Well, we can probably put down Jason Kokrak as one of the next PGA Tour players to announce that he’s a defector to LIV Golf. Either that, or he just threw one of the biggest tantrums this side of your 5-year-old before naptime.
How else could you explain the utterly bizarre and memorable way in which the 37-year-old Korkak—already rumored for some time to be destined for LIV—seemingly bid farewell to the tour on which he’s played 11 full seasons, won three times and earned more than $20 million?
ShotLink tells the story from Friday at the Travelers Championship in Cromwell, Conn. Kokrak teed off on his final hole of the day, the ninth at TPC River Highlands. He’d shot 67 in the first round but was four over in the second following his second double bogey of the day (the first came on a five-putt). Kokrak hit the tee shot 327 yards on the dogleg right par 4 into the left rough. He had only 43 yards to hole. And then he proceeded to blast that shot over the green and across a road. Or as ShotLink put it, “87 yards into the unknown.”
Then, get this … he walked right off the grounds, reportedly disappeared into the player parking lot, got in his car and likely left the PGA Tour in his rearview mirror. As noted in the last line of the tour’s second-round media notes: “Jason Kokrak was disqualified during round two for failing to record a score on his final hole and subsequently failing to return a scorecard.”
Incredible. One can imagine Kokrak’s fellow players are getting a tremendous kick out of his antics or are completely disgusted that someone who’d played so long beside them would blow them off in such a way.
As for Kokrak, ranked No. 33 in the world, going to LIV, nothing is official yet. But if he’s not playing in next week’s LIV event in Portland, he’s got a lot of explainin’ to do.