Donovan McNabb and the State of Football
As the inaugural LIV Golf season came to a close Sunday at Trump National Doral in Miami, Dustin Johnson proved to be the upstart league’s most valuable asset once again — both on and off the course.
With a win in Saturday’s match play semifinal and a two-under 70 in Sunday’s stroke play final, Johnson helped lead 4 Aces — of whom he is the captain — to LIV’s Team Championship and its $16 million prize split evenly among the team’s players (Patrick Reed, Talor Gooch, Pat Perez).
It’s the culmination of a landmark season for Johnson that saw him earn $35.9 million across only eight events.
- In addition to the $4M he won in Miami, Johnson earned $3.1M from team efforts, which included wins in every U.S.-based event (Portland, Bedminster, Boston, Chicago).
- He made $10.8M for his individual performance in the invitationals, including a dramatic win in Boston that netted him $4M.
- Johnson won the Individual Championship — an $18M payout.
For perspective, the 38-year-old earned $96.4 million in his entire 15-year PGA Tour career. Tour champion Rory McIlroy made $28.5 million across 17 events this season.
“Personally, my season, yeah, you add up the numbers and it was great, but I played good — I didn’t play my best, so it always could be better, but that’s golf,” Johnson said after the win at Doral. “But I’m just happy that the 4 Aces just won this tournament. That’s all that matters.”
This is all, of course, just icing on the cake: LIV is reportedly paying Johnson $125 million over four years in guaranteed money just for joining the offshoot tour.
