Weekend Wrap - Aerification Edition

There's nothing quite like aerated greens to remind your humble blogger that it's ski season....

But we'll cover a couple of bits until my mountain actually opens (though, amusingly, they're already reporting 13" of snow).  I know, numbers as suspicious as those from inner Philadelphia precincts.  Too soon?

Mexicali Blues - Anyone catch that Grateful Dead reference?  The event itself is little import or interest, but talk about finishing strong:

Behind a ridiculous 11 birdies, Austin Eckroat wins World Wide Technology

Eleven birdies is pretty good in mini-golf.

See if you can suss out the irony here:

Video-game numbers. From a video-game player. A day earlier, after he shot a six-under 66 during Saturday’s third round of the World Wide Technology Championship to move within a shot of the lead, Austin Eckroat was asked how he would ready for Sunday. Margs? They’re playing in Mexico this week, after all. Rest?

Neither, Eckroat said.

“Play some more video games, he said. “That’s how I kind of take my mind off things — you can’t think about anything else. I’ll get back, eat some food and play some video games.”

Any one in particular?

“They came out with a new ‘Call of Duty’ — that’s been my obsession of recent,” Eckroat said. “It always changes, but that’s the one right now.”

The only thing I remember about this event is that it's on a Tiger-designed golf course, ironic in that Tiger himself is a Call of Duty kind of guy....

A couple of minor bits.  I've been conscious of Eckroat since his Oklahoma State days, and he could well be poised for a breakout, though I do wish we could moderate the hyperbola:

The takeaway

Something special could be coming from Eckroat. On the Golf Channel broadcast, analyst Johnson Wagner said he wouldn’t be surprised if he made a Scottie Scheffler-like run going forward. Watch out.

In the last twenty-five years, the only players meeting that bar are Tiger and Scottie, so maybe dial it down to 8 Johnson?

The only other bit of note to this observer was the leaderboard of young talent in desperate need of a breakthrough:

Justin Lower, Nico Echavarria and Carson Young start the final round in a share of a one-stroke lead. Lower, Echavarria and Young are at 16-under, Joe Highsmith, Austin Eckroat and Max Greyserman are at 15-under, and Ben Griffin and Maverick McNealy are at 14-under.

Just my way of noting that, had I been watching, I'd have been rooting for any and all of those over Eckroat, for the simple reason that they need it more.  Specifically, we have follow-up on Lower and Greyserman, the latter being the subject of an epically silly Tour Confidential Q&A:

3. Austin Eckroat won the World Wide Technology Championship, besting Justin Lower and Carson Young by one and Max Greyserman by two in Mexico. Greyserman talked earlier in the week about his close calls, and with his third-place finish here, he’s now placed in the top five five times in his 27 career starts (including three 2nds) and still hasn’t won on Tour. Is he the best current PGA Tour player without a victory? Or does someone else hold that title?

Are you finished laughing yet?  Do we think they read the competition?  Because this is a piece that Golf Digest simply refuse to take down:

You won’t believe how many golfers have earned $10 million on the PGA Tour without winning an event

Now, there are some shockingly marginal names on that list, Briny Baird and Jeff Overton as examples, but nobody names Max.  Shall we see how they handle this silliness?

Piastowski: I’ll cheat here a bit and go with Tommy Fleetwood — the seven-time DP World Tour winner and multiple-time Ryder Cupper has stunningly never won on the PGA Tour. But if we’re playing things straight up, gimme Denny McCarthy, maybe the Tour’s best putter. Golf is a hard game. This all being said, Greyserman’s too talented not to win, and I’m thinking he jumps off this list quickly.

Zak: I think Greyserman needs to do it more than just one season to earn that title. It’s definitely Tommy lad, as Nick points out. And it might not be close? Cameron Young comes to mind, too.

Dethier: Let’s get more specific: He’s on the hottest current run of anyone without a Tour win. There’s no guarantee one will ever come, but Greyserman seems to be the total package. He’s high on every watch list for 2025.

