PGA Tour: Christmas Presents: Notes from the Ballwasher

First topic message reminder :

1).To Tim Finchem:
A thinking cap as he strives to establish a PGA Tour policy for anchored putters.
He could decide to ban them in nine months' time as the 2013/2014 PGA Tour season gets underway.
He could decide to wait until 2016 to fall in line with the USGA.
Or he could opt not to ban them at all.
Remember, it's not just the PGA Tour constituency he has to placate - he also has to figure out how to deal with the Champions Tour, where the incidence of anchored putters is much higher.
My guess is that he'll start by banning anchored jobs from the 2014 web.com Tour and likely leave the Champions Tour completely alone.
It's the PGA Tour that will give him sleepless nights.

2).To Tim Clark (123rd), Ernie Els (112th), Garrigus (146th), JJ Henry (108th), Harley Choffman (181st), O'Hern (168th), Adam Scott (148th), Vijay (170th) and Brendan Steele (119th):
Putting lessons. You're anchoring your broomsticks and still can't get in to the top 100 in putting stats.

3).To Michael Allen (1st), Langer (2nd), Funk (3rd), Peter Senior (7th) and John Huston (9th):
A lobbyist. You're in the top ten in Champions Tour putting and your well-heeled annuities are under greater threat from the putter police than Father Time.

4).Laura Davies:
An invitation to the World Golf Hall Of Fame. You're never going to achieve the "points" necessary to qualify via the LPGA route, you'll turn 50 next October, but you've graced (is that the right word?) the world of women's golf for a quarter of a century. Let her in!

5).Nick Price:
A Presidents Cup. Come on Nick, you're Captain International this time round and the competition is rapidly becoming irrelevant. 'Course, the Aussies could help, only Leishman in the winner's enclosure this year, and no wins on the European Tour. And get the Koreans and Japanese, if there are any, alarm clocks and tell them to turn up on time.

6).Paul Lawrie:
An invitation to the Father / Son tournament for next year. If your sons sometimes beat you, I fancy you'd show these Loves, Nelsons etc a thing or two.
(And while we're at it: Isn't it somehow incongruous that all the participants in that very same Father / Son event reckon its their favourite event of the year - but none of them ponied up, individually or collectively, the necessary cash to keep the tournament going? I, for one, would like to see the Pros playing for their own money, just once.)

7).The European Golf Tour and the R&A:
Some decent p.r.: After the year that Rory McIlroy enjoyed, it's pathetic that he only received 2% of the SPOTY vote. Not saying he should have won it, he probably shouldn't, but 2%????

8).Steve Elkington, Rocco Mediate, Colin Montgomerie, etc:
$1,000.00: Which you'll pick up from your first Champions Tour event even if you come dead last - the Champions Tour: The gift which keeps on giving.

9).Jonas Blixt:
A Masters invitation: I just want to see what Billy Payne makes of your gallery. Please!

10).The Queen, Margaret Thatcher, Maggie Smith, Sue Barker, Adele, some Ms somewhere:
An invitation to join the R&A: You know you're behind the times when Augusta National has more diversity than the R&A, or anyone else for that matter.

11).kwini:
A week off for Christmas. Have a happy one.

kwinigolfer wrote:Aah, more Finchem handcuffs - the competing event release! That makes sense robo, thanks, but still a potential loophole for bloody-minded players - only once though!

(Any sceptics should note that Love's lifetime exemption (priority 17)qualification is only marginally ahead of the top 125 (19) via which he also qualifies. Perhaps Norman and Watson could also use Cat 17 if so inclined.)

You are correct about Watson and Norman... I can verify Tom was NOT listed as a sponsor exemption for the 2012 Greenbriar, but he was in the field, I would suspect via his Cat 17. I can also verify that Norman (who just barely qualified as a Life Member with exactly 20 wins) was NOT listed as a sponsor exemption for the 2012 Humana or Mayakoba either.

As for Davis Love... Players will play out of the highest category in which they qualify except they will generally save the top-25 and top-50 career money exemptions until they are about to expire or as last resorts.

Love gets a boost by his Cat 17 because it makes him eligible for "some" of the invitationals he might not otherwise be eligible for (based on his #100 money list position). Humana/Clinton, Arnold Palmer, Heritage are examples. (Granted, he would almost certainly get in all three otherwise, even without SE's, but his Cat 17 guarantees it). However Life Member status is NOT an automatic qualification for invitationals such as Colonial, the Memorial or AT&T National.

EDIT: By the way... Under Category 17, I believe Davis Love III is currently #93 in Section III-A priority if EVERY player above him chose to play in a particular tournament. (Section III-A is the base priority list used for "regular" events) Love is #136 in priority using Category 19. So again, in reality, he would still get in all the "regular" events via last year's #100 money list position.

