We’re About to Get Some Answers on the PGA Tour’s Future

A long-awaited news conference Wednesday will be closely watched by everyone in the sport, Bob Harig writes. Also: Jon Rahm's stalemate and a Masters qualifying watch.

Before this week's Players Championship begins, PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp will share his vision for where the Tour is heading. | Ben Jared/Getty Images

ORLANDO — The PGA Tour heads up the Florida interstate to its flagship event this week at Tour headquarters in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla. The Players Championship is its crown jewel and should be celebrated as such, but there will be side stories that could undercut what occurs on the TPC Sawgrass Stadium course.

For weeks, the Wednesday news conference with new PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp has been touted as the place where the Tour’s future—or at least parts of it—will be unveiled.

Also, there’s been none-too-subtle conjecture that the Tour is ready to reignite the long debate—for years put on the backburner—that the Players Championship should be considered a major championship.

The latter is a rather dubious play, especially given the popularity of the Players in recent years when that narrative was abandoned and the tournament prospered. And without all players being eligible—LIV Golf members cannot get into the Players—the argument is a non-starter.

But how will future schedules look? How will the PGA Tour’s competitive model change? Will some longtime events that fans and players have come to know over decades be scuttled in the name of profits and investor returns?

It’s possible a few of those questions are answered this week. There is still a lot to unpack, and a few weeks ago, Tiger Woods—who has a role on the PGA Tour Policy Board and was appointed last year by Rolapp to the Future Competitions Committee—made clear that task is complicated.

Sports Illustrated reached out to several stakeholders in the game, all of whom suggested that the Tour still has a lot of work to do. Many title sponsors have yet to be contacted, which suggests that we won’t get any definitive news on the comings and goings of events.

But we could be told more about specific goals around scarcity, a new competitive model (will the FedEx Cup format change?) and a general outline of the future.

Lucas Glover doesn't want the PGA Tour to lose its character by abandoning smaller markets. | Steve Roberts-Imagn Images

“I’d hate to see us lose any of our tournaments,” said Lucas Glover, 46, a PGA Tour veteran who was recently voted chairman of the Player Advisory Council and will next year take a seat on the PGA Tour Policy Board and Enterprises Board.

“Bigger markets, I think, is important. But at the same time, I don’t want to lose the Molines [John Deere Classic] and the Greensboros. For those fans, it’s maybe the biggest thing in their community.

“I’m still taking the stance ... I hope we are doing what’s right for golf, what’s best for the game and not just the players’ pockets.”

And therein lies the big dilemma.

The pressure now is to turn a profit

No longer is the PGA Tour so adamantly about its charitable interests, the longtime rallying cry from week to week. While that is still part of the mandate, you hear far less about it.

With Strategic Sports Group investing more than $1.5 billion into PGA Tour Enterprises and a plan to pay equity grants to players over time that will, in theory, grow into millions, the pressure is on to make the Tour a profitable enterprise.

Glover is torn by these objectives and it is why he will take a unique place on the various boards next year. He, for example, is not in favor of the signature event model that saw him tie for 24th on Sunday. And yet, he admits he’s benefited from them these big-money events. (Akshay Bhatia earned $4 million for his playoff win over Daniel Berger.)

“Private equity doesn’t understand about some athletes, some golfers,” Glover said. “It’s not about the money [for all]. Scottie’s [Scheffler] got more money than [he knows what to do with]. He doesn’t care. He wants to win, beat the crap out of everybody out here. That’s all he cares about, playing good golf and winning. That’s how I was brought up. It was great and we were very fortunate.

“But the answer a lot of times seems to be ‘just give them more money.’ I’m hoping to add the perspective that some people don’t work that way.”

Glover might be getting into the fray too late. The Tour is clearly headed in a new direction, one that could cause some consternation among those who are fine with the way business has been conducted for years.

There will be contraction and possibly some longtime venues abandoned in the name of a better competitive model and, thus, a better chance to sell media rights. That is the path to profitability and it needs to be robust.

