For the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles, LIV Golf star Jon Rahm would like to see his sport take a page out of the playbook that enables LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Stephen Curry and nine other NBA all-stars to link up in Paris for Team USA.
“The Olympics, you want the best players to be able to participate,” the Spaniard said Tuesday at his pre-Olympics press conference. “Any tournament, you want the best players possible to be representing their country. … Obviously the qualifying criteria might need to change.”
Men's and women's golf returned to the Summer Games in Rio in 2016 after an 114-year absence. The Olympics' current ranking system is largely influenced by the PGA Tour-favoring Official World Golf Rankings. The OWGR factors in international tour events, but not LIV. (Pour one out for the Netherlands' Joost Luiten, who's hopefully doing the same on an island somewhere.)
No country can send more than four top-15 players. Team USA, for instance, is represented by Scottie Scheffler, Xander Schauffele, and Collin Morikawa (no-brainers), plus Wyndham Clark instead of Bryson DeChambeau.
Rahm, who is representing Spain with ascendant LIV talent David Puig, believes the selection process should allow more latitude for nations to hand-pick their delegates, especially as golf becomes more entrenched as an Olympics event.
“I think you can always do it, like with other sports, and allow the countries to pick themselves,” Rahm said. “There needs to be some guidelines. But Team USA basketball has freedom to choose whoever they want. I understand it's a different circumstance, but I think you need to let each country choose who they want to play.”
The 2028 Olympic golf competition will be held at Riviera Country Club, where Rahm won his last official PGA Tour event, the 2023 Genesis Invitational.
Rahm said he would be open to a mixed competition, too.
“In the future, I would also like to see some team aspect in the Olympics … I would love to actually, as a partner or somehow, whether as a combined sport or us playing together, to be able to represent Spain. That would be extremely nice to share the stage with another player, to do something different.”
Echoing Rory McIlroy, Rahm is hoping the Summer Games can salvage his disappointing major year. Rahm defended his green jacket with a T45 at the Masters. He missed the cut at the PGA Championship, then was a late scratch from the U.S. Open with a toe infection.
“It's hard to say,” he replied when asked about the significance of a gold medal. “Golf's history with the Olympics is so young right now, that it may not have the magnitude or recognition that it could have in the future, right?”
Rahm is entering Paris with momentum. He followed a promising T7 at the Open Championship with an “emotional” first individual LIV Golf win in the United Kingdom. (In his first campaign on the Saudi-backed circuit, the two-time major winner has finished top-10 in every event and sits second in the points standings. Rahm's Legion XIII has four wins and is leading the team race.)
“Majors are always going to be … the biggest part of the sport,” Rahm stressed. “I think to the public, having the major might mean more. On a personal level, to be able to win a gold medal for your country is always going to have much more meaning for yourself than it might to the public, right? It's hard to say.”
The Men's Golf competition will take place from Aug. 1-4 at Le Golf National. The women play Aug. 7-10. Rahm will be paired in a marquee group with defending gold medalist Schauffele and Viktor Hovland (Norway).
“Very few people in the history of athletes in the world can say they have been part of the Olympic Games, and for us to be the ones can say we qualified is quite special,” Rahm said. “To add to the medal count of Spain, it would be quite unbelievable.”
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