The PGA Tour has undergone a dizzying array of changes in the last few years, some voluntarily, some imposed upon it. On Tuesday, however, it was made clear that golf's strongest circuit has further room to evolve. The tour’s 16-member Player Advisory Council shared a 23-page memo with the entire membership that outlined several proposed changes it’s asking take effect in 2026. They include everything from the reducing the size of tournament fields to whittling down the number of exemption categories, from tweaking FedEx Cup points distributions at certain events to reimagining its pace-of-play policy.These proposed interconnected changes—to which PAC chairman Camilo Villegas foreshadowed were coming an Oct. 16 memo—are intended to streamline the competitive environment, create more drama and clearer storylines, and improve the overall PGA Tour product. It’s no exaggeration to say that what the tour Policy Board will be voting on when it convenes Nov. 18 is the most sweeping overhaul since the creation of the all-exempt initiative in 1983.
In my fevered imagination, i can hear Glinda telling Patrick that he's always had the power....
Here's where the rubber meets the road, and I pay off the header. because it's a pretty awful time to be a Tour rabbit:
Smaller tournament fields. The proposal creates a new maximum field size of 144 players (down from 156) in an open tournament held on one course. However, fields can be reduced further to 132 or 120 to account for available daylight. Notably, the Players Championship would be trimmed from 144 to 120.
Yes, we can't have any of those pesky players taking food out pf Patrick's mouth:
Having completed the palace coup that keeps the riffraff out of those massive money grabs, the powers that be decided there were still too many pretenders But, bear with me, as I repeat a few words from the excerpt above:
create more drama and clearer storylines
Do you feel silly? You should, because I suspect that we have all been laboring under a naïve assumption that these are athletic competitions. You see our mistake, though, as they're in this to control outcomes.
Shockingly, nobody does the math of the total reduced playing opportunities, but the fix is not even evident on the graphic, as it elides their biggest coup, those eight Signature Events. The rabbits will know, as they're being warned to not ever expect entry into those moneygrabs. Know your station, proles!
Are you ready for that next shoe?
The PAC is calling for significant cuts to the number of players who are exempt on tour each year, while also proposing to limit exemption categories and other qualifying avenues. First and foremost, the plan calls for a reduction in the number of fully exempt players who retain their tour cards off the FedEx Cup points list each year from 125—a number established in 1983 with the creation of the “all-exempt tour—to 100. The Korn Ferry Tour would see a reduction of 10 cards, from 30 to 20. The tour also would cap the Q-School graduated at the top five finishers (it used to be top five and ties) and either eliminate Monday qualifiers or reduce the number from four to two in others during the regular FedEx Cup season, depending on an event’s field size. This is all part of the tour redefining, to some degree, what it means to have a card and its significance. In some ways, the tour is strengthening its position as a meritocracy—drawing a clear distinction from the rival LIV Golf League—by challenge its members to play better in order to keep their tour status.
And as soon as they've choked off that supply of exempt players? You know the LIV guys are coming back at some point....
Reactions are bizarre, take this from two Golf.com writers about the reduced field sizes:
Dylan Dethier: Why? Because the Tour was sick of finishing their first rounds on Friday instead of Thursday and making the cut on Saturday instead of Friday! Because they were sick of players warming up in the dark and finishing in the dark! And, if you want to zoom way in, because they were sick of players finishing the ninth hole of their Thursday or Friday round and having to wait at the turn because there was a backup caused by 13 groups in a wave (current) instead of 12 (proposed). A fog delay would essentially derail the structure of the entire event. The status quo was getting bad for players, for staffers, for viewers, for broadcasts, for gamblers. Even for golf writers. Really bad. This is good. Sean?Sean Zak: It’s the easiest way of making sure these tournament days finish on time, which had sneaky become a real issue for the Tour. Could you make players play faster? Sure. But could you just take a few players off the board instead? That’s going to be much more efficient.
Sure, Sean, it's more efficient, unless you're one of the few players involved.... And heaven forfend these guys get around in under five hours, but that's a lot to ask.
I have trace elements of sympathy for the early season events with their limited daylight hours, but we seem to have given up any sense that we remember what matters. But it's quite the sequence of changes, because fresh off denuding those Moneygrabs of interest because of their comically small field sizes, they've turned their attentions to destroying the tour's remaining events. Yanno, those events that they've already beclowned by making them Non-signature.