I'd forgotten all about the competing events release thing. Is there any record of what exactly Finchem would/could do if a player were to just stick two fingers up and play somewhere else anyway? It must be getting a bit close to restraint of trade, which coincidentally has also been an issue in Asia in the past few months, with court cases and fines flying around... for example:
http://thepeninsulaqatar.com/sport/217116-asian-tour-could-face-further-legal-challenges-lawyers.html

Could we see a parallel Stateside soon?

Ned,
I'm sure robo has a better answer but one of the sanctions that can be applied to non-conforming members is exclusion from the FedEx Play-Offs and resultant participation in the bounty of annuities that can follow.

But I agree with your inference that any such action (which I'm sure would not be publicised except perhaps by the player himself) would have to be retroactive.

Membership might have its privileges, but surely it can also enforce some obligations?

NedB-H wrote:I'd forgotten all about the competing events release thing. Is there any record of what exactly Finchem would/could do if a player were to just stick two fingers up and play somewhere else anyway? It must be getting a bit close to restraint of trade, which coincidentally has also been an issue in Asia in the past few months, with court cases and fines flying around... for example:
http://thepeninsulaqatar.com/sport/217116-asian-tour-could-face-further-legal-challenges-lawyers.html

Could we see a parallel Stateside soon?

I'm not a legal eagle... NOR have I had this discussion with anyone who would have any kind of "official" take on this... so take this as OPINION only.

My understanding is the Asian Tour situation is different because they outright PROHIBIT players from playing on the OneAsia Tour. I could certainly see how that would be a restraint of trade. However, the PGAT has NO such prohibition, so I would think it would be difficult for a similar restraint of trade to be taken against the PGAT...

HOWEVER... there is a situation that I guess "could" develop with a full time PGA Tour player (specifically an American) deciding to dual tour on say the PGAT/EuroT (as AK was supposed to do before he got hurt and DJ has indicated he would do at some point also). There are rules that allow the international player to play "home tour" events on his home tour without Competing Event Releases (CERs)... but near as I can tell from the Player's manual there is no procedure for an American to dual tour elsewhere.

Forget this year with the truncated schedule... let's look at the 2013-2014 season going forward. Right now to meet the minimum 13 events on the Euro Tour a Major/WGC qualified player needs to get in 5 Euro Tour events in addition to the 8 common co-sanctioned events (4 majors, 4 WGC's after the HSBC is added). WHERE does he get his releases to do so? Assuming the PGAT player played 20 events on the PGAT, then he could get 4 competing event releases... Then he could play the off week in the playoffs... and that gets him his minimum.

BUT... there's a CATCH. Who would want to play the Euro Tour if you can't participate in their playoff series? The Euro Tour end coincides with the end of the fall segment of the PGAT.... and since the Euro Tour is going to require players to play in 2 of the 3 "final series" events to play in the 4th. How does the PGAT player get enough releases against the 6 week Fall PGAT segment to do that? I'm not sure he reasonably can.... He probably has to use all four of his competing event releases for the October and November Euro Final Series.... so that leaves him ONLY that off week in the middle of the FedEx Playoffs to get his 5th event.

And it's worse (maybe impossible) if it's a PGAT player that's qualified for say only 4 of the Majors/WGC's.... because now he needs 9 more Euro events... and he needs Competing Event Releases (CER's) for alternate events too... so there doesn't seem to be enough "holes in the schedule" to get in the 9.

My guess is... and ONLY guessing... the commissioner has the power to grant additional releases. So I guess any full time PGAT player who wanted to dual Euro Tour would have to sit down with the Commish and work out an acceptable schedule to both parties... because without some waivers to the existing rules... I don't see how it could reasonably happen..

kwinigolfer wrote:Ned,
I'm sure robo has a better answer but one of the sanctions that can be applied to non-conforming members is exclusion from the FedEx Play-Offs and resultant participation in the bounty of annuities that can follow.

But I agree with your inference that any such action (which I'm sure would not be publicised except perhaps by the player himself) would have to be retroactive.

Membership might have its privileges, but surely it can also enforce some obligations?

Kwini... On this one I don't think I have a better answer. The situation is NOT covered in the Regulation Manual near as I can tell (I have 2012 and before, but not 2013's manual yet). Near as I can tell... Under Section IX-B Voting Membership... the only paragraph that seems to directly relate to a penalty for not playing 15 is the loss of participation in PART of the retirement plan.... AND there are other sections that "might" indicate a player must wait up to 6 months to reapply for membership (but I'm not sure on that at this point - I'll ask around)

Here's the language: 3. Special Privileges of Voting Members
Besides their exclusive rights to vote for Player Directors of the PGA TOUR Policy Board (see Section G of this Article IX), only voting members shall be eligible to participate in the PGA TOUR Deferred Compensation Player Retirement Plan (the "Cuts" plan) unless the member has achieved Veteran Member status pursuant to Section A.1.p of Article III.

