Paulina Gretzky ‘shut it down’ after threats over Johnson’s LIV move

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Paulina Gretzky revealed that her and husband Dustin Johnson received numerous death threats after the golfer’s big-money defection to LIV Golf in 2022.

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The daughter of the Great One, Wayne Gretzky, appears on the second season of Netflix’s golf docuseries Full Swing and opened up about a turbulent time in the couple’s lives. She says that she had to “shut it down” and stay away from messages on social media.

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“People sending death threats and awful, awful, awful things,” Gretzky said. “People were aggressive, that’s for sure. But that’s when I shut it down for a little bit. I was like ‘I don’t need to look at this. Everyone has an opinion on it. Fine.’”

Johnson was paid a reported $125 million to jump from the PGA Tour to the Saudi-funded golf outfit, where he is the captain of the 4Aces GC team.

After settling into their new reality, Gretzky said that she’s happier now that she’s not “taking a back seat” to the couple’s “old life” on the PGA Tour, which featured a much more extensive schedule.

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“We have a little bit more time together now since things have changed a little, whereas before, it was like, go go go,” Gretzky said.

“We have more control now of how we do things. That old life that we had, I had to take a backseat, but now it feels like we’re in the front of the plane together flying. It was the right move.”

On top of the extra time together as a family – the couple have two sons, Tatum and River, ages 9 and 6 – Johnson has raked in much more cash than could’ve been possible on the PGA Tour.

The former Masters and U.S. Open champion reportedly collected more than $35 million in winnings from his first year with LIV Golf on top of the four-year, $125-million contract he signed to come over.

Johnson has individual wins in all three of his LIV Golf seasons: 2024 Las Vegas, 2023 Tulsa and 2022 Boston.

He reportedly made roughly $75 million during his 15 years on the PGA Tour.

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“Dustin Johnson took the money. He got 150 million,” golf journalist Dan Rapaport said in an interview for the docuseries. “He seems to be living his very best life and it’s just not any more complex than that.”

Despite the death threats, Johnson said that he has no regrets about his move.

“We knew what we signed up for,” Johnson said.

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