Now, in this case I do kind of agree with them, except we're forgetting who expanded to fill 52 weeks of the calendar:
2. TOUR SIZEFor decades the Tour has maintained full status for the top 125 players on its FedEx Cup list (and, pre-FedEx, its money list). In this proposal, they’re changing that to 100.Why? And is this good or bad?Dethier: It’s hard to call this “good” without seeming a bit heartless, but I think there’s a better way to think about it: these changes are protecting the sanctity of what it means to have a PGA Tour card. In recent years the Tour has added so many different side-doors into PGA Tour membership that you could have status and still not get into a lot of events. When you factor in reductions in field size, this isn’t necessarily “good” but it’s essential. And look, this isn’t a career-ender for those outside the top 100 — if you finish No. 105, say, you just get bumped down a couple categories and you’ll play a bunch of events. This is a more realistic reflection of what it should mean to have a full PGA Tour card.Zak: I think it’s really solidifying the top part of the pyramid. I’ve written a good bit about the PGA Tour-As-Food Chain idea, and in this case we are moving to a very round 100 players with full status and a very round 50 with full Signature Event access. It’s turning the membership into a much easier to understand, more package-able entity. It’s cutthroat, to be sure, but it probably is necessary. Mr. 101 is still going to do just fine, but as always I would suggest they play just a little better.
Guys, I've got some swamp land in which you might be interested, because clearly you'll buy anything....
Having succeeded with their coup involving those moneygrabs, I agree this seems like petty cash. But it's all about insulating the only players that matter, yeah all six, from any effects of the marketplace. Obviously to make that stick you have to slow this train down.
3. PATHWAYSThe Tour’s “Pathways Subcommittee” determined that they needed to cut down the number of cards given out by 10 or so. While the Korn Ferry Tour was determined as the “primary pathway” to the Tour, spots given to KFT grads will cut from 30 to 20, Q-school will go from top five and ties to just top five, and the DP World Tour will still get 10 spots.Why? And is this good or bad?Dethier: Woof. Here’s where it’s tough to avoid the real-world consequences of these changes. It’s not “good” that there are only 20 cards coming from the KFT instead of 30; that’s a pretty limited number and a significant cut. On the other hand, I’m glad there aren’t cuts to the 10-card DP World Tour pathway, because 1. Those guys have played well on Tour, 2. It’s an important and tangible connection with the DP World Tour and global golf and 3. It’s smart and arguably essential for the PGA Tour to maintain a mutually beneficial relationship with the DPWT, given LIV’s looming presence in the global golf market.It’s good from this perspective: If you make it through these pathways, you’ll have a better idea of where you stand. The KFT pathway is just slightly narrower than it was. I think I’d prefer keeping 25 KFT cards, though, and finding a few more mini-cuts elsewhere.Zak: Overall, I think this is just creating a structure that actually aligns with the immense money atop the game. There’s going to be a lot of money up top — and it’s really not going away, given the spending in sports these days — and the people who deserve it most are those who earn the tee times. Who earn their spots in the fields. The journey to those spots is tighter than ever, but so be it. The prize at the end of the rainbow has become shinier than ever, too. (And let’s not act like the path to get there isn’t also pretty profitable)
Sean, you're an ignorant slut. he just buys without any cognitive dissonance that there are only a handful of players that matter. Yet, he wouldn't be able to answer why the Signature events sucked (and the Tours best moments came in those unscripted full-field events) or why twenty years of WGCs were so dreadful.
Focus if you will, on the italicized bit. Yes, the KF Tour is and should be the primary gateway to the PGA Tour, but we've just reduced those cards by a full one-third. Tell me how we're not sacrificing the next generation of players for the glory of Patrick Cantlay!
And if the DP World Tour gets ten slots, how can we limit the KF Tour to twenty? Of course, with the reduced field sizes, we'll find that even the remaining twenty cards might not come with all that many tee times....