How much we get brought up to date on all this will be of great interest before a ball his hit on the Stadium course.

Dissecting Jon Rahm’s stalemate with the DP World Tour

Jon Rahm won the LIV Golf Hong Kong event Sunday to cap a wild week that saw him defending his belief that he doesn’t owe the DP World Tour fines and quietly helped several of his colleagues travel from the Middle East to Hong Kong amid widespread disruption.

Rahm made it clear last week that he’s not pleased with the offer the DP World Tour presented him that would have alleviated the need for conflicting event releases in 2026—as well as fines for not getting them—in return for agreeing to drop his appeals while paying outstanding fines through 2025.

Eight of Rahm’s LIV Golf colleagues took the deal and are free to play as much as they want on the DP World Tour without sanctions.

Rahm, however, believes the fines were unjustified and has specific issues with the terms. Here’s a breakdown of his comments, which to his credit were extensive.

Rahm: “My position hasn’t changed in a week. I don’t like what they’re doing currently with the contract they’re having us sign. I don’t like the conditions. They’re asking me to play a minimum of six events, and they dictate where two of those have to be, amongst other things that I don’t agree with.”

Perspective: It’s easy to understand why Rahm is upset about having to add events. He’s being asked to play two more tournaments than the minimum for membership. But he’s not being singled out. The stipulation is a trade-off for dropping the releases and fines. And the other eight players were offered a similar deal and took it.

Jon Rahm has taken issue with certain parts of the DP World Tour's deal. | Hamad I Mohammed/Reuters via Imagn Images

Rahm: “If we just go based on that—I’ve been a dual member my whole career, PGA Tour and DP World Tour. Now with LIV Golf being accepted in the world rankings as part of the ecosystem, you could almost say a three-tour member, even though I’m suspended from the PGA Tour. But I’ve always been a dual member. Never once have I been asked for a release to play either one of those tours. We’ve never submitted a release. So why is it now that we need to be offering this and there’s all these penalties? I understand why they’re doing it. What’s the problem?”

Perspective: Rahm is not accurate here. In terms of the PGA Tour, Rahm did not have to get releases because of the Tour’s “home tour” rule which allows unlimited releases for a European player in Europe and the Middle East in return for playing 15 PGA Tour events. A player who comes up short loses his Tour membership for a year (see Martin Kaymer in 2015). The DP World Tour was also not requiring releases for every PGA Tour event played as long as membership rules—four minimum—were kept. The very, very big difference: a LIV player cannot skip a LIV event.

Rahm: “Given also the fact that two years ago I was asked to appeal the fines so they could figure this out and sort it out, and I did, and we’re running into more problems right now.”

Perspective: This is interesting if the DP World Tour actually told Rahm—along with Tyrrell Hatton—to appeal their fines, thus pushing down the road a decision on membership and thus the Ryder Cup. Both players competed at Bethpage last year as the appeal process has yet to be resolved. But it’s no longer an issue for Hatton. And it’s quite possible that all of the parties involved back in 2024 when the appeal was lodged were under the impression that a deal between the PGA Tour, DP World Tour and the Public Investment Fund—which backs LIV Golf—would have taken care of such a pesky matter.

Rahm: “I just don’t like the situation. I think we should be able to freely play where we want and have the choice to play where we want and not be dictated what we do. Especially myself. I can’t speak for others; only myself.”

Perspective: Rahm is being disingenuous. He knows there are rules for all the tours. He knows that before he joined LIV Golf, the DP World Tour had won an arbitration case that allows it to enforce its conflicting events rules. He also knows that he’s not free to play wherever he wants when LIV is playing. He is contracted to play there.

Rahm: “I don’t know what game they’re trying to play right now, but it just seems like in a way they’re using us to—they’re using our impact in tournaments and fining us and trying to benefit both ways from what we have to offer, and it’s just in a way they’re extorting players like myself and young players that have nothing to do with the politics of the game.”