As a reminder, Greyserman was the guy that Matt Kuchar tried to convince to wait until Monday morning to finish his final round when  birdie would have put him into a playoff.  That was an iffy decision, but five Top-5's doesn't doesn't require an Hall of Fame bust just yet.

In fact, though, he might need to send a Christmas card to one of his fellow competitors....

Upon Further Review - This story is just bizarre, given that we all know what's going on.

Maverick McNealy figured out the inequity of FedEx Cup points. Now his methodology is a vote away from being adopted

Yeah, many of us have figured it out....

A few months ago, he was perplexed at what appeared to him to be an inequity in the FedEx Cup

points given for majors, signature events, regular events and opposite field events. It was a topic that caused plenty of heartburn among players – particularly the rank and file trying to keep their card – and best exemplified by Lanto Griffin who told Golfweek last fall, “Give them all the money they want but when you start giving them the points, I’ve got a problem with that. Do you know what fifth in an elevated event next year makes in FedEx Cup points? 300. It’s 110 for a normal event. So I go play Torrey Pines with 156 players and a cut and Rory goes to L.A. the next week in a 78 players, no-cut field, and he gets nearly three times the points for the same finish. How is one going to compete with that?”

Griffin knew intuitively that something was out of whack; McNealy went a step further and did the math.

“It was a personal exploration,” McNealy called it. “I didn’t think the points were equitable and a bunch of guys felt the same way.”

I'm going  way out on a limb to take a wild stab at what happened.  As crazy as it might sound, I'm gonna guess that Cantlay and buddies kept all those FedEx Cup points for themselves....  Yeah, it's a gift.

What he found confirmed his beliefs and he eventually shared his findings with the PGA Tour and the Player Advisory Council, who proposed an adjustment to the FedEx Cup points distribution table that, if approved at the Tour’s upcoming board meeting on Nov. 18, would take effect in 2025.

The Tour’s focus in determining the points distribution across a variety of events was solely on creating a system that matched historical retention rates across the top 50, 70 and 125. It’s a small sample size but the system seemed to achieve that goal, but as McNealy illustrated, it simply wasn’t rewarding play uniformly.

McNealy, a 29-year-old Stanford graduate, said it was looking at the results of Canadian pro Corey Conners that initially sent him down this rabbit hole.

“In back-to-back weeks, he finished sixth at the RBC Canadian Open and had a two-way T-20 at the Memorial. So he earned 100 points at Canadian and he got 97.5 at the Memorial. I was like, ‘Hold on a sec. That doesn’t seem right,’” McNealy said.

The good news is that they actually listened and seem prepared to make an adjustment.  The bad news is that said adjustment will render the system only slightly less rigged.  The Tour Confidential panel took on the larger subject of those substantial changes to Tour membership:

1. Last week, the PGA Tour notified members of several proposed changes that could take place in the 2026 season, a couple of which would be handing out fewer Tour cards and reducing field sizes for some events. “I hate all the changes they’re making,” Justin Lower

said last week. “Seems like anytime I do something good they make a change.” Lower, due to his ranking, would be one of the players most likely affected if these changes go through, but with all the Signature Event tweaks, field-size adjustments and constant change in the men’s game lately, does he have a point about the Tour changing too much and even running the risk of confusing the average fan? Is the Tour’s constant change good, bad, or inevitable?

Nick Piastowski: From the fan’s perspective, I think it depends on what you like about the pro game. Do you enjoy watching the stars and mostly familiar names week in and week out? Or do you prefer the occasional underdog? In a sentence, then, the dark horses might get squeezed out — but there’s the strong possibility that the quality of play will improve, as it’ll be harder to keep a Tour card. As for me, I’m a fan of stories — and telling them! — and I think we’ll lose some here.

Let me see if I follow, Nick.  Play will improve by virtue of a smaller field?  Big, if true, but kind of cuts against the grain of our game. 

Sean Zak: Lower definitely has a point, but he’s gonna have to work pretty hard to earn a ton of sympathy. He’s just not one of the 40 or 60 or even top 100 golfers in the world. The truth these days is you need to be a top player to have the system always working in your favor. That is earned by really good golf.

