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Legendary golfer Jack Nicklaus was awarded $50 million by a Florida jury after suing Nicklaus Companies, his former company funded by billionaire Howard Milstein, for defamation.
18-time major champion sued the company after it said Nicklaus was considering a $750 million deal to join LIV Golf and was no longer mentally fit to manage his affairs.
Nicklaus said he met with the Saudis in 2021 but said he turned down offers twice. Sports Illustrated.
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Jack Nicklaus speaks with his lawyers during a break in closing arguments in Judge Reed P. Scott II's courtroom at the Judge Daniel T.K. Courthouse. Hurley in West Palm Beach, Florida on October 20, 2025. (THOMAS CORDI/PALM BEACH POST/USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images)
“The Saudis have offered me in excess of $100 million to do work likely similar to what Greg is doing,” Nicklaus said at the time. “I refused. Once verbally, once in writing. I said, “Guys, I have to stay on the PGA Tour. I helped start the PGA Tour.”
The suit said Nicklaus “was not interested in the offer and declined it because he believed the PGA Tour was an important part of his legacy and if the PGA did not support the new league, he did not want to be involved.” according to ESPN.
Jack Nicklaus addresses the media prior to the Workday Memorial Tournament at Muirfield Village Golf Club on June 4, 2024 in Dublin, Ohio. (Tracy Wilcox/PGA TOUR via Getty Images)
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“These are the people who planted the story,” Nicklaus' lawyer, Eugene Stearns, said in his closing argument via Palm Beach Post. “This story is a lie… They wanted to create in the public's mind that Jack Nicklaus is an old man who sold out to the Saudis.”
The Palm Beach Post reported that jurors found the defendants spread false information that damaged Nicklaus' reputation and led to “ridicule, hatred, mistrust, mistrust or contempt.”
“It's always hard to prove damage to reputation in a defamation case because, especially for a guy like Jack, it's always a very good thing,” Stearns added to ESPN. “But I think the biggest thing was the controversy that arose 3 1/2 years ago when the company told the world that Jack was selling the PGA Tour to Saudi golf when that was not true. So, we're glad Jack was acquitted.”
Jack Nicklaus stands on the 18th hole during the final round of the Workday Memorial Tournament. (Aaron Doster/Imagn Images)
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Nicklaus, 85, is widely considered one of, and perhaps the greatest, golfers of all time, winning a total of 73 tournaments. His 18 majors are the most ever – three more than Tiger Woods, who is tied with Sam Snead for the most PGA wins (82).
Nicklaus's last specialty was 1986 Masterswhich he won 24 years after his first.
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