Perspective: There’s no question that the DP World Tour is doing some gymnastics to try and get LIV players who are members into its tournaments. That’s likely because sponsors want them. The tournaments in Spain want Rahm and don’t care about the politics. They also want Sergio Garcia. The tournaments in Germany want Kaymer. But “extorting” seems strong. Rory McIlroy last week called the offer “generous.” It allows the rules that other DP World Tour players who are not part of LIV to be discarded in place of adding two extra events and dropping future fines.

Rahm: “Now, I did tell them, funny enough, lower that to four events, like the minimum says, and I’ll sign tonight. They haven’t agreed to that. I just refuse to play six events. I don’t want to, and that’s not what the rules say.”

Perspective: So taken by itself, that is an interesting admission. Rahm would take the deal if he only had to play four? Rahm’s principles would seemingly go away. And the rules are actually more detailed than just having to play four events. Again, it’s a trade-off to be able to drop the releases and fines.

And so here we are. There’s no word on when an appeal will be heard. Meanwhile, Rahm would have been fined last week for missing the Joburg Open. And those fines will continue to pile up. If he loses the appeal, he’d be required to pay them in order to be eligible for the 2027 Ryder Cup.

It’s still hard to envision a scenario that doesn’t see this worked out. There’s a long way to go. But the easy way out is for Rahm to accept the deal.

Visiting Augusta

Chris Gotterup took his first trip to Augusta National recently and made the most of it, bringing his dad and brother along for a memorable first round. As is protocol, he needed to play with an Augusta National member.

“So like you can bring two guests with you, but you have to play with a member,” he said. “So you just have to find someone that’s willing to take you and spend the day. Luckily, I mean, the guy that took us was a local guy and he was super nice and showed us all around the whole property. We spent the full day. We played the par-3. We got it all taken care of.”

Chris Gotterup found out that Augusta National in person is very different from the course he has seen on TV. | Kiyoshi Mio-Imagn Images

Asked for his impressions of the course where he will play the Masters for the first time, Gotterup said:

“The chute on 18 is much tighter than TV gives it credit for. I would say, like [No.] 2 with no people there, 2 green is so wild looking because it looks so massive on TV and obviously the framing of all the people behind you. It’s just like the green’s just thrown in like perfect grass obviously. So it looked much smaller and different.

“Then I would say [No.] 1 green was much more severe than TV gives it credit for. So like you have obviously a tough tee ball and then you have to hit a good second shot to be able to get it in the right section.”

Time running out to qualify for the Masters via world rankings

Just three weeks remain for players to qualify for the Masters via the top 20 in the Official World Golf Ranking and several players made moves over the weekend that at least give them a chance.

On the PGA Tour, Daniel Berger missed out on an automatic invite which would have come with a victory at the Arnold Palmer Invitational but his runner-up finish saw him jump from 61 to 34, putting him in excellent, if not guaranteed, position.

A consolation prize for Daniel Berger's runner-up at Bay Hill is a move well inside the top 50 in the world, likely landing him in the Masters. | Reinhold Matay-Imagn Images

With a tie for ninth, Rickie Fowler moved from 67th to 60th—a top-four finish would have put him in the top 50—and is within striking distance after playing in just one of the past five Masters.

Adam Scott is in as past champion but he has a chance to make his 100th consecutive major start at the U.S. Open, for which he is not yet exempt. Scott, with a tie for 11th, is now 50th in the world with the top 60 getting a U.S. Open invite at two points later in the spring.

Two-time major winner Jon Rahm climbed closer to where he belongs with his LIV Golf Hong Kong victory, going from 52nd to 36th with his victory. The OWGR accreditation is prove the LIV players now have a chance to make a move with good play.

Thomas Detry, with a runner-up finish, moved from 70th to 61st and has given himself a chance to qualify for the Masters with strong events this week in Singapore and next week in South Africa.

Elvis Smylie, who made a big jump with his season-opening win in Riyadh, stayed at 73rd after a tie for eight.  And David Puig, after a tie for eighth, moved from 84th to 71st, keeping the Masters in play.