DUBAI — It was a joke in March when Laurie Canter made her Players Championship debut and received a set of Tiffany cufflinks from PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan. That becomes even more true now, eight months later, when Kanter will become the first former LIV player to play a full PGA Tour event.
As one of the top 10 players yet to receive an exemption in Dubai, where points were completed on Sunday, Kanter will receive full eligibility on the PGA Tour next season, a prize he never considered three years ago when he played a full season on the rival tour.
It was June 9, 2022, when Kanter became a founding member of Cleeks GC. Minutes after teeing off at LIV, Monahan sent out a memo to the golf community: All competitors on the rival tour would be suspended from the PGA Tour. From that point on, all LIV events were considered “unsanctioned” events and anyone participating in these events had to wait a full year before qualifying for a PGA Tour sanctioned event.
This even applies to non-tour members like Kanter, who finds himself stuck in the unpopular middle ground of professional golf’s cold war. He plays a full season in 2022 and then serves as a LIV wild card in 2023. After two games in early 2024, he was replaced by LIV’s next big thing, Anthony Kim.
Kanter doesn’t take it personally, but his professional golf options are limited. He returned to the DP World Tour with financial security – a comfortable $5.6 million earned in 20 LIV events – just in time for the best golf of his life.
Kanter won the European Open in June 2024 and then the Bahrain Championship in March 2025, earning enough world ranking points to squeeze into the Players Championship, which is where he received special cufflinks from Monaghan.
Kanter was the focus of the first interview day in his debut at TPC Sawgrass, but ultimately failed to advance. From there, his year was feast or famine, with just enough feast to advance to the DP World Tour Championship, compete for the title, and earn one of 10 PGA Tour cards in 2026.
“It’s not orthodox, or in that respect it’s not intentional,” Kante said on his debut as a player in March. “That’s the way I was presented with the opportunity.”
