The men's professional golf world has been shaken up over the past several months as this man



has sold his soul to the devil and aligned with MBS's blood money regime in an attempt to tear down the PGA Tour. Greg Norman has had a personal vendetta against the Tour for decades and he's finally found a mark to fund his grudge. So far his Saudi back league is 0-for-1 in the U.S. legal system with the bigger case(s) not being settled until likely 2025. Unfortunately for LIVtards, their OWGR will sink into the hundreds and many of them won't be eligible for future majors. But that is the price they chose to pay to receive bonesaw dollars in their bank accounts.

But enough of the Saudi golf leage, this thread is dedicated to the preeminent golf tour based in Florida. Some good news for the players as, a few days ago, the Tour announced a series of elevated events where we are guaranteed to see the world's top players teeing it up together. Let's take a look at those events:

The three playoff events: FedEx St. Jude Championship, BMW Championship, The TOUR Championship

The Genesis Invitational
Arnold Palmer Invitational
the Memorial Tournament
WGC-Dell Match Play
Sentry Tournament of Champions
The PLAYERS Championship

The four majors: The Masters, PGA Championship (Oak Hill C.C.), U.S. Open (LACC), British Open (Royal Liverpool G.C.)

TBA: four additional events

That's a **** ton of elite events on the calendar the Tour is delivering to fans this season. The world's best golfers at some of the game's most historical courses and tournaments.

Here's a link to the Korn Ferry Tour '25':

https://www.pgatour.com/korn-ferry-t...tourbound.html

Word is that Taylor Montgomery is a name to keep an eye on in this new crop of professionals that possess a coveted Tour card.

Now for some questions we should have answered during this upcoming Tour season (which kicks off September 15):



Now that Will Z has the win monkey off his back does a major win soon follow?

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Does another golfer reach golf's Holy Grail?

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Who will we miss more? Cameron Tringale or Jena Sims?

Thread was overdue for an update.
Will this also be the gathering place to discuss the brand spanking new indoor imaginary tests of golfing skills?

hell no

They should ban Rory and Tiger if they play in the Virtual Tour

In before Mark Zuckerberg starts the metaverse golf tour and starts writing massive checks.

Well when Scottie was up by 6 strokes I thought this would be the end of the staggered leaderboard for the Tour Championship. I think had Scottie run away with it and won by 8, there would be talk of changing it up.

As it turned out we got a great duel down the stretch and the guy who had the best score without the starting strokes handicap, won anyway.

So I guess they will be sticking with this format. I'd still rather see some sort of combination format for the Tour Final, like a stroke-play for the first 2 days with top finishers advancing to match play for the last 2 days, something like that.

It's pretty crazy that Rory started the tournament with a 6-stroke handicap, then triple-bogeyed the very first hole, and still won the whole thing.

indifferent at best to the changes, but I'll probably watch some anyway.

The changes don't do much other than give more money to the top 20.

I'll still watch every week like always and more money for players the better. I'm looking forward to seeing how much tiger plays this season and if his leg continues improving.

Part of the reason the PGA Tour retains as much vitality as it does is that the money (and the opportunity to win that money) isn't concentrated exclusively in the hands of a few. Limited field, no-cut events do exactly that. Extrapolate that over time and you end up with a stale product. You need guys coming up, good stories, hungry players to constantly refresh the product.

But that's just my opinion.

they'll still have that. if i'm not mistaken, the elevated events have spots reserved for players doing well in the other tournaments

To be fair I haven't spent much time reading the details. But I rather doubt that the PGA Tour is done "evolving" and the evolution only runs in one direction.

I think there's a bunch of stuff for the lower-ranked guys also - $500k minimum salary for one. Also a $5k stipend for travel for players missing the cut at an event.

The fact that the Top 20 is based on PiP is a bit odd though, although supposedly it will not be weighted by social media anymore. Have no idea how the rankings will work since no one knows how the PiP actually works.

There will definitely be a bunch of events with ludicrously weak fields, since all the top guys will be concentrated in the bigger-money elevated events. Not sure how those tournament sponsors will feel about that.

Has the tour said where all this extra money is coming from, are sponsors ponying up more, or are they giving less to charity?

I figure about $160 million additional payout to players next year. Inflation will probably cover about $25 million. PGA Tour owns exclusive rights to its shotlink data platform, so expect some changes there to increase revenue. Networks may be willing to up their deals in short order instead of waiting. Regarding charities, PGA Tour only contributes about 10% of the aggregate raised across the board (i.e. including local charities), so I don't see a material change there. Also, reducing charity $ to pay players more is bad optics. They might be doing that, but they will bury it in the details. They could sell off some of their TPC properties, but matching asset sales with rising expenses is clearly not sustainable.

PIP will be about 30% of 2022 purse money, which for me appears to be the Rory and friends fund that will remain until LIV is gone. To whom that gets paid out does not seem merit based, other than the phrase "top players".

Rory keeps saying that everybody has a chance at getting to these new limited field events. If he wants to compare 90 lower tier guys teeing it up in a full field event the same as 15 or so qualifying with a top 5 or whatever, that is really disingenuous. Even current invitational events like Memorial or Arnold Palmer have a lot of players who will not be eligible in the new format. (if the proposed changes get approved)

I get it, the tour wants to protect their membership. Unions would do it with triple tier wage scales. LPGA did it for years until it became obvious the Lori Kanes of the world can no longer compete. PGA Tour does it with the guys from 100-125, even down to 150 have status. KFT events have fields that rival many of the smaller purse Tour events in quality. At least it seems easier to be promoted to the Tour than in the past.

