Johnson scoops $18m as LIV champion

BANGKOK, Thailand — Dustin Johnson has clinched the first LIV Golf Individual Championship and the $18 million first prize.

Johnson had five top-10 finishes in the first six events, including a win at the LIV Golf Invitational Boston. Having earned 121 points through the upstart tour’s point system — 42 more than second-place Branden Grace — he cannot be caught.

“Locking up the individual competition is big. It’s an honour to be LIV’s first individual season champion,” Johnson, 38, said according to Reuters.

LIV Golf commissioner and CEO Greg Norman congratulated him. “The first chapter of LIV Golf’s history could not be written without Dustin Johnson’s name. By any measure, DJ is among the elite players in the world,” Norman said.

“From the start, he’s been a LIV Golf cornerstone. He has more than lived up to his billing and he deserves immense credit for clinching LIV’s first individual season title.”

Several players remain in contention for the runner-up and third-place prizes of $8 million and $4 million, respectively.

The places will be determined after the LIV Golf Invitational Jeddah in Saudi Arabia.

Patrick Reed trails Grace (79 points) with 76, followed by Cameron Smith (56). More than a dozen players are still in contention should they win in Jeddah, which carries 40 points for first place and 30 for second.

LIV Golf will conclude its inaugural season Oct. 28-30 with a team event at Trump National Doral Golf Club in Miami. Twelve teams will compete for a $50 million purse.

Johnson has 121 points going into the LIV Golf Invitational-Jeddah event this week in Saudi Arabia. He has a 42-point lead over Branden Grace, who had to withdraw last week because of an injury. The winner of each event gets 40 points.

Johnson was the most significant player Greg Norman signed for the rival league. He held the No. 1 ranking longer than any other player since Tiger Woods and had said in February he would stick with the PGA Tour until changing his mind in June.

The $30 million is in addition to the signing fee to join LIV Golf, which The Daily Telegraph reported to be about $125 million over four years.

Johnson won the Boston event in a playoff. He tied for second in the LIV events at Trump Bedminster in New Jersey and outside Chicago.

The LIV Golf events feature $25 million in total prize money – $20 million for the individual competition, with the winner getting $4 million.

Johnson’s most lucrative year on the course on the PGA Tour was in 2020, when he captured the FedEx Cup and its $15 million bonus and earned just over $5 million in regular prize money. He played 14 times that season, which lost nearly three months because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Greg Norman, the CEO and commissioner of LIV Golf, referred to the 38-year-old Johnson as the “cornerstone” of the league.

“He has more than lived up to his billing,” Norman said according to AP.

After the seventh event in Saudi Arabia, LIV Golf wraps up its season with a $50 million bonanza at Trump Doral near Miami for team competition. Each player on the winning team gets $4 million.