Dylan Dethier: He definitely has a point. And there’s definitely a cost to these changes. But the PGA Tour — and its big-time new consultants — have made this decision with fans and with simplicity in mind. I think this adds clarity to a confusing system, which is a good thing. Still work to do, of course …

Fans and simplicity, Dylan?  The guys making the decisions are also the biggest beneficiaries, but nothing to see here....

2. Another one of the proposed changes was tweaking the pathway to the Tour, and 20 Korn Ferry Tour grads will now receive PGA Tour cards instead of 30. The DP World Tour will once again award 10 cards. In an interview last week following the Tour’s proposed changes, DP World Tour chief Guy Kinnings said it wouldn’t surprise him if more Americans started to consider joining the DP World Tour. Do you agree? And are there advantages and disadvantages to this scenario?

Piastowski: Yeah, I could potentially see that. On the DP World Tour, the purses are bigger, and the locations are more exotic. You can make a good living and travel the globe. But if your goal is the PGA Tour, 20 cards is still greater than 10. I’m questioning how much things change.

Zak: Totally agree, but it’ll be in reverse. As in those who finish outside the top 125 on the Tour first, then head to Europe, rather than those coming from college to Europe on their way to the Tour ranks. But as long as the purses on the KFT are somewhat comparable, the proximity to home is going to be a better fit for most.

Dethier: This week’s DP World Tour field was a reminder that it’s tough to put this circuit in a box — it’s an epic global tour that’s also a feeder tour, an outlet for LIV guys and a part-time stop for some of the biggest stars in the world. I’m all for incorporating it more fully in the PGA Tour system … but there are still big-picture identity questions it has to confront. But as Rory McIlroy said this week, it’s a tour with its options open.

What is to become of the Euro Tour is a bigger topic than can be covered today, but it is little more right now than a feeder tour for the Korn Ferry Tour.  But the larger picture from 30,000 feet is that the ability of young talent to rise in the game has been severely degraded.  Of course there are always ways to break through, take a bow Nick Dunlap, but what we see is the guild protecting its own.

Arnie and Jack were always focused on ensuring that those that came behinds them had greater opportunities.  Tiger and Rory, by way of contrast, seem only focused on ensuring that Patrick Cantlay makes bank.

Methuselah Lives:  All credit to him, but there's something significant missing in these answers:

4. Ageless wonder Bernhard Langer won the Charles Schwab Cup Championship on Sunday in Phoenix, extending his senior-circuit winning streak to 18 years and giving the 67-year-old pro his record-extending 47th win on PGA Tour Champions. Given Langer’s talent and longevity and the mass sums being made on the PGA Tour these days, is his PGA Tour Champions win record (which could still be added to) something that will ever be broken?

Piastowski: No. Unless that dude who wears red on Sunday — who turns 49 next month! — commits to a full Champions schedule.

Ummm, Nick, the guy never played a full schedule on the big Tour, so how many 54-hole events do you have him penciled in for?

Zak: It will not be broken. It’s ridiculous. I see that level of pro golf only developing more parity moving forward, too. Langer’s records are safe.

Dethier: The PGA Tour Champions is funny because your age works against you from the moment you make your debut. For everyone else, that is. Remarkable stuff and a testament to his discipline.

You know what other record was never going to be broken?  Yup, Hale Irwin's senior win total....

That irony aside, does anyone appreciate that this tour is on the Endangered Species List?   This round-belly tour exists and survives only because of large subsidies from the PGA Tour.....  Hmmm, anything change there recently?  Now on a for-profit model and with Vulture Capitalists requiring a return on their invested capital, one assumes that these subsidies should not be taken for granted.  Enough said?

Then again, if it were to be cancelled or curtailed, would anyone notice?  

That's it for today, kids.  Thanks for dropping by and, while a reduced blogging schedule is to be expected this time of year, we'll cover anything of interest that presents.  Have a great week.