Fedup With The Fedex?
OK, So the PGA Tour
has come up with a brain-storm that can't be beat. Nor can
it be understood! I'm not sure, other than an attempt to milk more money
from the sport, what Tim Finchem was thinking when he put his John Hancock on the
bottom line for the FedEx Cup. There seems to be quite a bit of
dissent from the players and I believe the fans are too confused about it
to say much of anything. So here I am to help simplify the format so
we all can root with confidence.First: The playoff system involves 4 weeks in a row of regular PGA Tour tournaments. Players have earned points all season long to make the final top 144 players that can compete, or not, in the first of the playoff tournaments, The Barclays. Then the next 120 point leaders can compete in the second leg, The Deutsche Bank Championship. After that, the next 70 of the point leaders will play the next tourney, BMW Championship. Then we come to the last one. The top 30 point leaders will play in The Tour Championship.
So far so good.
Second: The participants are vying to win the FedEx cup and an unprecedented 10 million dollars prize package, sort of. Here's where it gets a bit mucky. For simplicity, I'll just address the winner even though the first few places have the same restriction. Lets assume the winner is one of the young guns, say 27 year old Justin Rose. If Justin wins the FedEx Cup and the 10 million dollar prize, he may invest the money any what he chooses, but won't be able to touch a dime of it until he is 45. At 45 he may opt to defer payment until age 60 or start getting monthly payments for the next 5 years and limit his PGA participation to 15 tournaments a year. After which, of course, he then qualifies for the senior tour. HUH??? Of course he could always win 18 more FedEx cups, but I don't know what happens then.
Third: OK, Now to the scoring. Keeping in mind that this is called a playoff. Players earn points all year long. It is possible for a player to earn enough points during the regular season to win the FedEx Cup without participating in the playoff. HUH? This year, Tiger missed he first one, several top players skipped the second and Phil, who was leading the FedEx points, skipped the third event. How this can be called a playoff is beginning to escape me. Other than all the hype, it really hasn't changed anything in how the players are ranked. Nor doesn't it seam to effect the regular earnings other than the FedEx money that they can't take anyway until they are 45 then semi retire. Or not.
OK, I don't know any more about this than when I started and I suspect, anyone reading this didn't gain much either. Hopefully, as we grow older, we'll understand why this is considered a playoff or even why this was really necessary. I would think a playoff would be match play or some other form of play rather than plain old golf for points, if you feel like it, or not.
Can someone please explain this to me???
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