Massive PGA Tour changes might be better than you think — here’s why

On Tuesday morning the PGA Tour emailed its members a list of proposed changes to the Tour’s structure. Yawn, right? Not this time! Pending their approval by the Policy Board on Nov. 18, some of these are significant — they affect the size of the PGA Tour, the playing opportunities for its members, access to the Tour, reduction of Monday qualifiers, changes to pace of play and more. As pieces of the 23-page memo leaked out on social media they engendered a strong response among golf’s thought leaders: To name two, Ryan French called the changes “so sad” while Tron Carter called ‘em “progress.” So we convened GOLF senior writers Dylan Dethier and Sean Zak to break things down, one issue at a time.

1. FIELD SIZES

The Tour has reduced field sizes for the majority of non-Signature events. The maximum field size will go down from 156 players to 144 (other than for multiple-course events like the American Express), while single-course events played prior to daylight savings time will drop to 120 (they’re currently 144 or 132). Events from daylight savings time until the Masters will cap at 132 players, and post-Masters they’ll expand to 144 for the summer season. 

Why? And is this good or bad?

Dylan Dethier, senior writer (@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 (@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. 

2. TOUR SIZE

For 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. 

3. PATHWAYS

The 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)

4. MONDAY Qs

Included in the changes is the reduction and elimination of Monday Qs, which will be gone for fields of 120 players or fewer and reduced from four to two spots for 132-player events.

Why? And is this good or bad?

Dethier: As one-offs, the Monday Q stories are pretty compelling. They’ve been a cool part of the Tour throughout its history, and the original vision — that top local players could earn spots into the field to tangle with the pros — is undeniably cool. But at what expense? They’ve become an insane and wildly expensive subculture of pro golf; it’s almost taken for granted that an aspiring pro will spend whatever money necessary to fly around chasing these lottery tickets.

The data is compelling, too; per the Tour, 65-70 percent of Monday Qs miss the cut that week and, given the preciousness of a spot in the field, the Tour is probably better served allocating those spots to its members. I don’t think they should be outright eliminated, and I’m in favor of keeping full-on Monday Qs for KFT events, but I’m fine with these PGA Tour cuts. They don’t make sense as a big-time piece of the modern, ultra-competitive PGA Tour. And they’re almost always dead ends. Even though, for nostalgic and storytelling reasons, this is sad, I’m fine with their reduction. It’s mostly good, and it makes sense.

Zak: The whole idea of having a local qualifier was simply to produce a better field by getting some local pro who could go uber-low for 18 holes. Does that improve the field strength in modern, elite golf? Not to the same extent as rewarding the 100th or even 150th-best player in the world, as evidenced by years of recent form. Monday qualifiers are romantic, sure. But they don’t routinely add to the story of an event, so I’m pretty unbothered by their decreasing presence. 

5. PACE OF PLAY

Pace of play is central to the above discussion. Armed with additional pace-of-play data, the Tour announced it will relax punishments in some areas — more leniency to groups “out of position” on par-3s, give players additional time to find distance markers, eliminate bad-time fines at majors and reduce bad-time fines — while ramping up fines for the worst offenders of bad “average stroke time” measurements.

Why? And is this good or bad?

Dethier: I see how it looks dumb and bad, as Monday Q pointed out, to reduce penalties on slow players. But let’s keep our eye on the big picture here, because as I read it, that’s what the Tour is actually doing. Rather than obsessing on one-time offenders and potentially punishing the wrong people it’s redirecting its focus to the habitual tortoises of the Tour. Don’t get me wrong, this is a big-time problem. I’m open to any and all suggestions to speed up play. Shot clocks. Shock collars. Whatever. But yeah, this program is probably some progress as they continue to zero in on bad actors.

Zak: What I like most about the 23-page document shared Tuesday was that it was the executive summary of the 16-player Advisory Council, which is assembled via 16 different sections of the FedEx Cup standings. In other words, it’s a fantastic cross-section of the membership. They hear all the gossip. They hear all the opinions. They know who the slowest players are, and they know when the pace of play regulations have gone too far, or missed something. In other words, I tend to trust them to — in this initial movement — highlight a way to punish the slowest players. 

Now, if we’re trying to make tournament golf move faster, that will not come from the PAC. That will come from the PGA Tour adjusting Time Par and enforcing it harshly. That, my friends, seems unrealistic. 

6. MISCELLANEOUS

There were several other tweaks mentioned in the memo. Anything weird or interesting that caught your eye?

Dethier: I thought it was interesting to see that they’re shifting C-suite schmoozing (the “Sponsor Value Program”) from Tuesdays and/or Wednesdays during the day to Thursday or Fridays after a player’s morning round. This is nerdy but I find this sort of minutia interesting because this sort of player-executive interaction really is an important piece of how the Tour derives some of its value, so it has to work for both sides. In short, important people from sponsor companies don’t want to come hang with golfers in the middle of the work week, and players don’t want to interrupt practice to go see ‘em anyway. Let’s do it Thursday or Friday afternoon instead, thanks!

Zak: The FedEx Cup points distributed from decent finishes in Signature Events are getting a serious haircut. Basically, players who finished between 7th and 30th in Signature Events — many of which didn’t have a cut or included sponsor exemptions into a limited field — were getting too many points from those finishes. At least that’s what the PAC has decided. 

… And I kinda dig it. Let’s look at Mr. 50 from 2024, the last man to guarantee his spot in the Signature Events for 2025: Eric Cole. Eric’s top three finishes, according to FedEx Cup points? The Sentry, in Hawaii, a T14 finish in a field of 59; The AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, another T14 finish in a field of 80; and The Genesis Invitational, a T10 finish in a field of 70. Those three events outweigh his three top 10s in June, July and August by about 60%. Right or wrong, this new system would have pushed Tom Kim ahead of Cole by season’s end.

7. FINAL VERDICT

Good, bad or other?

Dethier: Change is hard. It’s okay to miss what was, even if you know you’re changing for the better. Okay, this is starting to sound like a horoscope, so let’s wrap things up: These are largely good changes. It stinks that the Tour is sort of admitting defeat in the fight against slow play, and we shouldn’t let ’em off the hook there, but a slightly streamlined Tour will make for a slightly better, more coherent product with more fair treatment of its players. Are pro golf’s problems now solved? They are not! But let’s appreciate these as a few small steps in the direction of common sense, despite their cost.

Zak: Amen to that. Ultimately, the Tour needed to streamline its best assets, at the slight cost of other, lesser assets. (And by assets, we mean players and we mean events. This is the same principle that led to putting more behind its Signature Events and less into its lesser tournaments.) Getting into a leaner, “Top 50, Top 100, The Rest” type of setup is going to look better and better down the road.

The writers welcome your feedback at dylan_dethier@golf.com and sean_zak@golf.com.

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