Moving PGA to May critical
Adjustment gives FedEx Cup more attention.
PONTE VEDRA BEACH, FLA. — The timing for a revamped PGA Tour schedule could not have been more appropriate.
This is the 50-year anniversary of the PGA Tour breaking away from the PGA of America, leading to years of disharmony. Well, as much as this gentile game allows. And yet all these years later, it took a strong relationship between the two organizations for American-based golf to get the schedule it wanted.
Next season’s schedule was released Tuesday, and there were lots of moving parts, most of them already known.
The FedEx Cup playoffs have been reduced from four events to three, with the opening event alternating between the New York area and Boston. The season will end at the Tour Championship on Aug. 25, allowing the richest payoff in golf — expect that $10 million FedEx Cup prize to increase significantly next year — to be awarded before fans shift their interest to college football and the NFL.
Minnesota replaces Houston. Golf returns to Detroit and leaves Washington. Florida will have four straight tournaments in March for the first time since 2006.
None of this works, however, without the PGA Championship moving from August to May.
“Without the commitment and great partnership with FedEx, and the great partnership with the PGA of America, we’re not where we are today,” PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan said Tuesday.
Monahan’s main concern was his biggest corporate partner, FedEx, which in 2007 ponied up $35 million in bonus money for a year-end bonanza aimed at giving the PGA Tour a more defined finish to its season. It was critical to establish continuity and heritage for the tour to renew its deal, and that meant creating more value — more attention — for the FedEx Cup.