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World`s golfers divided between two events in same week
Georgia, Oct 02: There are two tournaments on the PGA Tour schedule this week. That`s one too many. The top players on Tour will tee it up in the World Golf Championships-American Express Championship in Georgia. That`s where you`ll see Tiger Woods, Ernie Els, Davis Love III, Jim Furyk and Mike Weir.
Georgia, Oct 02: There are two tournaments on the PGA Tour schedule this week. That's one too many. The top players on Tour will tee it up in the World Golf Championships-American Express Championship in Georgia. That's where you'll see Tiger Woods, Ernie Els, Davis Love III, Jim Furyk and Mike Weir.
The rest of the guys are headed to Madison, Miss., for the Southern Farm Bureau Classic. That's where you'll see everybody else who wants to play on the first weekend in October.
The Southern Farm Bureau has a new slot on the schedule this year. Previously it was held opposite the Tour Championship, but the Tour wisely changed the schedule so that all of our attention is focused on an event that features the top 30 money-winners from this season.
Maybe it's time to give some thought to clearing the schedule a little more. The Tour season began in 2003 on Jan. 9 in Hawaii with the Mercedes Championships. It will end officially when the Tour Championship crowns a winner on Nov. 9, a 10-month schedule.
In reality, though, the season hardly ends. The World Cup follows the Tour Championship the very next week, then comes the Franklin Templeton Shootout, the Presidents Cup, the UBS Cup, the Skins Game, the Target World Challenge and the Wendy's Three Tour Challenge, which is a taped event.
Granted, the tournaments that follow the Tour Championship are unofficial and have limited fields. Still, that means there are only about three weeks out of the year where some PGA Tour-related event is not taking place.
And there's nothing wrong with those events. We all like and watch them, or some of them. But it seems that with so much golf on the schedule, perhaps it's time to get away from holding two tournaments in the same week.
We see that happening four times each year, with the WGC's Accenture Match Play, NEC Invitational and American Express Championship and with the British Open.
While those four events are on the Tour schedule, they are different in that the first three are sanctioned by the International Federation of PGA Tours and the British Open by the Royal and Ancient. They're Tour events, but sort of not Tour events.
But the Masters, U.S. Open and PGA Championship are sanctioned by other bodies and do not have competing events. And the B.C. Open should not be played the same weekend as the British Open. Not that the B.C. competes for attention with the British; the focus of the golfing world is on the game's oldest championship. It smacks slightly of disrespect having a competing tournament against the British when the other three majors don't have another event taking place the same week.
There's nothing wrong with the B.C. Open. It's been a great stop on the Tour for years. It just needs to be played another week, as do the Southern Farm Bureau, Chrysler Classic of Tucson and Reno-Tahoe Open, the latter three being opposite the WGC tournaments.
The Reno-Tahoe and the Las Vegas Invitational have sponsor problems (neither event has have one). Should those events cease to exist, that would be a good time to let the Tour schedule decrease by two events. Let attrition take care of two more, and there would be no more competing events.
Commissioner Tim Finchem has said that the job of the PGA Tour is to provide tournaments for its members. He's right; that is the Tour's job. But would the Tour actually suffer if the second echelon of players didn't have a place to tee it up one week when the weather is warm? Uh, no.
Wouldn't cutting the number of tournaments decrease some players' chances of making the top 125? Not really. There are guys who already have played 25 to 30 tournaments in 2003 and still haven't cracked the top 125 in money earnings. Those players have issues other than the lack of a place to play.
Would four more events help them? You could say they might get lucky one week, but the odds say they won't. Maybe a week away from the grind would help more than pressing to make the cut in the Reno-Tahoe Open.
Bureau Report
The rest of the guys are headed to Madison, Miss., for the Southern Farm Bureau Classic. That's where you'll see everybody else who wants to play on the first weekend in October.
The Southern Farm Bureau has a new slot on the schedule this year. Previously it was held opposite the Tour Championship, but the Tour wisely changed the schedule so that all of our attention is focused on an event that features the top 30 money-winners from this season.
Maybe it's time to give some thought to clearing the schedule a little more. The Tour season began in 2003 on Jan. 9 in Hawaii with the Mercedes Championships. It will end officially when the Tour Championship crowns a winner on Nov. 9, a 10-month schedule.
In reality, though, the season hardly ends. The World Cup follows the Tour Championship the very next week, then comes the Franklin Templeton Shootout, the Presidents Cup, the UBS Cup, the Skins Game, the Target World Challenge and the Wendy's Three Tour Challenge, which is a taped event.
Granted, the tournaments that follow the Tour Championship are unofficial and have limited fields. Still, that means there are only about three weeks out of the year where some PGA Tour-related event is not taking place.
And there's nothing wrong with those events. We all like and watch them, or some of them. But it seems that with so much golf on the schedule, perhaps it's time to get away from holding two tournaments in the same week.
We see that happening four times each year, with the WGC's Accenture Match Play, NEC Invitational and American Express Championship and with the British Open.
While those four events are on the Tour schedule, they are different in that the first three are sanctioned by the International Federation of PGA Tours and the British Open by the Royal and Ancient. They're Tour events, but sort of not Tour events.
But the Masters, U.S. Open and PGA Championship are sanctioned by other bodies and do not have competing events. And the B.C. Open should not be played the same weekend as the British Open. Not that the B.C. competes for attention with the British; the focus of the golfing world is on the game's oldest championship. It smacks slightly of disrespect having a competing tournament against the British when the other three majors don't have another event taking place the same week.
There's nothing wrong with the B.C. Open. It's been a great stop on the Tour for years. It just needs to be played another week, as do the Southern Farm Bureau, Chrysler Classic of Tucson and Reno-Tahoe Open, the latter three being opposite the WGC tournaments.
The Reno-Tahoe and the Las Vegas Invitational have sponsor problems (neither event has have one). Should those events cease to exist, that would be a good time to let the Tour schedule decrease by two events. Let attrition take care of two more, and there would be no more competing events.
Commissioner Tim Finchem has said that the job of the PGA Tour is to provide tournaments for its members. He's right; that is the Tour's job. But would the Tour actually suffer if the second echelon of players didn't have a place to tee it up one week when the weather is warm? Uh, no.
Wouldn't cutting the number of tournaments decrease some players' chances of making the top 125? Not really. There are guys who already have played 25 to 30 tournaments in 2003 and still haven't cracked the top 125 in money earnings. Those players have issues other than the lack of a place to play.
Would four more events help them? You could say they might get lucky one week, but the odds say they won't. Maybe a week away from the grind would help more than pressing to make the cut in the Reno-Tahoe Open.
Bureau Report