iStockphoto / John David Mercer-USA TODAY Sports/gguy44
Change is Coming sign in front of the East Lake Golf Club sign in Atlanta, Georgia at the PGA TOUR Championship
The PGA Tour’s TOUR Championship is being held at East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta this week. It is the culmination of the FedEx Cup Playoffs and the PGA Tour‘s season and despite there being $40 million up for grabs this week it lacks all of the luster of Golf’s Major Championships.
All of this is set to change next season. Brian Rolapp, the PGA Tour CEO and Commissioner, held a press conference at East Lake GC this morning and announced the TOUR’s plan to move to a match-play format next season. Following the PGA Tour Championship series final event next season, which includes 90 players, the top 32 golfers in points accrued from throughout the season will move on to a two week long match-play competition.
As awesome as this sounds for golf fans, PGA Tour members have been ‘violently against’ the idea in the past.
PGA Tour Championship Will Be Two Week Long Match Play Event
The event will be held at multiple courses according to the announcement. But the new plan was not welcome by all. An article from ESPN’s Mark Schlabach cites a PGA Tour player advisory council meeting two years ago where the idea of a match-play style TOUR Championship was proposed. Keith Mitchell who sits on the Future Competition Committee says Tour members were “violently against” the idea when it was proposed.
At that point, the proposal was for a traditional match-play style culmination to the season. This will not be that. Instead, it will take place following the season and will include 32 golfers.
Keith Mitchell told ESPN “the most important thing for the players was rewarding a seasonlong champion without some sort of gimmicks [like] elevated points or starting strokes. We wanted the regular-season champion to be as accurate as possible, and the FedEx Cup bonus distributions to be as accurate as possible.”
The ‘starting strokes’ has been a point of contention in recent years with the FedEx Cup Points leader coming into East Lake with a several stroke lead over the field before play even began. It has been clear that model was not welcome by the golfers or the fans and the TOUR needed a new approach.
Moving to a two-week-long match-play style championship will certainly stretch out TV ratings and test the lengths golf fans are willing to go to watch their favorite pros on TV. Anyone who works remotely will welcome this change with open arms. Having consequential / high stakes sports on TV during the middle of the day on a Tuesday or Wednesday is as good as it gets when you work from home.
How will it work?
Week 1 will include all 32 golfers each competing in 4 matches. Their win-loss records will determine whether they move on to Week 2. Keith Mitchell told ESPN “you’re not one-and-done because some guy has a great round and you’re out of the tournament. The group play kind of solves that.”
Week 2 will then begin with 16 golfers advancing until the last golfer remains undefeated.
What do you think, will this solve the currently lackluster ending to the PGA Tour and how the TOUR Championship has lost gravitas throughout the years? Let me know your thoughts down below in the comments.