Getty Image / Fred Kfoury III
Next week’s Memorial Tournament in Dublin, Ohio was scheduled to be the PGA Tour’s first event with spectators since the season resumed on June 11, but those plans have changed.
On Monday, the PGA Tour announced that out of ‘an abundance of caution’ fans will not be allowed at the tournament. The original plan was to allow up to 8,000 fans through the gates each day with social distancing measures in place, but with positive test numbers appearing to increase in certain spots around the country the Tour elected to pull the plug on that idea.
“The Memorial Tournament presented by Nationwide and the PGA TOUR have made the right decision in not allowing spectators to attend this year,” said Ohio Governor Mike DeWine. “I know it was a difficult decision to make, but the organizers of the Memorial Tournament have put the health and safety of players and fans first.”
This week’s tournament, the Workday Charity Open, is the first of back-to-back events set to take place at Muirfield Village. The original scheduling never mentioned fans being allowed this week, only for next week’s Memorial.
Ultimately, this decision to not have fans at next week’s tournament seems like a no-brainer as the PGA Tour, just like any other professional sports organization, has to play things as safe as possible especially with 10 more events on slate for the 2019-20 schedule.
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Mark is an associate editor at BroBible. Follow him on Twitter @ItIsMarkHarris for the occasional good tweet. Feel free to contact him at Mark@BroBible.com.