The PGA Tour is tabling its plans to stage a world sequence of three occasions that may have included its prime gamers competing for purses price as a lot as $25 million, sources confirmed to ESPN on Wednesday.
The PGA Tour introduced Aug. 1 that the highest 50 gamers within the FedEx Cup factors standings, in addition to prime performers from an undetermined variety of fall occasions, would compete in three worldwide tournaments that would come with restricted fields and no cuts. At the moment, the tour didn’t announce dates and places for the worldwide occasions.
An individual aware of the tour’s plans advised ESPN that the tour would as an alternative focus its efforts on 13 tournaments with elevated purses for prime gamers, which is able to embody the three FedEx Cup playoff occasions, Sentry Event of Champions, Genesis Invitational, Arnold Palmer Invitational, The Gamers, Memorial Event, WGC-Dell Applied sciences Match Play and 4 further occasions that may rotate by way of current PGA Tour tournaments.
Commissioner Jay Monahan introduced final Wednesday that the PGA Tour’s prime gamers had dedicated to compete in 20 occasions, together with the 13 elevated occasions with common purses of $20 million, beginning in 2023.
Gamers may even compete within the 4 main championships, in the event that they’re eligible, and three different tour occasions of their selection to finish the 20-event schedule.
Monahan had initially introduced plans for the worldwide sequence throughout a information convention on the Vacationers Championship on June 22. The supply stated the worldwide sequence is perhaps staged in some unspecified time in the future sooner or later, doubtless going down as limited-field, no-cut, non-points occasions.
By including the 4 new elevated occasions, in accordance with the supply, going ahead with the worldwide sequence would have been too taxing for gamers who need extra day off within the fall after the FedEx Cup season ends in August.
The tour plans to maneuver again to a streamlined schedule, from January to August in 2024, as an alternative of the wraparound schedule it has used the previous few seasons. Following the FedEx Cup playoffs in August 2023, a yet-to-be-determined variety of official tour occasions can be performed within the fall.
Whereas all gamers with standing can be eligible to play in these tournaments, these outdoors the highest 70 will compete for FedEx Cup factors and standing for the 2024 season. The highest 70 gamers who qualify for the primary FedEx Cup playoff occasion can be totally exempt for the following season.
At the least one PGA Tour member, Spain’s Jon Rahm, expressed issues in regards to the 20-event requirement for gamers to be eligible for the $100 million Participant Influence Program bonuses. Rahm can also be a member of the DP World Tour and has to play 4 occasions in Europe to be eligible for the European Ryder Cup group.
“If now we have to play all these 20, then yeah, 100% [it’s asking more of the European guys],” Rahm stated. “I would not be stunned if that adjustments, as a result of that places me in a tough place. If I’m going play in Europe within the fall, I’ve to play from January till August 20 instances. I believe that is my seventeenth [tournament] from January [this year] and I do not suppose I might add any extra.
“So yeah, particularly with Ryder Cup and having to play 4 in Europe, yeah, I believe it is a bit of an ask, and I would not be stunned in the event that they revise a little bit of a rule or make an exception for some gamers. But when they do it for gamers like me and Rory [McIlroy], they could should do it for everyone.”
