English tour pro Eddie Pepperell says he’s ‘heard it all’ after Jon Rahm claimed one of the reasons he joined LIV Golf was to avoid the ‘wave weather difference’.
After weeks of intense speculation, Rahm, 29, signed on to the breakaway tour on December 8.
In a deal reportedly worth £450 million, the third-ranked player in Spain became LIV’s biggest acquisition to date.
Rahm has listed a number of reasons why he was drawn to the idea of joining LIV in addition to the financial incentive, even though he had previously expressed disapproval of the format and “laughed” at rumors he would join the rival league.
Rahm recently joined the new LIV podcast, Fairway to Heaven, to discuss his high-profile switch.
He explained: “Yeah, maybe the format was a set back in the past, but at the same time there’s a lot of positives to it as well.
“And one of the things that a lot of players kept mentioning is you don’t have a wave weather difference, where you can simply get unlucky and you’re out of contention for that tournament.
“It’s part of the game, I get it, but it’s something you don’t have to deal with anymore. So that part is a very nice aspect.”
Pepperell didn’t take too kindly to Rahm’s statement. He wrote: “The ‘wave weather difference’ .. F— me. Heard it all now.”
The golfer spoke a little more in depth about Rahm’s decision to join LIV in the most recent installment of The Chipping Forecast with golf commentator Andrew Cotter and journalist Iain Carter.
Pepperell said: “This signing, in my opinion, should be the biggest shock yet to the PGA Tour. They have an opportunity to think outside the box and create something truly global in nature.
“Regardless of LIV, there is as yet copious ability playing on the PGA Visit and DP World Visit by which assuming that they hope to grow their vision and make a really worldwide visit, one that both energizes support from worldwide players and one that movements to all edges of the world performing, then, at that point, I actually accept it can make something undeniably more significant than LIV at any point will.
“This is as much a supplication as whatever else to the people pulling the strings to now take a gander at a full solidification, present to it all [PGA Visit and DP World Tour] together and make something else. We want receptive outlooks and top US-based players [especially] to embrace this open door.”