LPGA Commissioner Leaving After Brief Up-and-Down Tenure

The LPGA is looking for a new commissioner after announcing Mollie Marcoux Samaan will step down following a brief tenure of just over three and a half years. 

The resignation will be effective Jan. 9, 2025, when Liz Moore, the LPGA’s chief legal and technology officer and corporate secretary, will assume the role of interim commissioner. The LPGA Board of Directors will work with an executive search firm to conduct a global search for a new commissioner.

Marcoux Samaan was hired in May 2021, and her five-year contract was supposed to run until 2026. In 2022, her salary was just under $1 million, according to the LPGA’s tax return.

She had been criticized in several leadership areas despite overseeing a prize money increase of more than 90%, culminating with a record $125.95 million in 2024, and another increase on the way in 2025.

Critiques ranged from the LPGA’s relationship with Golf Saudi, a lack of clarity around the tour’s gender policy, and the loss of various tournament sponsors in recent years.

“I focus every day on trying to support the athletes, to try to grow the tour, and to try to make this the best place in the world to play and to give additional opportunities to girls and women,” Marcoux Samaan said two weeks ago when asked about criticisms of her tenure ahead of the season-ending CME Group Tour Championship. 

“So I feel like the statistics and the stats really speak for themselves. I think we’re experiencing enormous growth,” she said. “That’s really what my job is. So I’m just dug in on it, and I do the best I can every day.”

Marcoux Samaan was the athletic director at Princeton for seven years before joining the LPGA. Before that, she was the EVP of the Chelsea Piers Connecticut sports and fitness complex. Marcoux Samaan’s predecessor at the LPGA, Mike Whan, spent 11 years as commissioner before taking the USGA’s CEO role.

There has been a lot of change atop golf’s top tours and governing bodies this year.

The R&A—golf’s governing body outside of the U.S.—appointed Mark Darbon as its new CEO in July, replacing Martin Slumbers, who retired. The PGA of America is set to announce a new CEO soon, following the resignation of Seth Waugh in June.

LIV Golf is also searching for a new CEO to replace Greg Norman, whose contract expires in 2025. Last week, former NBA and NHL executive Scott O’Neil was reported to be close to accepting that job, first by Sports Business Journal. O’Neil led the business operations of the 76ers and Devils while working for those teams’ parent company, Harris Blitzer Sports & Entertainment.