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Two PGA Tour golfers defecting to LIV Golf in time for season-opening tournament in Mexico

tom d'angelo, palm beach post
·2 min read
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FILE - Mito Pereira, of Chile, leaves the green on the 18th hole after his final round of the PGA Championship golf tournament at Southern Hills Country Club, Sunday, May 22, 2022, in Tulsa, Okla. He hit driver into the creek that cost him a chance at his first major. (AP Photo/Matt York, File)
FILE - Mito Pereira, of Chile, leaves the green on the 18th hole after his final round of the PGA Championship golf tournament at Southern Hills Country Club, Sunday, May 22, 2022, in Tulsa, Okla. He hit driver into the creek that cost him a chance at his first major. (AP Photo/Matt York, File)

LIV Golf reportedly is adding two PGA Tour players who will give the league a boost for its season-opening tournament in Mexico.

Sebastian Munoz told Colombian El Tiempo he was jumping to LIV and is being joined by Chilean Mito Pereira, who lives in Palm Beach Gardens. Pereira has been rumored to be making the jump since August.

Munoz, a native of Colombia, and Pereira are expected to join Joaquin Niemann's Tourque team, giving Greg Norman's league an all-South American team less than two weeks before the season starts at El Camaleon in Mexico.

Pereira, 27, is close friends with fellow countryman Niemann, who lives in North Palm Beach. Pereira was looking to move about 18 months ago and chose Palm Beach County with some urging from Niemann, who settled in North Palm Beach about four years ago.

Now he is also following Niemann to LIV.

Pereira, 45th in the World Golf Rankings, is coming off his rookie season on the PGA Tour in which he had three top-10 finishes in 27 starts. But he is best known for surrendering the lead on the 72nd hole of the PGA Championship at Southern Hills in Tulsa. He hit an awkward tee shot that landed in a creek and led to a double-bogey, resulting in a third-place finish behind Jupiter's Justin Thomas, who defeated Will Zalatoris in a playoff.

Pereira, who has never won a PGA Tour event, handled the shocking finish with class. He had another top-10 finish the next week, placing seventh at the Charles Schwab. But after closing 13th at the Memorial, he missed four consecutive cuts, as many as he had missed the previous nine months. He's played in 37 career PGA Tour events, earning $3.7 million.

Munoz, 30, is ranked 93rd. He turned pro in 2015 and has one win on the PGA Tour, the 2019 Sanderson Farms Championship. Munoz has made $9.2 million in 134 PGA Tour events.

LIV, which is financed by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund, is rebranding as the LIV Golf League this year and will include 14 events with a total prize purse of $405 million. Eight events are in the U.S., including two in Florida: March 31-April 2 at Orange County National in Winter Garden, and Oct. 20-22 at Trump National Doral.

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Two more PGA Golfers defecting to LIV to join Joaquin Niemann's team