This May Be the PGA Tour’s Last Week in Hawaii

A new-look version of the PGA Tour next year may see the end of the traditional Hawaiian start, Bob Harig writes. Also, a playoff change, Pat Perez's plight and the opener in Dubai.

This year's Sony Open in Hawaii may mark the end of an era. / Kyle Terada/Imagn Images

The 2026 season begins Thursday, a week later than usual, at the Sony Open in Hawaii. The Pacific Ocean views are unable to mask the uncertainty surrounding the event, and the future of what is sure to be a new-look version of the PGA Tour.

The annual stop on Maui, the Sentry, was canceled in October due to a course watering issue that may or may not have been a convenient excuse to scrap a tournament that was negatively impacting the now for-profit PGA Tour.

This week’s tournament on Oahu dates to 1965 but is in danger due to Sony’s sponsorship ending after this week. It has led to the serious conjecture that the long-time two-week Hawaiian start to the season will be scuttled as part of a broader plan to contract.

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New PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp has made no secret of a desire to come up with a plan that involves a leaner, meaner product, one that makes all of the events more meaningful while potentially abandoning some long-time Tour stops.

Change is difficult even if, ultimately, some of it might be necessary to reach a different set of goals that involves a different revenue plan.

“I think we all know change is needed,” veteran PGA Tour player Gary Woodland said. “Change is tough. We’ll see when it gets down what’s really going to happen. I do believe we do need to change. We’ve been stagnant for a long time.

“[But] it’s hard to go away from taking opportunities away. This Tour has been based on opportunities for a long time, but I understand we’re star-driven. It’s definitely been that way the last four or five years.

“It will be interesting. At the end of the day, if you play well, it takes care of a lot of things, and now I think you’re going to have to play really well to take care of a lot of things. I’m assuming ’27 is going to be a lot different.”

Some changes to the Tour are already here

Change already occurred for this season with the reduction in full PGA Tour status from 125 to 100 players, as well as Korn Ferry Tour graduates shrinking from 25 spots to 20.

Several tournament fields are also being cut, with this week’s Sony event down to 120 players from 132. Many tournaments, including the Players Championship, are seeing a reduction in the interest of faster play, the result being fewer opportunities.

The Tour is evolving from one that catered to the masses to one that is geared toward the top players and leaning into their star power. It’s why there are eight signature events with limited fields and big purses. And why there is talk of further contraction going forward, all of which makes for an uneasy feeling.

“I think we needed to find a place where we all play more together, and that’s tough too because of the schedule,” said Woodland, who is beginning his season this week in Hawaii. “The one beauty about being out here is you get to pick your own schedule, and that has probably dwindled the last two years with the signature events. It’s hard for guys to take off.

“It will be nice, I think we’ve proven that, when all the guys get together. Especially when we go to big golf courses, iconic golf courses, the ratings and everything go up and it’s a lot better. But trying to get guys together 20 times a year, if we can do it, it’s great. We’ve all just got to make sure we take care of the other guys as well.”

And therein lies the issue—and some of the potential problems. Among the ideas floated is a Tour schedule that sees just 22 events (not including the four major championships). That would be a reduction in eight tournament weeks, which would mean a later start to the season and potential off weeks during the schedule.

How that could be achieved is daunting.

PGA Tour veteran Matt Kuchar, who is not in the Sony field—a victim of the new smaller exempt Tour—said he met with Rolapp in November and had a two-hour discussion about the possibilities for the future.

Matt Kuchar had a long discussion with new PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp about what a new-look Tour might be. / Marc Lebryk-Imagn Images

“The biggest thing I came away with is they’d like to have our version of the Tour kind of owning, controlling, operating a handful of really great events,” Kuchar said. “Certainly what the Players Championship as turned into is incredible. It’s arguably one of the best run events in the world now.

“But part of me wonders how much of an appetite there is for, let’s say, 20 major golfing tournaments. I still scratch my head at what happened to the World Golf Championships. For the most part, all of the top 40, 50 guys in the world played all the World Golf Championships. Tiger [Woods] won half of them so clearly they were successful from a TV standpoint. And they no longer exist.

“I definitely think the Tour had ought to be concerned about putting out the best product possible.”

Kuchar’s point about too many “big” events is valid. If they are all big, then they cease to be special. There is a sense now that eight (nine with the canceled Sentry) signature events is too many, making for two levels. Widening that gap with even more small field events would seem problematic.

Navigating all of these issues is what will play out over this year.

Davis Love III, 61, has pretty much seen it all in his time as a PGA Tour player, board member and tournament host. A member of the World Golf Hall of Fame, Love’s foundation runs the RSM Classic, the final event of the fall schedule. Like everyone, he is curious to see how it all plays out.

