The “free Wesley” movement has once again reached a fever pitch. Wesley Bryan is a PGA Tour winner turned content creator who has been banned from the PGA Tour.
The “free Wesley” movement has once again reached a fever pitch.
Wesley Bryan is a PGA Tour winner turned content creator who has been banned from the PGA Tour. That’s because Bryan featured in a LIV-organized YouTube video, where content creators played alongside LIV players.
It’s strictly prohibited for any PGA Tour players to feature in LIV events, including videos such as these, so Bryan was given an indefinite suspension. Some thought this punishment was harsh, as it was akin to the one given to players who left the PGA Tour to join the LIV Golf league.
There have been frequent calls for the PGA Tour to allow Bryan back, and those cries have grown louder since the tour allowed five-time major winner Brooks Koepka back after he left LIV.
In a recent interview Bryan revealed whether he knew that he’d be punished by the tour before filming the event.
Wesley Bryan said he knew the PGA Tour would suspend him for playing in LIV event
Bryan’s suspension was surprising for most. The PGA Tour had punished players for leaving to play on LIV professionally, and that was to be expected, but showing that the same rules applied to content creators threw an interesting wrinkle into the mix.
But not for Bryan, who was told that he’d be suspended prior to the event. He said on the Dan on Golf podcast: “I talked with a couple of people at the tour, trying to plead my case, or at least give them some things to think about why I didn’t feel like it should have been an event that didn’t go well.
“At the time I’m like learning the rules and regulations on the fly and I’m just looking at it, I’m not a lawyer or anything, but I’m looking at it from my point of view saying there’s just no way that I can read these and actually go through with a penalty as harsh as anybody that teed it up in a LIV event.
“Turns out I was wrong through that process. But I had a little more faith in the appeals process and appeals committee than I probably should have. But at the end of the day, it was me taking a stance that YouTube golf is my passion. That’s where I feel like I can have the most impact on the game of golf.
“And I felt like it was going to better serve our audience by me doing the YouTube thing and potentially sacrificing playing rights on the PGA Tour to continue to do what I was really passionate about.
“Obviously, in a perfect world, I’d love to do both, but I was put kind of in a corner to where I could turn down an opportunity to make really, really good content that we would own. The creators would own Grant Horvat Bryan Bros Golf, being a couple of those people that were actually going to own the content.
“I had to turn that down, to continue to play on a tour of which there’s no hiding it, I’ve seen it a lot in comment sections recently that yes, I didn’t win five major championships. And believe it or not, I do realize that I’ve missed a lot of cuts on the PGA tour as well. So, I’ve seen that in comment sections as well.
“I just had to make a decision for the overall YouTube golf landscape. That was obviously a difficult decision that I had to make at the time, knowing what the repercussions could be.
“And I was at peace with it. I really was until the last couple of weeks when all this stuff started kind of resurfacing of a direct pathway back to the PGA tour, and in a quicker timeline than mine.”
Wesley Bryan says how the PGA Tour responded to his letter to them after Brooks Koepka’s return
When the PGA Tour allowed Koepka to return, Bryan sent another plea to CEO Brian Rolapp. He wasn’t allowed back on the tour as a result of the letter, and he revealed how the tour responded to it.
Bryan said, “I think the most disappointing part of it all is, my wife sent a letter off to Brian Rolapp and Jay Monahan, and we got a response saying they reviewed the letter, but it was from basically their assistant saying there were no conversations necessary.
“That was pretty difficult to say, like why can’t we even talk on the phone for 10 or 15 minutes to just like just help me understand, from a guy that’s actually the one making the decision, of I want to at least be able to meet on some common ground.
“Because I want what’s best for the game of golf as a whole, and I feel like the YouTube golf community can provide a lot of value to the PGA tour, but also to the game of golf, and we should have a vested interest in that together. But it seems like right now it’s pretty one-sided.”
It doesn’t look like the PGA Tour has any intention of allowing Bryan back any time soon, so the “Free Wesley” movement might have to continue for a little while yet.
Category: General Sports