Eamon Lynch is mostly a fellow traveler in these matters, though I think his current offering is missing some key points. But you know his mind from his header and the photo at the top of his piece:
Pity the PGA Tour’s proletariat, who are now fretting about two votes in November that could jeopardize much of what they feel entitled to. Some of them might even be less wary of a former California prosecutor than they are of a prosecutorial Californian. After all, Kamala Harris doesn’t much care about reshaping the PGA Tour, but Patrick Cantlay sure does.On Nov. 18, Cantlay and his fellow Policy Board members will vote on an extensive slate of proposals that will have an enormous impact on rank and file Tour members. Potential changes include reducing fields in most regular tournaments from 156 competitors to 144, and in many cases 120; cutting the number of fully exempt players from 125 to 100; slashing by one-third the number of cards earned via the Korn Ferry Tour; and reducing or eliminating Monday qualifiers, which award four spots most weeks.Some players will see an unfair narrowing of pathways to make a living; others will welcome a toughening of competitive standards. Either way, it represents revolutionary change for an organization whose members revere Adam Smith but are accustomed to seeing their workplace run as though Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez were the commish.Capitalism for thee, socialism for me!
I think that's such a hot mess that I don't know where to begin. He seems to be accusing the rank-and-file of being overly entitled, but it's that guy pictured above that has insisted on guaranteed money for himself, to the detriment of those clawing their way up. Not just the PIP program (and Patrick isn't much of a social me4dia guy), but the limited fields and no-cut regimen, combined with the outsized purses, is nothing short of guaranteed money for Patrick and his homies.
He throws a coupler of punches that land, including this on a subject I haven't even gotten to yet:
The Tour’s longstanding raison d’être — creating playing opportunities for members, an objective on which its executives were bonused — is dead. Remaking a complacent product for a competitive market means it’s now about earning opportunities. Every proposal is defensible, if debatable. (Except the elimination of Monday qualifiers; that’s the ultimate meritocracy and ought to be expanded and streamed as additive to the Tour’s weekly narrative.) And while it’s easy to characterize these likely changes as another sop to top stars, the truth is that any reform is unlikely to ever discomfit the Tour’s one percent.
They've only held Monday qualifying since, checking notes, the year of the flood, but history is for losers.
But I think Eamon's last sentence is a pretty big misfire. I think what he's missing is that these moves are necessary because of the coup already conducted, necessary to keep the riffraffish further removed from the gates to heaven.
But here's where Eamon needs to be more cynical:
These proposals emerged from the Players Advisory Council, a 16-man committee made up of both superstars and journeymen, and they administer an overdue dose of reality. Players are fond of pointing the finger at HQ when it comes to bloat — not unfairly, it must be said — so there’s irony in the first announced layoffs being players themselves. Whether in the glass-walled offices of Ponte Vedra or the wood-paneled locker rooms on Tour, too many people are paid too much money for too little. More than 600 guys have made starts on Tour this year, and the average inside-the-ropes earnings currently stands at $2,030,418. That’s a lot of money for what is, comparatively speaking, a lot of mediocrity.Finally, the Tour has reached the stage of making incremental changes to better its product rather than to slake the cash thirst of its stars. There’s a long way to go — not least in delivering a product that focuses more on fans than players — but the fact that proper improvements are imminent doesn’t necessarily mean the right folks are making the decisions.The Tour has always boasted of being a member-led organization, even when it was only nominally so. Since the backlash to the Framework Agreement with the Saudis and the subsequent governance reforms, players are now absolutely calling the shots. In fact, three Policy Board members who will vote on the recommendations — Peter Malnati, Webb Simpson and Jordan Spieth — are perilously close to finding themselves at the mercy of the unforgiving new dispensation they could usher in.
I'm sorry, Eamon, did you take the summer of 2024 off? Do you not remember who got the sponsor's exemptions into Riviera or how many such exemptions your Webb Simpson bagged? Those votes are in the bag, having been purchased for sponsors' exemptions into the Signature Events..... The Guild takes care of its own, the rest of us are merely nauseous at the sight.
What we are seeing is nothing short of disgusting. The Tour has historically featured men such as Arnie and Jack that evidenced a desire to leave the Tour stronger for those that came after them. Today the Tour's player-leaders, Tiger, Rory and Patrick, have renounced that commitment.
I watched far less golf in 2024 than in prior years, a trend line guaranteed to continue in 2025. To me, the best moments in 2024 were the most unexpected, say Nick Dunlap at the AMEX, and the money grabs repel this potential viewer. At least we have the four majors.
Sorry, I needed to get that rant out. There's no golf being played this weekend, so next week's schedule will be made up on the fly. Have a great weekend.
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