Curry, golf tour eye S.F. for event

City could OK Harding Park stop Thursday

The San Francisco Recreation and Park Commission is expected to approve a proposal Thursday to amend the city’s contract with the PGA Tour — paving the way for an annual tour event at Harding Park hosted by Warriors guard Stephen Curry.

One consequence of the deal: Harding will not host the 2026 Presidents Cup, as previously planned.

Tour officials have been talking to Curry for nearly two years about attaching his name to a new tournament in the Bay Area. The event would make its debut in September 2021, on the fall portion of the PGA Tour schedule.

The contract for the Curry event will cover at least five years, according to a Rec & Park staff report posted Wednesday. The amendment scheduled for a discussion and vote Thursday would relinquish the ’26 Presidents Cup, as city and tour officials finalize the Curry

event.

Harding Park is scheduled to host the PGA Championship, Aug. 69, the first major in the course’s 95year history.

Curry, an avid golfer who made two starts on what is now known as the Korn Ferry Tour, has long sought to align himself with a PGA Tour event. Lake Merced Golf Club in Daly City once was considered the likely destination, but talks broke off in January 2019.

“We are still committed to bringing an event to San Francisco,” Curry told The Chronicle at the time. “It just won’t be this year.”

Curry preferred to host an event at a public course such as Harding, to fit his mission of growing the game. The charitable foundation Curry and his wife, Ayesha, established — Eat. Learn. Play. — will be the main beneficiary of the new tournament.

Workday, the finance and humanresources software company based in Pleasanton, has agreed to be the title sponsor. Workday also sponsored last week’s PGA Tour event in Ohio.

This counts as the latest example of Curry’s expanding involvement in golf. Beyond those two tour starts and his regular appearances in the celebrity event near South Lake Tahoe (the American Century Championship), he also pledged $1 millionplus in August to fund the Howard University golf program.

Curry then held a charity event at Harding Park in September, in conjunction with his foundation and the PGA of America. He serves as an ambassador for PGA Junior League, an initiative to bring kids into the game.

The PGA Tour, a separate entity, also was eager to seize on Curry’s popularity and interest in golf. Hence, the behindthescenes maneuvering over the past two years to launch a new tournament in the Bay Area.

“To partner a PGA Tour tournament with an iconic global athlete like Stephen Curry would be an extraordinary opportunity and one we’ve been pursuing, as widely reported in recent months,” the tour said in a statement in January 2019, when the proposed event at Lake Merced fell apart.

“... We look forward to continuing discussions with Stephen Curry, his family’s foundation and other parties with the hopes of ultimately bringing a PGA Tour event to the Bay Area.”

Now the event is nearly finalized, giving Curry and Harding Park an annual presence on tour.

The new event probably will open the PGA Tour’s 202122 wraparound schedule, and immediately precede the Safeway Open at Silverado Resort in Napa. That would create backtoback tour stops in Northern California, potentially strengthening the fields in both tournaments.