It's that time of year again, in which I disappear for more than two weeks and blog from the strange land called Scotland. Specifically, we leave late tomorrow night and head directly to the Highlands for three days with Elsie and John in Strathpeffer.
Since it's the same exact trip we've taken at least the last two years, I've no clue as to that which I'll blog. Up in the Highlands we'll be playing Tain, an Old Tom Morris track, and then touring the Glenmorangie Distillery. Amusing in the sense that your humble blogger cannot abide brown liquor, but Employee No. 2 will be quite happy. There's a statue of Old Tom at the club, and you'll no doubt be seeing a version of this from a few years ago, Elsie and John with our friend Glenn.
We will drive down to Fife on Saturday, and play at Crail that Sunday, awkward in the sense that the local bakery is closed on Sundays, resulting in our first round likely being played without the sustenance provided by our usual sausage rolls. I'm told these are first world problems...
Just a wee bit of blogging today..... I'll be in country for the Open at Royal Portrush, one of my favorite places on the planet, but don't know whether I'll blog the event, or merely the trip. The bride and I watched this the other night, and it's a great preview of Portrush and its architecture. It's not too nerdy in that regard, and includes enough great looks at the dunes and dramatic vistas to be well worth your time:
Deere Me - I did actually switch over after the conclusion of Wimbledon and a certain baseball game, and saw the finish and playoff. Not much joy in Ponte Vedra Beach over the leaderboards the last few weeks, but you won't get name brand golfers at the top if they're, yanno, not in the field. And they're not in the field because they've been paid to play elsewhere, something you might think the John Deere folks might have an issue with.
So, a guy you've never heard of won, amusing because that John Doe won for the second time this year:
The PGA Tour just got a 2-time champ nobody saw coming
He was already among the most shocking winners of the PGA Tour season.Now he’s definitely the most shocking two-time winner.Brian Campbell is the shortest hitter on the PGA Tour — he ranks 171st out of 171 players and has the slowest ball speed. He entered the week with just one top-30 finish this season — his win at the Mexico Open. It has been a decade since his Tour debut — and he’s spent most of that decade on the Korn Ferry Tour. He’s battled injury, doubt, more injury, more doubt. His results over the last month have been MC-WD-MC. Nobody saw this win coming because not even Campbell saw it coming.“I have no words,” Campbell said. “I mean, to be, let alone in a playoff, and to finish it off this way, it’s just been amazing.”
At least they caught his good side in the accompanying photo.....
Nobody saw him coming and, when we get those ratings later this week, we'll find that no one saw him closing as well, literally. But how funny is it for him to be literally, there's that word again, the shortest guy out there?
It does remind me of a certain Masters playoff. After Tiger won his second straight Masters in 2002, they lengthened the course to "Tiger-proof it." They must have done incredibly great work, because in 2003 they were treated to a Mike Weir-Len Mattiace playoff, two guys that would play first from the fairway were they paired with Brian Campbell.
But perhaps I'm denying this great event its due, because these guys really know what grows our game:
FedEx Cup payouts are changing. Whereas the playoff-capping Tour Championship used to determine players’ hauls from the $100 million overall FedEx Cup prize fund, the Tour will now dole out bonuses based on FedEx Cup points standings after the Wyndham Championship (the regular season’s final event) and also after the BMW Championship, the second FedEx Cup Playoffs event. (The top 10 after the Wyndham will split $20 million, with first place banking $10 million, and the top 30 after the BMW will share about $23 million, with the top-ranked player heading into the Tour Championship pocketing $5 million; the remaining money — about $57 million —will be paid out at the Tour Championship, with the champ winning $10 million.) The Tour’s said the payout were recalculated “to account for the increased volatility of the final event, reward season-long performance and recognize the significance of the FedEx Cup.” Sensible move?Dylan Dethier: Sensible seems like the right word for it. Sensible, fair, equitable. That doesn’tnecessarily equal exciting, but it at least means there will be an added incentive for players to perform at each stage of the playoffs — and down the stretch in the regular season. We haven’t yet seen high monetary stakes move fan interest in pro golf, so perhaps ditching starting strokes was correctly made top priority.Josh Schrock: Yeah, it all makes sense. It’s good to reward players for good regular seasons and not leave it all up to chance in the final three playoff events. It’s incredibly difficult to be consistent over an eight-month stretch, so I like that there’s a chunk to reward those who performed best throughout the season and then have the rest of the money go toward playoff performance.Alan Bastable: For sure. Remember when Jon Rahm got hosed a couple of years ago (monetarily, anyway) after having a monster season but a poor Tour Championship? Didn’t feel right. This system is a check against that kind of thing happening. OK, now that we’ve got the money sorted, can we please incorporate a match-play element in the playoffs?!
Does that rock your world?
Is this maybe progress? My take has been that the insanity of the FedEx Cup is a result of the Tour's refusal to decide between the season-long competition and a high-stakes shootout, so maybe they're reemphasizing the season-long component here. Of course, the only reason to watch East Lake is that some guy will get handed an oversized check with lots of commas, and they're reducing that gaudy payment:
- 2025: $10 million
- 2024: $18 million (estimated based on previous years, though the format has changed)
- 2022: $18 million
- 2021: $15 million
- 2020: $15 million
- 2019: $15 million
- 2007-2018: $10 million
But perhaps this will free the Tour up to do something more interesting with the event formerly known as the Tour Championship.
