PGA Tour Announces Major Overhaul to 2024 Schedule, With Limited-Field 'Signature Events' for Top Players
The PGA Tour made its 2024 schedule official Monday, announcing that eight tournaments will now be called "Signature Events," with the three player-hosted invitationals having 36-hole cuts and offering $4 million to the winner.
The "designated event" model was in play this year but has been altered to have fields limited with only the legacy tournaments— the Genesis Invitational, Arnold Palmer Invitational and Memorial Tournament—having 36-hole cuts to the top 50 players and ties and anyone within 10 shots of the lead.
Here is the full 2024 PGA Tour schedule
The Sentry—the season-opening event in January previously known as the Sentry Tournament of Champions—AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, Genesis Invitational, Arnold Palmer Invitational, RBC Heritage, Wells Fargo Invitational, Memorial Tournament and the Travelers Championship make up the Signature Events.
The 2024 PGA Tour season will begin again in Maui with The Sentry.
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They will have fields between 70 and 80 players and be comprised of the top 50 from this year’s final FedEx Cup standings and via two FedEx categories that will allow players to qualify.
One is the top 10 in the current year’s FedEx Cup standings, not otherwise exempt for the event; the other is the top five in points in a series of events preceding the tournament.
For example, the top 10 players from the FedEx Cup standings not otherwise exempt through the Palm Beach (formerly Honda Classic) tournament will qualify for the Arnold Palmer Invitational. Another five will qualify from a separate points list known as the "Swing Five" which will include just the Mexico Open and the Palm Beach event.
That gets the field to 65 players. There will also be four sponsor invites as well as anyone in the top 30 of the Official World Golf Ranking, which could bring the field to no more than 80 players.
Two of the events will move to the week prior to majors—the Wells Fargo Championship is scheduled for the week before the PGA Championship, and the Memorial moving to the week prior to the U.S. Open. The Travelers follows the U.S. Open, meaning a stretch of three straight big events in a row and five in seven weeks.
The no-cut, limited-field model is the direction the Tour was heading throughout this year but adding a cut to the three legacy events was viewed as a concession. Those tournaments will still have a maximum of 80 players, meaning only a dozen or so will but cut after 36 holes. The $20 million purses at those events are being redistributed so the winner gets $4 million, or 20 percent of the total, as opposed to the usual 18 percent.
A significant change will see the Pebble Beach tournament go from a full-field event over three courses to a limited field over two. Both Spyglass Hill and Pebble Beach will be used the first two days, with the final 36 holes switching to Pebble Beach on the weekend. The amateurs who make up a big portion of the vent will be limited to the first two days.
And after enjoying a nice run preceding the U.S. Open, the RBC Canadian Open will now go two weeks prior, switching places with the Memorial Tournament.