I like the $5k travel stipends. For a young talented player who struggles getting a sponsorship this could be a difference maker over a couple seasons of events. $500,000 minimum yearly seems to be a negotiating chip to counter balance the $100 million PIP + the exclusive $20 million tournament club, for the general membership to sign off on the deal.

So the way I see it the existing tour will become 2 tours. The top 60 will tend to remain the same top 60 year over year for the most part, of course with a few guys getting relegated and an equal number promoted. The lower tier tour will eventually transition to an upgraded KFT, and KFT will become a qualifying school similar to, but with more events than what we had in the past.

Point to add: the lower tier "tour" events will almost certainly see a reduced purse structure, or at least not go up in relation to the exclusive tour events, most likely due to lack of major TV network coverage and reduced sponsorships. Monahan can justify this internally by rationalizing that the Joel Dahmens of the world should be happy getting what they get. This won't be sustainable IMO, and will likely cause additional rifts between membership, event organizers, and sponsors. How this plays out will likely determine the future of professional golf, as the upper tier "tour" consisting of limited field no cut events will not be sustainable on it's own.

you know, there's one thing the 'Joel Dahmens' of professional golf can do to help their lot

play better

Eventually they will. But the shop will remain closed long enough to give Rory and friends so much $ that it won't matter.

The Joel Dahmens of the tour that left for LIV, guys like HV3, Gooch, Swafford, Uihlein, Perez, Lahira, Otriz will most likely end up making out way better. The Joel Dahmens of the PGA might miss out on a lot of the big money events now on the PGA while also missing out on the opportunity to now join LIV.

lol these bottom feeders will be kicked out at the first opportunity

how is Andy Ogletree's career going?

First opportunity of what, Better players joining LIV?

possibly, or MBS saying fk this and dropping Norman's pet project. these guys are hitching their wagon to MBS. there are risks involved with doing that

also, there's a thread for LIV talk. keep it in that thread plz

There's always risk involved.

I'm not talking about LIV. I'm talking about the new PGA tour structure that kinda sucks for guys who don't win often and a bad run or nagging injury could cost them a lot of money compared to guys that left for guaranteed income.

'there's always risk involved'. true. a meteor could end life on Earth tmr

if their conscious can bear it, those guys should consider lvg the Tour and joining LIV (if they rcv an invitation). i don't think the majority of golf fans have a problem w players going to LIV. they do have a problem w LIV players trying to have their cake and eat it too / LIV's goal of tearing down the Tour. if you don't think that is one of LIV's goal you don't know the devil that burns bright inside Greg Norman

i remember somebody said in the LIV thread what is the 140th player in the world owed (or something to that affect). is he owed $20m a year? $15m? $10m? $5m? $1k? he's owed whatever the market will bear. are the changes the Tour is making worsening his earning power in the future? i'd argue no, that in fact his earning power will stay steady/increase

if there is no PGA Tour his earning power is drastically reduced, so the first order of business is making sure the PGA Tour stays a viable sporting property. how best to do this? retain and market your best talent, no? these are the steps the Tour is taking. no, check that, this is what the players are doing led by the players that matter, the players that TV networks pay millions to broadcast, the players sponsors want to be associated with, the players fans want to pay tickets to see. going in a different direction would be business malpractice of the highest order. Harvard biz students would be reading case studies on how the PGA Tour, for some reason, took direction from James Hahn and not Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy. would be laughable, wouldn't it?

finally, a **** ton of money has been poured into the PGA Tour beginning now. existing 'secondary' tournaments will not have their purses reduced. routes to the 'elevated' events are available for the 'bottom feeders'. how is this hurting their earning power? you rarely get something for nothing in this lifetime (blood money from MBS being an exception), so 'bottom feeding' players need to, you know, earn that money and those playing opportunities. quaint, isn't it?

We don't yet know how purses will be impacted for lower tier events post 2023. Sponsors/networks likely will want some concessions, with the bargain they simply won't carry these events. The Tour could subsidize these purses, but I doubt that is sustainable.

Some aspiring players may like the 2 tier structure. Maybe they prefer a chance to run hot and get on the gravy train instead of the grind it is now. But I suspect most will realize that the opportunities to win big events now are better than these token spots being offered. McIlroy says everybody has a chance. Certainly that is a true statement, just like everybody has a chance to hit the lotto or hit a big slot jackpot in Vegas. I'm not saying these are numerically equivalent, but McIlroy is completely off base. Is one guy who wins $5 million the same opportunity as 10 guys winning $1 million? Obviously not.

If the end result of professional golf is that only X number can make a good living, then perhaps we are entering that phase. LPGA has been like that for some time: if you are not top 40, forget about a career there.

lol at painting the evolving PGA Tour as some drastic difference from what we have now. yes we do know the secondary tournament purses won't be effected as the commish said so. there's no indication of any TV contracts being renegotiated. why would they be? you're painting a narrative that doesn't exist (or please provide me the links to the dire straights so that i can educate myself).

LIV is a trash product without a TV product. the only game in town for US broadcasters is the PGA Tour. LIV as an entity hasn't changed this in the least. the Boston event this weekend is unlikely to exceed 750,000 concurrent viewers worldwide. worldwide. that's a **** product. they're a joke and golfers signing up for them are signing up for golf irrelevance. who gives a **** how Koepka is hitting the ball this weekend. it doesn't mean a thing. who gives a **** how Ancer is putting this weekend. it doesn't mean ****. they are irrelevant in the sport now. the PGA Tour is a star making enterprise. the PGA Tour will continue to spit out new stars. LIV isn't capable of making stars

lol at if you're not top 40 forget about having a career. again the market will dictate what type of living you 'deserve'. if you don't like it go back to school and learn C+ or Java. or take courses in nursing and elder care and choose what part of the country you wish to work and live in as the demand is through the roof to wipe the asses of Boomers