Golf: Dustin Johnson has US$30 million year and growing in LIV Golf

Dustin Johnson is assured of claiming the LIV Golf points race and a US$18m bonus. Photo / AP

Dustin Johnson needed only six events to have a US$30 million (NZ$53.9m) year, and he still has two events left with Saudi-funded LIV Golf.

Even though he failed to finish in the top 10 for the first time, Johnson clinched the inaugural LIV Golf Individual Championship over the weekend.

The two-time major champion already has earned US$12,758,600 — US$3 million of that from four team victories in the LIV Golf Invitational series — with one individual title.

Winning the season points title comes with an US$18 million (NZ$32.3m) bonus.

With 1228 total shots over his six rounds so far this season that equates to $26,302 per swing of the golf club or around $746k-an-hour based on a four-hour round.

Johnson has 121 points going into the LIV Golf Invitational-Jeddah event this week in Saudi Arabia. He has a 42-point lead over Branden Grace, who had to withdraw last week because of an injury. The winner of each event gets 40 points.

Johnson was the most significant player Greg Norman signed for the rival league. He held the No. 1 ranking longer than any other player since Tiger Woods and had said in February he would stick with the PGA Tour until changing his mind in June.

The US$30 million is in addition to the signing fee to join LIV Golf, which The Daily Telegraph reported to be about US$125 million over four years.

Johnson won the Boston event in a playoff. He tied for second in the LIV events at Trump Bedminster in New Jersey and outside Chicago.

The LIV Golf events feature US$25 million in total prize money — US$20 million for the individual competition, with the winner getting US$4 million.

Johnson's most lucrative year on the course on the PGA Tour was in 2020, when he captured the FedEx Cup and its US$15 million bonus and earned just over US$5 million in regular prize money. He played 14 times that season, which lost nearly three months because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Greg Norman, the CEO and commissioner of LIV Golf, referred to the 38-year-old Johnson as the "cornerstone" of the league.

"He has more than lived up to his billing," Norman said.

After the seventh event in Saudi Arabia, LIV Golf wraps up its season with a US$50 million bonanza at Trump Doral near Miami for team competition. Each player on the winning team gets $4 million.

Johnson earned nearly US$75 million, not including FedEx Cup bonuses, in his 15 years on the PGA Tour before resigning his membership to join LIV Golf.

LIV Golf is funded by Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund.

- AP