“I wear a lot of hats and I don’t know what you call my position now, but our foundation operates a tournament,” Love said. “So we’re very interested in where it all shakes out. I think with the committees and the board and the player representation, the players are being heard more than ever. And it’s more like let’s make this a successful long-term business now. And we’re shareholders now. So I’m interested in that side. I think it’s going in the right direction. I just don’t know what the end result is going to be.

“So how is this going to end up? I don’t know. That’s where I caution players concerned or who don’t like it. When we started the FedEx Cup [in 2007] ...how many times has it changed? It changed a lot. If this doesn’t work, it can always change.

“Where this shakes out in the end, the last five, six years have been very tumultuous.”

That doesn’t appear to be changing anytime soon.

FedEx Cup playoffs get a point adjustment

It has yet to be announced but a change to the FedEx Cup points structure is set to take place in 2026, according to the PGA Tour Player Handbook.

Throughout the year, regular events give 500 points to the winner, with 700 points at the signature events and 750 to the majors and Players Championships.

This year, the first two FedEx Cup playoff events, the FedEx St. Jude Championship and the BMW Championship, will see their points to the winner reduced from 2,000 to 750—the same as the majors and the Players.

This is a logical move, given the bonus structure that is now in place following the BMW Championship, thus meaning less volatility through the first two playoffs and more of a reward for the entire season.

For now, it appears there is no change to the season-ending Tour Championship at East Lake, which crowns the FedEx Cup champion based on the results of the 30-player tournament. Like 2025, it is listed as having a $40 million purse, with $10 million going to the winner.

The plight of Pat Perez

With more than $28 million in career earnings on the PGA Tour, Pat Perez would be exempt on the PGA Tour Champions, which has an eligibility category based on all-time career money earned between the regular and senior circuits.

The problem: Perez’s affiliation with LIV Golf.

Pat Perez's affiliation with LIV Golf may delay his desire to play the PGA Tour Champions. / Jim Cowsert-Imagn Images

The three-time PGA Tour winner jumped to the controversial league in 2002 and played for three seasons. He wasn’t retained by his 4Aces team after 2024 and morphed into an on-course reporting role last year.

Perez has given that up because he wants to pursue Champions Tour golf. He turns 50 on March 1 and wants to play when his age permits. The problem: his affiliation with the LIV broadcast last year has led to an undisclosed—so far—sanction that could keep him from competing right away.

The Today’s Golfer website in the U.K. reported last week that Perez faces sanctions via “promotion of and association with an unauthorized event,” which LIV Golf tournaments are deemed by the PGA Tour.

“Non-member players who participate in an unauthorized event will be subject to the Non-Member Policy which prohibits play in PGA Tour events for one year from the date of participation in an unauthorized event,” the policy reads.

“Promotion of and association with an unauthorized event is considered participation in the event for the purposes of this regulation. Should players seek to reinstate their membership in the future, they would be subject to disciplinary action for violations incurred as a member and any violations to the Non-Member Policy.”

But here’s the problem with that policy: it applies to players who were not members of the PGA Tour. Perez is viewed differently. His sanctions are not necessarily a blanket one-year ban. It could be more or less.

Perez has declined to discuss the situation as he wants it to play out and doesn’t want to jeopardize his chances to return as soon as possible. He will be eligible for three senior majors: the U.S. Senior Open, the Senior PGA and the Senior Open. How much else he gets to play is still to be determined.

Rory McIlroy starts his year in Dubai

The DP World Tour schedule resumes this week in Dubai, with five tournaments having already been staged as part of the 2025-26 season. The Dubai Invitational is the first event as part of what the tour calls its international swing, with four in the Middle East.

Rory McIlroy is among the headliners at this week’s event, which has been played on an every-other-year basis in non-Ryder Cup years. He will be joined by Tommy Fleetwood, Shane Lowry and Padraig Harrington, as well as LIV Golf players such as Patrick Reed, Tom McKibben and David Puig. McIlroy is also expected to play next week’s Dubai Desert Classic, where Tyrrell Hatton is the defending champion.

Scottie Scheffler will make his season debut next week at the PGA Tour’s American Express Championship, which is getting a good field, perhaps the result of the lost event at the Sentry. He is one of six players ranked 11th or better in the Official World Golf Ranking to enter after just two of the top 10 competed last year.

Other top players in the field are Russell Henley, Robert MacIntyre, Ben Griffin, Justin Rose and Sepp Straka.

Scheffler is making his sixth appearance in the event but missed last year while he was recovering from a hand injury that kept him out until February.

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