Changes to the Tour, your thoughts?

[fix]

The PGA Tour has announced big changes to the 2007 season. It will start in January and players earn points up to the and including the PGA Championship.

Depending on their standings in the points players will then compete in four play-off style events in August and early September with the Tour Championship being the 4th. Early reports have the Barclay's Championship, Western Open and Deutchebank being the others (New York, Boston & Chicago markets).

After that there will be the quest for the card where another 6-7 events will follow the tour championship to allow golfers to try and earn their card for the next season and will still count as official money.

The Player's Championship will move to May to give a major event in every month.

One aspect of this that I really like is the new schedule date on the tour calender for the Canadian Open, it moves back to a mid-summer date from the September date is has held since 1990.

[BSmack]

From a fan's perspective, anything that will force the best players to compete for a solid 2 month period is a good thing. Between the 4 event "playoff" and the British Open, WGC and PGA Championships, the world's elite players will be playing a hell of a lot of tournament golf from Mid July through mid September. This is going to create big drama and will be a huge ratings boost.

The big losers are the post Tour Championship events who have just been relegated to AAA status like the 84 Lumber event. They will be forced to throw even more money at top players to try to lure decent fields. If I am the CEO of 84 Lumber I am very pissed off about investing huge amounts of cash into an event only to have it put on the back burner by the Tour. I expect a big time scramble as title sponsors and tournament directors react to this change by either pushing for a schedule change for their tournaments, changing sponsorships and adding big dollar corporate outings to the schedule a la what the Doral Tournament did this year.

For the average touring pro, I say it is a win-win situation as the average purse size looks like it will double from what it was. For guys like Tiger, Vijay, Ernie and Phil, I say it is more like win-break even as they will not have the luxury of dictating their major tournament preparation schedule like they have in the past, but they will be playing for twice as much money as they were playing for.

As for the Canadian Open, is it going to be in the sport the Western Open used to hold? If so, that aligns perfectly with the schedule favored by most of the big name players. If not, it will be Mike Wier and a bunch of scrubs playing.

[fix]

That's the spot that the CPGA is hoping for and one that has been talked about.
There's also rumours floating about that it will be either the weekend following the British Open or the weekend prior.

[BSmack]

That's the spot that the CPGA is hoping for and one that has been talked about.
There's also rumours floating about that it will be either the weekend following the British Open or the weekend prior.

I like the Canadian Open square inbetween the US and British. Call me a traditionalist, but I like the idea of the top players competing for national championships. Unfortunately, I can see the 84 Lumber tournament raising a big stink and thowing huge dollars at the PGA to get that prime slot. They sponsor Daly and Vijay, and that counts for something as well.

IMO, if the PGA is going to go to a points system, they need to subtract points for tournaments not played. Give the guys a certain number of free passes and then penalize on points thereafter. Say maybe any fewer than 25 tournaments and they start losing points.

Of course you would have to make the prize big enough to make it worth the effort for the guys to compete for the points. And therein lies the rub.

[indyfrisco]

I like the idea. Although I don't watch NASCAR, I believe this is the same type of deal as the Nextel Cup. Crowning a champ each year in this fashion should bring much more excitement to the game. It will also produce more "rivalries" I think, not just Tiger vs. The World.