LIV GOLF STEYN CITY: MARCH 19-22
10 BEST INDIVIDUALS 2025 1 Jon Rahm (Legion XIII) 2 Joaquin Niemann (Torque) 3 Bryson DeChambeau (Crushers) 4 Sebastian Munoz (Torque) 5 Dean Burmester (Guards)
6 Talor Gooch (Smash) 7 Patrick Reed (4Aces) 8 Carlos Ortiz (Torque) 9 Sergio Garcia (Fireballs) 10 David Puig (Fireballs)
3 BEST TEAMS 2025 1 Legion XIII (Rahm, Hatton, McKibbin, Surratt) 2 Crushers (DeChambeau, Casey, Howell, Lahiri) 3 Stingers (Oosthuizen, Grace, Burmester, Schwartzel) TEAM CHAMPIONS Crushers and Legion XIII have the best team records in LIV history, with 8 team titles and one team championship apiece. 2025 Legion XIII 2024 Ripper 2023 Crushers 2022 4Aces CAREER MONEY-WINNERS* 1 Jon Rahm $75m 2 Joaquin Niemann $68.5m 3 Talor Gooch $66.5m 4 Dustin Johnson $61m 5 Bryson DeChambeau $47.6m 6 Cameron Smith $47.2m 7 Brooks Koepka $44.7m 8 Sergio Garcia $44.7m MOST LIV WINS* 7 Joaquin Niemann 5 Brooks Koepka 4 Talor Gooch 3 Cam Smith, Bryson DeChambeau, Dustin Johnson 2 Dean Burmester, Sergio Garcia, Jon Rahm *End of 2025 season 9 Patrick Reed $37.5m 10 Branden Grace $36m *End of 2025 season
all English. Ripper has a new recruit in Elvis Smylie, as do the Majesticks with Laurie Canter, both from the DP World Tour. The South African quartet have re- mained surprisingly competitive de- spite their advancing years – an average age of just under 40 – and will be driven to put up a good showing at Steyn City in front of home fans for the first time. They finished the 2025 season strongly with three podium finishes. They are a tight-knit unit, clearly having plenty of fun together on the LIV cavalcade, and passionate about the LIV experience, captured so eloquently in the Greens & Gold series. They have won three team events over the past four years (Chicago last year), and their combined earnings tally $118 million. Burmester knows the Nicklaus De- sign course better than his team-mates, finishing runner-up on 22-under in the 2022 Steyn City Championship which was part of the DP World Tour. The wide fairways will suit his firepower.
– Louis Oosthuizen, Charl Schwartzel, Branden Grace and Dean Burmester – have changed their team name to Southern Guards, which doesn’t have the same ring to it. It follows their excel- lent Greens & Gold documentary series broadcast on SuperSport. Team element on show LIV’s popular matchup of 13 teams at every tournament has similarities to the growth of successful T-20 cricket leagues and franchises around the world, includ- ing the Betway SA20 which has gathered tremendous crowd support locally. The LIV teams have each become strong individual brands with global partner- ships. The weekly tournament team prizemoney this year has been doubled to $10-million by the kingdom’s Public Investment Fund. It’s three scores to count in every round; and increasing the ante from 54 to 72 holes adds to the pressure on every team member. Southern Guards are one of six teams identifying with a country or region. The Iron Heads have this year been re- branded as Korean Golf Club – reaching out to the Korean market – following the signing of Byeong Hun An as team captain. Ripper, led by Cameron Smith, represent Australia, the Fireballs un- der Sergio Garcia are Spanish, Torque’s team captained by Joaquin Niemann, is drawn from Central and South Ameri- ca, while Lee Westwood’s Majesticks are
‘Changing our team name from Stingers to Southern Guards was an emotional decision. We felt the time was right to embrace a name and visual identity that more authentically reflects who we are, and the responsibility we carry in representing SA on a global stage.’ – Southern Guards GM Richard Glover
62 GOLF DIGEST SOUTH AFRICA
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2026
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