The image is seared into memory. Cameron Smith, his face alight with the impossible joy of a dream realized, lifting the Claret Jug at St Andrews. The mullet, the grin, the unshakable putting stroke that carried him past Rory McIlroy in that transcendent final round. For a moment, the Queenslander wasn't just winning a major championship. He was etching himself into the permanent story of golf.

Three years later, that moment feels both indelible and impossibly distant. The LIV Golf saga that swirled around Smith even as he conquered the Old Course has since consumed his career trajectory in ways that tell us less about one man's choices and more about the fractures running through modern sports. The money was always going to talk. But what happens when the trophies stop?

Smith's decline in major championships since joining LIV isn't just a statistical downturn. It's a human story about how quickly the ground can shift beneath an athlete's feet. The man who seemed destined for multiple major titles now faces the very real possibility that his St Andrews triumph might stand alone. There's no villain in this narrative, only the quiet tragedy of momentum interrupted.

The LIV Golf debate often reduces to moral absolutes. The establishment versus the rebels. Tradition versus progress. But Smith's journey exists in the uncomfortable middle ground. His game was perfectly suited for golf's biggest stages, and yet the siren song of generational wealth pulled him toward a tour that has fundamentally changed his competitive rhythm. Whether this was foresight or myopia depends entirely on who you ask.

What gets lost in the financial calculus is how athletes experience time. That five year major exemption felt like security in 2022. Now, with two years remaining, it looms as an hourglass draining faster than anyone anticipated. Every missed cut at a major isn't just a bad week. It's a subtraction from the finite inventory of chances Smith has left to remind the world why the Claret Jug wasn't a fluke.

Australian golf fans know this pain well. Greg Norman's own complicated legacy serves as a ghostly parallel. The what ifs that followed Adam Scott after his Masters triumph. The way Jason Day's body and game drifted out of sync after reaching world number one. There's a particular melancholy to watching brilliant golfers confront the limits of their primes, especially when outside forces accelerate the process.

This isn't to suggest Smith's career is over. Golf history is littered with resurgences. But the question lingers. Can he rediscover competitive relevance while playing a fragmented schedule against diluted fields? More importantly does he even want to? The answers may determine whether we remember Smith as an all time great who took the money and ran, or as a cautionary tale about timing and legacy.

The irony is brutal. Smith left for LIV to secure his future, but may have inadvertently shortened his present. As he prepares for Portrush, one suspects he isn't just facing a golf course. He's reckoning with the version of himself that electrified St Andrews. The golfer who made us believe anything was possible. The champion who deserved better than to have his coronation overshadowed by questions about where he'd go next.

The tragedy isn't the money. It's the talent. And how quickly we forget what it looks like when it shines its brightest.