wanting to be there instead of ‘oh my gosh, this is getting a little much.’”

Ancer, discussed the drama in the golf world right now, the potential return of Anthony Kim, and why Mark Wahlberg is not lying about his legendary speed golf rounds. Plus, we discuss the Matthieu Pavon “scandal” that captured Golf Twitter’s attention on Sunday. The full interview is available to hear on The Loop wherever you get your podcasts.

Image: Michael Reaves