Does this rebalancing make the playoffs any more interesting for fans? Or is this really only consequential for players?Dethier: Touched on this above but I think the good news is that it’s certainly not less interesting for fans. We should have more pros in the mix at the Tour Championship, and it’ll mean something special to get there. Is there room for improvement? I think so; August stops in Memphis and Atlanta have never been my bag. But this should be fun.Schrock: I think Dylan hit the right note. Fans just don’t really care if Scottie Scheffler or Rory McIlroy make $30 million or $1 million. They want to see consequential golf. Removing the starting strokes and tiering the payouts differently should at least make the Tour Championship easier to follow and add more drama, but this feels more like a way to appease the players. Over the past few years, Scheffler has repeatedly criticized the playoff format by calling it “silly” and noting that you “can’t call it a season-long race if it comes down to one tournament.” This feels like a way to assuage some grumbles from the membership.Bastable: Yes, yes and yes, Dr. Schrock! Tough look when the best player on the planet doesn’t endorse the system. And yeah…I can’t fathom a more boring topic for fans than how hundreds of millions of dollars of prize money are being reallocated. When you start moving decimal points around — $2.5 million vs. $25 million vs. $250 million — it’s easy to lose interest quickly. But the Tour hasn’t seemed to grasp that reality in the LIV era. Way too much talk about purses and bonuses and not enough about fan benefits and engagement.
In an interview with GOLF.com last week, LIV CEO Scott O’Neil was asked whether he feels LIV needs a deal with the PGA Tour. “The platforms that we have between what the PGA Tour is doing and what LIV is doing are very different,” O’Neil said. “The audiences are very different. We have a global platform, and we love this notion of taking this game to the world. I would say that almost everyone I’ve met in golf wants to do what’s best for the sport, and we’re all so early in this journey. We’re all going to figure out what’s best over time.” How do you interpret that response?Dethier: I’d take it to mean that O’Neil is seeking coexistence with the PGA Tour rather than a straight-up merger. Negotiations have gone silent these last few months, but O’Neil and Brian Rolapp (on the Tour side) are outsiders to the sport and newcomers to this rivalry; perhaps they’ll be more inclined to work together as a result.Schrock: It seems like another sign that the merger talks are iced over and might be DOA at this point. The reported schedule for LIV next season shows them taking even more of a global approach, with only five U.S.-based tournaments. It seems that O’Neil is tacitly acknowledging that the two tours are going their separate ways and no longer focused on coming together.Bastable: Right, Josh. Also, the longer this limbo period has gone, feels like maybe the tours have come to realize they don’t need one another after all. Job 1 for O’Neil should be locking up Bryson for another decade, whatever the cost. Job 2: Reignite convos with the Official World Golf Ranking, if that isn’t already happening. LIV players’ inability to collect rankings points still is arguably the most problematic element of the league when it comes to attracting new talent. Securing points for LIVers would be a boon.
It's fascinating in an unexpected way, no?
From the PGA's perspective, they present as not needing a deal since they've refinanced themselves to the tune of $1.5 billion large. Which is fine and defensible I suppose, as long as the burn rate isn't an issue. I've seen a reference that they're still sitting on all that cash, though it's hard for me to believe they're not burning though it with the dramatically-increased purses.
But I am quite puzzled as to Yasir's end-game. They've built nothing sustainable, at least nothing outside the jurisdiction of Adelaide, Australia. The interesting thing to see is that their player contracts are going to begin expiring, and we can only speculate as to how they'll handle that. They still need to put 48 or more guys on a golf course at each event, so they'll need to resign more than just the one guy mentioned.
There's also the issue of what becomes of the guys they choose not to resign, te presumption being that they become golf orphans. Stay tuned.
Brief Open stuff, including what sounds like the Mother of all Monday qualifying:
Beginning at the 2026 Open Championship, the R&A will hold a winner-take-all final qualifier — the “Last Chance Qualifier” — at the Open site (which is Royal Birkdale next year) on the Monday before the championship. The R&A said the event, which will be comprised of up to 12 players, was the byproduct of a survey that revealed fans want more live golf and opportunities to engage with the Open. Let’s take this exercise a step further: The golf powers have granted you permission to make one change or enhancement to any major. What’s your tweak?Dethier: The PGA Championship goes back to August — and it goes international. But first, it goes to Chambers Bay…Schrock: Let’s turn back the clock and make it so everyone except the defending champion has to qualify for one of the majors. Since the PGA Championship is still searching for an identity, I nominate it as the qualifying major. Next year, Scottie Scheffler is in, and everyone else has to earn their way into the fourth major.Bastable: I’d love to see the U.S. Junior Amateur champ get an invite to both the Masters and U.S. Open. Maybe that’d have a been a crazy thought a generation ago, but the gap between the youngs and the olds has never been narrower. The kids could hang.
The R&A actually did better than the writers' fever dreams, as qualifying at the actual Open site is a great spectacle. As for the juniors, they grow up too quickly as it is, Alan.
Speaking of the Open, this year’s edition, which is bound for Royal Portrush, is only two weeks away. Who’s your early pick?Dethier: Tommy Fleetwood jumps out, though I suspect he’ll be a popular choice. I’m saddened the final major is on our doorstep, but it should be a terrific addition.Schrock: How did we already get to the final major of the year? The long winter is upon us. I feel like Tommy Fleetwood will play well but I’m going to take Jon Rahm. He’s a terrific Open player and we’re due for an injection of spice back into the PGA Tour-LIV feud.Bastable: Heart says Rory, head says Russ, as in Henley. A winner this year (at Bay Hill and nearly at Travelers), has been on a heater the last few weeks and finished 5th at the Open a year ago. Not a flashy pick but he’s primed for a big week.
Ummm, Dylan, after that finish at Hartford, I'm guessing that Tommy Lad won't actually be that popular a pick. In case you haven't noticed, he doesn't actually ever win.
I don't have any sense of who will win, but I'm pretty sure it will be a great week.
That's it from me for now. Next we meet I'll be on the other side of the Atlantic. Have a great week.
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