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11/25 09:33 CST PGA Tour has fewer cards and smaller fields. But the big
changes are still to come
PGA Tour has fewer cards and smaller fields. But the big changes are still to
come
By DOUG FERGUSON
AP Golf Writer
ST. SIMONS ISLAND, Ga. (AP) --- Sunday at Sea Island was supposed to be looked
upon as doomsday for so many PGA Tour players who left the final event of the
PGA Tour season without a full card.
This was the year the tour eliminated 25 cards, lowering the bar to No. 100 in
the FedEx Cup standings to retain full status for 2026. The developmental Korn
Ferry Tour offered only 20 cards to the big leagues, down from 30 cards the
previous year. The fields will be smaller next year.
It just didn't feel like the end, perhaps because the next chapter remains so
uncertain.
Lee Hodges had a 10-foot birdie putt he missed on the final hole that would
have moved him into the top 100. Ricky Castillo thought he got it done with a
closing 62, only for Max McGreevy to make a 30-footer birdie putt on the last
hole that knocked him out.
Both are likely to be in Honolulu for the Sony Open on Jan. 15 for the start of
a new season.
Has anything really changed? Not yet.
There might not be as much opportunity, but there are tee times. And that's all
anyone can ask in a game where success is still tied to a score.
PGA Tour officials have been crunching numbers and their best estimate is the
leading 10 players who missed out on the top 100 will have access next year to
about 16 of the tournaments. That doesn't include the eight $20 million
signature events, the four majors, the three FedEx Cup playoff events and The
Players Championship.
A few of them can still play their way into the big stuff. Otherwise, they
might feel like they're playing on a different tour.
Perhaps that was the idea all along.
"I know it's going to get tougher and tougher, and the goal posts are moving a
little bit," Harris English said last week. "I know it's going to get harder
for me. I'm 36 years old. I'm not getting any younger. But we'll see where it
goes. Everybody is in for the good of the PGA Tour and to make our product the
best it can be.
What that product looks like remains to be seen.
English shared what amounted to water cooler conversation when he said "the
talk of the tour" was perhaps waiting until the Super Bowl was over to start
the season. That sounds like one of the options the Future Competition
Committee chaired by Tiger Woods is contemplating.
English usually doesn't make headlines unless his caddie can't get into the
U.K. or his name is slipped into the Ryder Cup envelope that keeps him from
playing singles.
"Just speculation," he said with a shrug before teeing off Sunday.
Such a move is plausible considering how often Brian Rolapp, the new CEO of PGA
Tour Enterprises, talks about "scarcity" in a bid to make the golf season worth
watching from start to finish.
Two days after English was talking golf and football, Rolapp was in Palm Beach
Gardens, Florida, for the CNBC CEO Council Experience Forum. He was asked
whether he could see a schedule that didn't start until the Super Bowl ended.
"Yeah, I could see that," Rolapp said Friday.
And to think that former PGA Tour Commissioner Tim Finchem once set a 20-year
goal in 2000 for golf to surpass the NFL in fan base. The tour has been running
from the football ever since.
"If you dig deeper into what he (English) said, it's not that complicated,"
Rolapp said. "Competing with football in this country for media dollars and
attention is a really hard thing to do."
The Future Competition Committee was formed in August and didn't meet for the
first time until a month ago. More telling was when Rolapp said he has invited
media partners --- and some media groups not (yet) involved in golf --- to seek
their ideas.
One advantage for Saudi-backed LIV Golf --- besides the funding --- was being
able to start a league from scratch without more than 60 years of having
operated roughly the same way. Blowing up a proven product can be messy.
"Part of professional golf's issue is it has grown up as a series of events
that happened to be on television," Rolapp said. "As opposed to, ?How do you
actually take those events and make them meaningful in their own right, and
cobble them together in a competitive model --- including a postseason --- that
you would all understand whether you're a golf fan or a sports fan.'"
He said it was key for the committee to start the process with more questions
than answers. His message to the media partners was simple.
"Blank sheet of paper," Rolapp said. "What would you do? How would you make
this great to increase fan engagement?"
His three guiding principles since he took over have been parity, simplicity
and scarcity.
"The bad news is golf only has one," Rolapp said, referring to parity. "But
it's the hardest one to get."
Eight players won the eight signature events this year. Scottie Scheffler won a
signature event, two majors and a FedEx Cup playoff event. Also, three
tournaments Scheffler played were won by players outside the top 50 in the
world ranking at the time.
"What worked in the NFL --- and I think all sports are chasing --- is how you
make the tightest competition possible so on any given Sunday you don't know
who's going to win," Rolapp said. "Golf has that. ... That is incredible
strength."
It's the other two that are the subject of debate.
"How do you actually make a competitive model that's simple to understand? And
how do you make scarce events that fans want to follow? Those are the
principles guiding the competitive model," he said. "I think we'll know in a
handful of months where we come out."
Maybe then it will be time for players on the outside to get nervous.
___
On The Fringe analyzes the biggest topics in golf during the season. AP golf:
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