For as long as there is a Tour Championship on the PGA Tour, there will be a debate over its format. At least, that’s what the last two decades would have you believe, as the Tour has waffled between FedEx Cup points, starting strokes, dreams of match play and, ultimately, what we see this year: a completely level playing field for 30 players.
That fluctuation has done little to create a lasting legacy and/or an exciting product for golf fans. Which is why you have press conferences every August filled with reporters asking players for their thoughts on the format, at least some of whom have had trouble keeping up with all the format changes. (Asked Tuesday about the tweaks for 2025, Tommy Fleetwood said, “In all honesty, I didn’t know until today or yesterday what the — obviously I knew it was a normal tournament, but I didn’t know everything evolving around it.”) It’s not perfect! And it may never be. But the Tour should be interested in making it as perfect as it possibly could be.
The frequent format adjustments, while somewhat unproductive, do at least show one thing: The Tour is not afraid of change. The Tour’s Player Advisory Council has had numerous meetings over the last year where the format of a season-ending finale was among the main topics. And plenty that came from those meetings was positive! Removing starting strokes and pushing FedEx Cup bonus payouts ahead on the schedule are just two. But I’ve got some more ideas in mind, which you can watch (and read about) below.
The most important thing you need to know about the Tour Championship — and how it will look in the future — is that it will need to appease and please at least five different parties: the Tour itself, the players, the TV rights holders, the sponsors (FedEx, chiefly) and the fans. Does that create a bit of a Rubik’s Cube, where solving for one impacts the others? Absolutely. But I think we make everyone mostly happy with what follows.
1. 30 players, just as there always has been. The Tour is obsessed with having 30 players advance to the TC. Thirty is a great number. It’s the third stage of the playoffs, and everyone who gets there gets a bunch of other stuff, too. They’ll start their season in Hawaii at the Sentry. They’ll also all get invited to the Masters. If we have more than 30 players at the Tour Championship — or much fewer than that number — something is either lost or gained. Thirty is a good number, and it keeps the Tour happy.
2. We begin with stroke play. Take it from Rory McIlroy, who spoke on the topic Tuesday: “I think it’s just hard for the players to reconcile that we play stroke play for every week of the year but then the season-ending tournament is going to be decided by match play. I think it was just hard for the players to get their heads around that.”
It’s true. Numerous players on the Tour Policy Board and PAC have said it. You can’t play stroke play all year long and suddenly have only a match-play championship. So we begin with all 30 players at the TC playing two rounds of stroke play.
3. Both ends of leaderboard matter. The top two performers after 36 holes will receive a first-round bye on Match Play Saturday. That’s what everyone is after: a much easier road to victory that is earned by solid play. The top 14 players will make the cut, but that is only after a possible playoff for the 14th and final spot. If four players are tied for 13th after two rounds, it’s a four-for-two sudden playoff, which brings us to another part of the puzzle…
4. TV execs would love it. When you institute a 36-hole competition, the first 18 holes really matter. And what happens late in the second 18 holes really matters. In other words, that four-for-two playoff would play out late in the day on Friday, hopefully for primetime viewing on the East Coast. Right now, there is little reason at all to watch the second round of the Tour Championship. This would change that.
5. Match Play Saturday. The sales team at the PGA Tour — to invoke an all-time comedy line — could sell (sponsorship of) a ketchup popsicle to a woman in white gloves. With a nimble, made-for-TV Tour Championship, I am looking to give them new business opportunities, like Match Play Saturday. Where the 1- and 2-seed have byes into the quarterfinals, and where 4 plays against 13, and 5 plays against 12.
To add some names to those numbers, using scores from the 2024 TC, Collin Morikawa and Scottie Scheffler would have received byes. Tommy Fleetwood (seeded 13th) would have sneaked past 4-seed Sahith Theegala, only to find himself matched up against (and losing to) 5-seed Xander Schauffele in the afternoon. We would have six matches in the morning, and then four in the afternoon, once again ending in primetime. Before anyone doubts match play as a viable TV product, my colleague James Colgan very literally got Sam Flood, NBC executive producer, to comment on that:
“There’s no question match play would work for the PGA Tour playoffs,” Flood said. “It would be dramatic for TV, and if it was done the right way, it could be one of the great moments in golf.”
That sound like an endorsement?
6. Playoffs would feel like … playoffs! You’ve heard it countless times — that the FedEx Cup Playoffs need to feel more like actual playoffs. Where players/teams survive and advance from one stage to the next. This format would only lengthen the surviving and advancing period. We’d begin with 70 players, narrow down to 50, then to 30, then 14, eight and, after the quarterfinals, just four. This is where we check the sponsorship box, because for the entire month of August, it would feel like there is a more direct line between the start of the FedEx Cup Playoffs and the end. Between the divisional round and Super Bowl Sunday. That’s a win for the company that sponsors it all, and is probably the most important sponsor in all of pro golf.
7. Building to a Sunday Shootout. Match Play Saturday would create a final four as we move back to stroke play for a neat and orderly shootout. 1 v. 1 v. 1 v. 1, 18 holes, low man wins. This solves for any concerns about a blowout championship match, or any flukey winners. If you have advanced to the final 30, made the top-14 cut after two rounds, advanced through two matches and then beat three other golfers who did the same? You are absolutely worthy of being the FedEx Cup champion.
For those who can’t quite imagine it just yet, I used the scores from the 2024 Tour Championship to get us as close as possible. Last year’s Sunday Shootout would have pitted Peak Xander Schauffele against Peak Scottie Scheffler against Peak Collin Morikawa against the birdie machine known as Wyndham Clark.
That kind of entertainment is how we check the box for fans.
