Jon

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Signing a five-year LIV contract cemented Jon Rahm’s status as one of the best paid sportsmen in the world.
 
Forbes magazine placed him second on the list of richest sportsmen in mid-2024, with estimated total earnings of nearly $220million. He trailed only soccer legend Cristiano Ronaldo, and left basketball icons such as LeBron James and Steph Curry in his wake.
 
His net worth was boosted by his outstanding form in LIV Golf events. He won in the UK and Chicago, and picked up $18million for topping the overall individual standings.
 
Rahm also savored his role as captain of Legion XIII. He and his LIV team-mates finished second in the overall points table in 2024.
 
The team is named for the legion that fought for Julius Caesar and won fame for crossing the Rubicon with the Roman emperor in 49AD.
 
The legion’s symbol was a lion, which explains the logo that appears on the team’s hat and other merchandise.
 
Rahm and his men are ready to roar again in 2025, while the skipper will also hope to add to his total of two Major titles. He is also keen to represent the European team in the Ryder Cup, which will be held on the Bethpage Black course in Long Island, New York.

Rahm was born in November 1994 in Barrika, a town in Spain’s Basque country. Like many a golfer from that country, he grew up inspired by Seve Ballesteros and still idolizes the charismatic legend of European and world golf.
 
By his mid teens, Rahm was representing Spain as an amateur and helped his nation to lift the European Amateur Team Championship in 2014, when he also topped the individual standings at the Eisenhower Trophy.
 
His next step was a move to Arizona State University on a golf scholarship. It soon became apparent that he was destined to reach the highest levels of the sport.
 
Rahm was the first two-time winner of the Ben Hogan Award, which is presented to the top college player, an accolade he received in 2015 and 2016. He still ranks that dual achievement among his proudest moments.
 
While reigning as the world’s top-rated amateur for a total of 60 weeks, his occasional forays into pro tournaments showed immense potential. His last tournament as an amateur was the 2016 US Open, where he tied for 23rd place.ac

“I fight till the end, every shot matters to me,” is a quotation that any golf fan who has watched him play would agree sums up Jon Rahm’s approach to the game.
 
This is an ultra-competitive player whose attitude and mental toughness have carried him to a host of top-level victories as well as a slew of other top 10 finishes.
 
Less than a year after turning pro, Rahm recorded his first PGA Tour victory by sinking a huge eagle putt to clinch the Farmers Insurance Open in San Diego in January 2017.
 
He competed strongly in several other tournaments in 2017, and moved up to 14th in the world rankings when he lost to Dustin Johnson in the final of his first appearance at the WGC-Match Play tournament.
 
Rahm started fast again in 2018, winning the CareerBuilder Challenge in a play-off against Andrew Landry. His consistency earned him an automatic place in the Ryder Cup, and he was part of a European team that emphatically thumped the USA in France.
 
More victories followed in 2019 and in the following year, his win in the Memorial Tournament put him at the top of the world rankings for the first time.
 
He was the first Spaniard since his idol Ballesteros to be world No.1, and over the coming years Rahm would occupy that coveted spot for more than 50 weeks in total.
 
All that was missing from his trophy cabinet was a Major championship victory. Rahm had racked up seven top-10 finishes in the majors going into the 2021 US Open, and this time he would finish top of the leaderboard.
 
Rahm moved steadily into contention over the first three days at Torrey Pines, but was still three shots off the lead on the scorecard going into the final round.
 
He still trailed when teeing off on the 17th, but showed his steely character by birdying both of the last two holes to finish with a 67 and beat Louis Oosthuizen by a single shot.

That 2021 US Open victory put Jon Rahm back on top of the world rankings, a position he would hold until the following spring.
 
More victories followed in 2022 but, having finished in the top 10 in all four the year before, the closest he came to another Major triumph was his 12th place at that year’s US Open.
 
“I battled my swing most of the year,” he later admitted. “I wasn’t as comfortable as I was the year prior, and that showed. When you go to Major championship golf, where you need to be better in every way, those mistakes are going to show.”
 
Rahm was born with a club right foot, and his right leg is half an inch shorter than his left. That has implications for his mobility – and his swing.
 