Remember the PGA Tour retirment plan is broken down into TWO parts... One is the contribution to player accounts based on cuts made that still exists... and the 2nd part is the money earned in the FedEx Playoffs (minus the cash portion earned by the top-10). For a NON-Veteran member... the CUTS PLAN participation is forfeited by not meeting the 15 event minimum.

I'll try to get something difinitive for future years... like what happens if a player who has not had excused injury or personal time off, comes up to playoff time with only 10 events? He can't possibly meet his 15 as the season ends with the Tour Championship. So what happens? I don't know... Maybe the 2013 Policy Maunal will have it, when I can get my hands on it.

Anyway... that's all for today... Gotta go to work... !!! :-)

Thanks for the replies Kwini and Robo. I'd forgotten all about the home tour exemptions too... I'm wondering whether I've forgotten more about the depths of the exemption regulations than I ever wanted to know. But the short of it, as fair as I can see, is that with every new situation that comes up, Finchem is burying himself further in clauses and subclauses to keep everyone (just about) happy. The risk is, I suspect, that someone eventually hoists him by his own petard, possibly in the scenario that robo sets out with an American playing two tours (and where would someone such as Scott Pinckney, an American starting his career in Europe, stand? Is it his home tour, or not?). Finchem's had a good run, but you'd have to think that sooner or later some sporting agent, who gets paid to cause this sort of trouble, will call him out on his own web of rules... and at that point he might reflect that it would've been easier to just keep the regulations to a minimum all along.

Anyway, this all started with a discussion of Stricker... good article here from Doug Ferguson on his plans:

http://espn.go.com/golf/story/_/id/8810263/steve-stricker-headed-semi-retirement-starting-season

Big news is the suggestion that Stricker was close to packing it in for the whole year... but even aside from that, I would think (or hope) that Finchem might get a few searching questions from journos, on the subject of the contradiction between the multitude of "player-commitment" rules he sets, and a senior player going public with an anti-golf attitude like this.

Interesting Ferguson story. Hadn't read that before.
Not really an anti-golf stance though, is it? More like pro enjoying life.

Stricker's always had slightly different motivations and objectives, but easy for him to make this decision now, when he has security of playing options.
But if the Majors are truly important to him, at least while he's competitive, he'll have to maintain at least a Top 50 World Ranking - which is not so easy to do.

Thanks for the link.

Anti-golf if you're those tournaments he won't be found at Kwini! We seem to be veering from one extreme to the other here; on the one hand we have the tour laying down rules (albeit with all these loopholes) insisting on players turning out in the US and nowhere else, and then on the other we have Stricker saying that despite being an elite golfer he'd rather not spend his time playing golf at all.
You'd hope there could be a middle ground, where the tour could trust players to make their fair share of events, and in return let them play elsewhere sometimes; and in return the players would show up enough to stop the various tours from collapsing in on themselves. Without wanting to pick on the guy, if the top 30 players on the PGA Tour all took the Stricker approach, and played WGCs, Majors and their home stop, then we'd probably only have half a tour left.

Is Stricker and has Stricker ever been much of a draw? Especially now he's on the turn I can't see his curtailed schedule making much of a difference to too many people.

I'd say Stricker is a draw at some of the events he plays, just another competent golfer at others.
But the deeper point that Ned is getting at is interesting:
Does the Tour resign itself to the possibility of some top players picking and choosing - opting to play selected tournaments, the John Deere and probably Houston in Stricker's case?
Or does it risk the wrath of legal action by imposing more rigorous criteria?

Regardless, Stricker is 46 - thirty years ago he'd be pipe and slippers anyway. I'd say, allow the natural selection process take its course.

It will be interesting to see what happens to his ranking because it may determine if he gets away with another part time year in 2014 as well as his 2013 one. I am sure he will have some exemptions that would get him into pga tour events in 2014 regardless, but seems like he would pack it in for good without having the majors and WGC's to play in.

This will certainly be interesting news for Tiger, as I have always thought he would only play 4 times a year if he could get away with it.

Four majors plus the tinpot tournaments he hosts himself and the ones he's paid absurdly to take part in. He's too 'fatigued' to play any more than that. Wonder if he'll sit out the next RC given his abysmal record.

In fairness he's exempt in the Masters and PGA forever anyway, and the Open til he's 60. Even the US he has an exemption til 2018. So he could just play those if he wanted, nothing the tour could do about it either. But I think even he's sensible enough to know he needs a few more "reps" than that if he's gonna be tournament-ready in the majors.