In a cringeworthy display of smugness, ESPN personality Rich Eisen hosted vocal LIV Golf critic Alan Shipnuck on The Rich Eisen Show to pronounce the Saudi-backed league dead and outline with barely concealed delight how the PGA Tour plans to punish its defectors.

The conversation wasn’t thoughtful debate — it was an enthusiastic blueprint for professional payback, complete with suspensions, demotions to the Korn Ferry Tour “minors,” and forced public atonement for the unforgivable crime of taking a better-paying job.

Shipnuck, whose anti-LIV book ‘LIV and Let Die’ makes his bias crystal clear, described PGA Tour officials as “enjoying this with great gusto,” predicting that while a few big names like Bryson DeChambeau and Jon Rahm might get preferential treatment due to their drawing power, most players would face “payback,” “retribution,” and “vengeance.”

“It’s time for payback,” Shipnuck shockingly said. “It’s time for retribution, vengeance. That’s on the menu here.”

He explicitly stated that defectors should “serve suspensions” and “earn it the old-fashioned way” through humiliating minor-league purgatory. Eisen, nodding and laughing vigorously, offered no counterpoints or challenging questions, allowing the segment to devolve into what felt like a coordinated struggle session against players who dared exercise economic freedom.

This is the epitome of the toxic country club smugness that has alienated so many golf fans from the traditional media establishment. The same voices who constantly lecture about “growing the game” now openly cheer the prospect of ritualistic humiliation for athletes who simply followed market incentives.

Brooks Koepka provided the perfect visual metaphor yesterday at the RBC Heritage, where the five-time major champion — reduced to first alternate — was photographed sitting in a plastic lawn chair outside the scoring area, waiting passively to see if he’d get into the field.

The viral X image captured the petty gatekeeping perfectly: a superstar made to audition like a rookie for the “sin” of joining LIV.

The hypocrisy is staggering. Players like Koepka, Mickelson, DJ, and DeChambeau spent years building the PGA Tour’s brand, generating massive television revenue and fan interest.

When LIV introduced innovative formats and transformative paydays, many logically followed the money and opportunity. That’s not disloyalty; it’s basic capitalism. Yet Eisen and Shipnuck treat it as ideological treason deserving of public shaming and career regression. Their glee at the idea of ex-LIV players groveling for reinstatement exposes an ideological authoritarian streak — punishing “wrongthink” rather than celebrating player agency in a free market.

Adding insult to injury is the complete lack of disclosure regarding Eisen’s vested interest. His show airs on platforms deeply intertwined with the traditional sports media landscape that has long partnered with the PGA Tour ecosystem.

Eisen — who admitted to “know” PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp, a former NFL exec — has previously criticized any PGA-LIV framework agreement as “Saudi Arabia buying the PGA Tour.” Fair opinion, but when your own professional success is tied to one side crushing the competition, basic journalistic ethics demand transparency. It was conspicuously absent here.

Shipnuck’s long-standing anti-LIV crusade is no secret, and commentators are entitled to their views. But amplifying those views on a major platform while jointly salivating over players’ potential degradation reveals the ugly underbelly of golf media culture.

The backlash to Koepka’s lawn-chair moment proves fans are fed up with this elitist attitude that treats world-class athletes as serfs who should remain grateful for the old system’s scraps.

LIV Golf undoubtedly faces real hurdles — funding questions, viewership challenges, and organizational flux are legitimate topics for scrutiny. But turning those struggles into a celebratory struggle session, complete with fantasies of vengeance, says everything about the critics’ petty mindset and nothing about genuine concern for the game’s health.

Fans see the double standard and the unseemly joy in punishing success, and they’re tuning out the smug set. The true embarrassment isn’t the defectors who took the money, it’s the media figures who can’t hide their delight at the thought of making them suffer for it.

Watch: Rich Eisen and Alan Shipnuck Fantasize About the Coming PGA Tour Struggle Sessions