He admits to having conflicts with coaches who wanted to moderate his style – he has a notably short driver swing – but has developed a technique that works perfectly for his body while imparting the power he needs to put through the ball.
 
From the start of 2023, Rahm looked much happier with his swing. He racked up three PGA Tour victories before the end of February, and went into the Masters tournament at Augusta as one of the leading players to prevail.
 
Rahm dueled with fellow LIV star Brooks Koepka throughout the four days at golf’s most iconic course. Starting the final round four shots behind his rival, he made a series of clutch birdies before sealing his first Green Jacket with pars at the last four holes.
 
That victory put Rahm back on top of the world rankings, and he competed strongly at The Open that summer before playing a key role in another European Ryder Cup success, this time in Italy.

Winning at Augusta ensured Jon Rahm a place among the immortals of golf – and attendance at one of the most exclusive social events in the world of sport.
 
Every year, before the tournament tees off, former champions assemble in their Green Jackets for the Masters dinner, where the menu is chosen by last year’s winner.
 
Not surprisingly for such a proud Spaniard, Rahm’s selection for his fellow diners included “Mama Rahm’s classic lentil stew”. More surprisingly, the usually confident Rahm admitted to being daunted at the prospect of having to deliver a speech to such an esteemed audience.
 
By the time he rose to address them, Rahm had taken the decision to accept his LIV deal and to become the captain of Legion XIII, where his team-mates included Ryder Cup colleague Tyrrell Hatton.
 
Legion XIII competed with honor throughout the 2024 program, finishing in first place at four of the 12 events before coming home fourth in the season-ending team championship.

It was during his time as a student in Arizona that Rahm met Kelley Cahill, who was an outstanding sportswoman in her own right. She represented the track team in javelin, and was also a highly regarded tennis player.
 
The couple married in 2019 and they have three children. Sons Kepa and Eneko were born in 2021 and 2022 respectively, and they were joined by daughter Alaia in September 2024.
 
The Rahm family are still based in Arizona – but his children’s names demonstrate Rahm’s deep devotion to his homeland. He has referred to Spain as “the country that has given me so much”, and speaks Basque, along with Spanish and English.
 
But Rahm isn’t a very Spanish name, is it? In fact, it comes from a distant ancestor who moved to Spain from Switzerland in the 18th century.

Jon Rahm has recorded eight holes in one during his professional career. Two of them came in successive days in practice at the Masters in 2020, where he finished tied for seventh.
 
The second of these has gone down in history as one of the most extraordinary aces you’ll ever see. His tee shot at the short 16th skipped several times on the surface of the water that guards the green before rolling slowly but surely into the hole.

Like most top golfers, Jon Rahm is always looking for the slightest change to his game or gear that might make a small but crucial difference to his score.
 
In late 2023, he switched to an Odyssey Ai-One Putter after analysts showed him a tiny improvement that might have earned him an extra $2.5million on the course that year.
 
Odyssey is part of the Callaway empire, the brand whose clubs Rahm has carried for many years. Among his other sponsors have been elite companies including Mercedes-Benz, Rolex, Santander. He wears Ringer Cuater golf shoes while on the course, and has had a long association with Maestro Dob Tequila.
 
Rahm’s consistent record of success has ensured that his long-term caddie, Adam Hayes, is one of the highest earning bag carriers in the game. Hayes’s annual salary is believed to be more than $500,000, a figure that is augmented by a cut of Rahm’s on-course winnings.

The Jon Rahm who takes part in the LIV Golf events of 2025 is one of the most recognisable, popular and successful players in the sport.
 
A family man with three children, at the age of 30 he can expect to have several years ahead of him as one of the leading competitors in any tournament he enters.
 
Rahm has a solid swing that works well for him, and a fierce competitiveness that drives him to excel and to try his absolute best on every stroke he plays.
 
He may have come a long way from his Basque roots, but the clear sense is of a man and a golfer with his feet firmly on the ground.
 
It will always be fascinating to watch him in action whenever he bids to add more trophies and titles to his proud record in the Majors and in LIV Golf.