Hertfordshire, England — Brooks Koepka has accused LIV Golf teammate Matthew Wolfe of quitting the course, telling Sports Illustrated that he “basically gave it up.”
Wolf, who won in his third start as a professional on the PGA Tour in 2019, joined the LIV golf league last year and plays for Smash, the team captained by Koepka. He’s finished among the top 30 for 48 players in his past five events, including pullouts.
“I mean, when you quit on your tour, you quit and stuff like that, that’s not a competition,” Koepka told Sports Illustrated. “I’m not a huge fan of that. You don’t work hard. It’s very difficult. It’s very difficult to have such a team dynamic when you have one guy who’s not going to work, one guy who’s not going to make an effort, who’s going to quit the course, break up the clubs.” , and getting down, and bad body language, it’s just so hard.
“I basically gave it up,” Koepka said. “A lot of talent, but I mean talent is wasted.”
Wolf won the Jack Nicklaus Award as the nation’s top player as a sophomore at Oklahoma State in 2019, turned pro and won in his third PGA Tour start at the 3M Open. He had a 54-hole lead at the 2020 US Open at Winged Foot before closing with a score of 75 to be runner-up to Bresson Dechambeau.
But he began to struggle and then took a two-month break in 2021 to address his mental health. He signed with Saudi Arabia-backed LIV Golf a year later.
Wolfe, 24, pulled out before the final round of a LIV golf event outside Washington last month with an undisclosed injury. It was partially removed from Smash’s social media pages.
Wolfe told SI he was trying to do what he could to “play the best round of golf and that will help the team.” When asked if he wanted to be on another team, Wolf stared, shook his head and left, SI reported.
Playing LIV Golf outside of London this week. Wolff is 25th in the points standings.