Brooks Koepka has voiced his support for the rule change that Tiger Woods has previously called for the PGA Tour to make. Koepka is allowed to compete in shorts at LIV Golf events - a luxury not afforded to Woods and all other players on the PGA Tour.
The advent of the Saudi-backed breakaway league saw LIV Golf revamp some of the sport’s traditions. Shotgun starts off the tee, competing for three rounds and no cuts were all changes to golf’s long-standing format.
In terms of dress code, the DP World Tour has allowed shorts to be worn in high temperatures, but the PGA remains a stickler for tradition. That’s despite calls from golf legend Woods for the tour to rewrite the rules - and Koepka has backed up the icon’s point.
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Asked about the feeling of playing in shorts since his switch to LIV in June 2022, Koepka told the Pardon My Take podcast: “It’s so much nicer.” The five-time major winner suggested that the extra comfort may even have improved his game by two strokes, adding that he is rarely in climates suitable for trousers: “You don’t even want to play when it’s [10°c] and raining.”
The PGA have allowed caddies to wear shorts since 1999 but remain steadfast on players competing in their standard attire, despite allowing shorts on practice rounds and at pro-am tournaments. It has been six years since Woods first called for the dress code rules to be relaxed.
“I would love it. We play in some of the hottest climates on the planet,” Woods said in 2018. “We usually travel with the sun, and a lot of our events are in the summer, and then on top of that when we have winter months here, a lot of the guys will go down to South Africa and Australia where it's summer down there.”
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“A lot of the tournaments are based right around the equator, so we play in some of the hottest places on the planet. It would be nice to wear shorts. Even with my little chicken legs, I still would like to wear shorts,” Woods joked.
Lee Westwood echoed his LIV Golf colleague Koepka when he was forced to comply with the PGA rulebook at the US World Senior Open in June. Having joined LIV in 2022, the 51-year-old was asked how he would cope competing for an extra 18 holes - but the dress code proved to be more of a sticking point for Westwood.
"I think I can manage it [72 holes]. It's playing in trousers that's bothering me more. 72 holes won't be a problem,” he admitted. "Like I say, it's looking down and seeing my legs in trousers. I prefer to get my legs out.
"If you notice, most of the guys wear shorts in practice. You can see how many people are comfortable, especially when it gets a bit warm putting a pair the shorts on."
