Two-time major champion Jon Rahm allowed his frustrations to boil over before inadvertently striking a volunteer with a divot during the opening round of the PGA Championship. LIV Golf star Rahm was grouped with Jordan Spieth and Rory McIlroy on Thursday at Aronimink, as the Spaniard’s future remains uncertain due to a funding reduction from the PIF beyond the 2026 season.
Rahm has secured two individual LIV Golf victories during the 2026 campaign, potentially the final campaign of the Saudi-backed tour. Playing amongst the world’s elite on Thursday, he finished at one-under par, but displayed considerable frustration on the seventh hole when he grabbed a chunk of turf from the ground in anger, sending the divot towards a nearby volunteer.
“Thanks for reminding me of that,” Rahm said when asked about the incident. “I got a flier on my second shot that went long. It’s not a good spot. Just out of frustration, I tried to make an air swing, just over the grass, and I wasn’t looking, took a divot, and unfortunately, I hit a volunteer.
Rahm’s second shot on the seventh went 170 yards to the right rough, landing over the green nearly 48 feet from the hole, leading to his frustration.
“Yeah, it hit him, and unfortunately it hit him in the shoulder and then the face,” explained Rahm. “Which I couldn’t feel any worse.
“That’s why I was there apologising. I need to somehow track him down to give him a present because that’s inexcusable and for something that could be completely avoidable. Whether it was my intention or not, it was just not good.”
Rahm has yet to win a PGA Championship in his career and said he needs to do a lot more to be considered in golf legend history.
“I think I need to accomplish a lot more to even think about it,” said Rahm. “It makes sense why Rory would think, second on the all-time list of majors in Europe. First one ever to do the grand slam. It makes sense why he would think about it, right? I would put him as the greatest European to ever play already.”
McIlroy completed the career grand slam in 2025 and earned back-to-back green jackets in 2026.
“When it comes to the grand scheme of things, he’s up there,” said Rahm of McIlroy. “And I can see why he thinks about it, because he can take this within the context, he’s not too far away from being an undoubtedly top-10 player of all time. Which I’m sure a lot of people would already put him there, and he still has many, many years to play.”