What PGA Tour Must Do in Future According to Jay Monahan

"“We’ve looked at all possible competitive models.” – Jay Monahan"

PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan said in his meeting with the media prior to The Players.  

"“It was evident and perhaps obvious that whatever we do differently, we must showcase our top performers competing against one another more often.”"

Monahan noted that their research has shown that at major championships, the top players in the world compete against each other 95 percent of the time, but in regular tour events, it’s only 40 percent of the time.

That’s why, up to now, major championships seem to be so exciting. The PGA Tour is trying to create that major championship feeling at their Designated Events.  

That I-can’t-change-the-channel kind of thrill was on display recently at the Arnold Palmer Invitational, eventually won by Kurt Kitayama, after Scottie Scheffler, Rory McIlroy, Tyrrell Hatton, Jordan Spieth, and Viktor Hovland all made charges during the final round.

Similarly, at the WM Phoenix Open, Scottie Scheffler defended his title after fighting off Justin Thomas, Jon Rahm, and others.

To keep the excitement flowing for 2024, the PGA Tour is working on what they call the Designated Event Model.

What will be different next season is that the top 20 players are not required to play in all Designated Events, which have $20 million purses, except for The Players, which has $25 million, and Sentry which had a slightly smaller purse of $15 million.

"“The model right now would suggest that roughly a little north of 60 percent of the players in the top 50 will retain their position. So more than a third will not.”                                               — PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan."

For 2024, there is going to be an adjustment to the schedule so that a non-Designated Event isn’t sandwiched between two Designated Events; as happened with the Honda Classic this year.

Instead, they plan to have something like two Designated Events followed by three non-Designated. Only the Commissioner and his staff know what that might look like. We will have to wait until August to find out.

Next year, the Tour hopes that the huge purses and the fact that Designated Events will have limited fields, typically between 70 and 80 players, will encourage the top golfers to play.

The no-cut events are an essential part of keeping both sponsors and television interested, and the fans like it, too.

However, The Players Championship field will remain the same size. It is unlikely to be a no-cut event, ever.

What we have been told is that the 2024 schedule will have eight no-cut events. Based on last fall’s announcement of designated tournaments, some of the no-cut tournaments will be The Sentry and the three FedEx Cup events.

Additional Designated tournaments are the Genesis Invitational, Arnold Palmer Invitational, and The Memorial.  No decision has been made yet on the size of the field for these events, but it is expected that they will shrink to between 70 and 80 players.

Regarding no-cut events, PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan pointed out that, in the past, Jack Nicklaus won 17 of them, Arnold Palmer won 23, and Tiger Woods won 26. (Even Woods’ cut streak somehow included no-cut events, which is incredible math.)

For many years we had the limited-field World Golf Championships which have fallen to the wayside over time. The Dell Match Play is the last one standing, and it goes away next year.

One big question is will the new format protect the top players too much?

PGA Tour Commissioner, Jay Monahan, had the answer to that as well.

"“The model right now would suggest that roughly a little north of 60 percent of the players in the top 50 will retain their position. So more than a third will not,” he said.  “When you look at the top 125 and our current system, the turnover rate there is 25 percent. So, the turnover rate within the top 50 is greater than what it’s been in the top 125 in the past.”"

To him and to the PGA Tour Board, this supports the idea that players have plenty of opportunity to advance, play their way into the top 50, and reap the benefits of playing on the PGA Tour.