On Wednesday, Jay Monahan announced several enhancements to the PGA Tour and its schedule in a press conference ahead of the Tour Championship.
The new changes include additional “elevated events” for 2023, with top players (defined as players who finish in the top 20 under the current Player Impact Program and players who finish in the top 20 under the revised PIP criteria) set to participate in at at least 20 PGA Tour events (up from 15, previously).
In addition, a new Earnings Assurance Program will guarantee all fully exempt tour players who compete in 15 tournaments $500,000.
Ahead of the season finale, a reporter at East Lake asked Rory McIlroy the following question: “Obviously several months ago Phil made some comments about the Tour that were pretty harsh. I’m just wondering in light of what we’ve learned today if any of his underlying points had some merit. Maybe not the egregious ones, but if you dug down deeper, is there any truth to some of that, and is that why we’re seeing this now?”
In response, McIlroy stated:
“Yeah, as much as I probably don’t want to give Phil any sort of credit at all, yeah, there were certain points that he was trying to make. But there’s a way to go about them. There’s a way to collaborate. There’s a way — you get all the top players in the world together and you get them on the same page. You then go to the Tour and you suggest ideas and you work together. This was pure collaboration.
“As I said, this isn’t some sort of renegade group trying to take some sort of power grab of the PGA Tour. This is, okay, how can we make this Tour better for everyone that’s going to play on it now and everyone that’s going to play on the PGA Tour going forward.
“Were some of these ideas, did they have merit? Of course they did. But he just didn’t approach it the right way.”
On the other side of the battlefield is Greg Norman, CEO of LIV Golf, who couldn’t resist a dig at the PGA Tour following the news, taking to Instagram to make his feelings known, saying “A day late and a dollar short.”
While LIV Golf had a 17-word response to the new changes, via Alan Shipnuckwhich read: “LIV Golf is clearly the best thing that’s ever happened to help the careers of professional golfers.”
- LIKE16
- LEGIT4
- WOW3
- LOL6
- IDHT2
- FLOP1
- OB0
- SHANK19