LIV Golf is facing an avalanche of speculation Wednesday about its future, with multiple reports suggesting the Saudi-backed circuit may be on the verge of collapse — though players on the ground in Mexico say they’ve heard nothing official.

Golf reporter Ryan French, the man behind the “Monday Q Info” X account, set off the firestorm during a Tuesday night X Spaces broadcast, telling listeners “everybody should probably stay near their phones… It’s happening, it’s definitely happening.” Mr. French said he had “some pretty good sources” telling him “LIV is shutting down.” He also claimed that some players and employees had not been paid on time.

The Telegraph added fuel to the fire Wednesday morning, reporting that LIV Golf executives had been called to an “emergency summit” in Manhattan, though the exact reason for the gathering remained unclear. The outlet also noted that not a single executive was present at Club de Golf Chapultepec, the site of LIV’s Mexico City event, one day before the tournament was set to begin, and that the media center had been closed Tuesday. 

Golf Channel analyst Brandel Chamblee, a longtime critic of the breakaway tour, did not hold back. In a post on X, Mr. Chamblee wrote that LIV had been “so ill-conceived and ended up being worse than anyone could have imagined,” pointing to its shotgun starts, team format and thin viewership, and asking whether it would surprise anyone if the Saudis “finally euthanized the whole lame-brained tour” — a circuit he said had been “losing billions along the way.” 

Not everyone was ready to sound the death knell. Sergio Garcia, speaking in Spanish at a pre-tournament press conference Wednesday in Mexico City, pushed back on the shutdown talk. “No, sincerely, we have not heard anything yet,” Mr. Garcia said. “That is not what Yasir told us at the beginning of the year, that he is behind us, that they have a project of many years.”

The league also released tee times for Thursday’s opening round, suggesting the $30 million event is expected to proceed as scheduled. Upcoming LIV venues have also not been informed of any change to their 2026 schedule. 

Golf social media personality Tom Hobbs, who runs the LIV-focused Flushing It account, said Wednesday that he had spoken directly to multiple people within LIV Golf, all of whom reported no issues with being paid and said future venues were proceeding as normal. 

The financial backdrop, however, has long been troubled. By 2025, LIV Golf had reportedly incurred losses totaling $1.4 billion since its founding in 2022, with Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund injecting an estimated $5.3 billion into the league by February 2026. The league averaged just 175,000 viewers on Fox networks last year, compared to the PGA Tour’s average audience of 3.1 million.