PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. — Jay Monahan’s team stood alone at the foot of the hulking clubhouse at TPC Sawgrass, illuminated in the afternoon sun. Beneath them, a few thousand people packed into the first tee box to see off Scottie Scheffler at the Players Championship.
It has become a tradition for Monahan and the PGA Tour’s head honchos to meet here, on the first tee box, for the final opening tee shots of tournament week — an intended victory lap of sorts for the Tour’s flagship tournament.
The vibe hasn’t always been celebratory. Last year, a noticeably smaller crew arrived here on a gray Monday morning for the same ritual. It had been a cold, rainy week — the weather forcing a lackluster finish in front of a subdued crowd. Of course, there was a larger storm forming on the horizon, that of LIV Golf, which was only months from barnstorming the professional golf world in a crusade targeted squarely against the Tour.
This year, however, the energy was light. Monahan and Co. wore sunglasses and warm-weather clothes as they chatted from a roped-off area on the great lawn. A brilliant afternoon was about to give way to a scintillating evening — one that would see Scheffler become just the third golfer ever (behind Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods) to win the Players and Masters in a 12-month stretch. It’d been a striking few days on the PGA Tour, filled with players meetings and wholesale changes, but now it was close to completion.
So, what did the man shepherding golf’s largest professional tour in this bold new era think of it all? Good week?
“Great week,” Monahan said, smile spread wide across his face.
In hindsight, last year’s Players served as a foreboding omen for the year to follow: Monahan’s now-famous “legacy, not leverage” commissioner’s press conference denouncing the rumored tour; Cam Smith’s eventual victory, cementing his status as a top player; and Tiger Woods’ Hall of Fame induction ceremony, a moment marking Woods’ official inauguration as the game’s foremost steward.
The events of the 12 months that followed changed golf as we knew it. The creation of a new rival tour, the steady drain of top talent — including the late-summer crown jewel: Cam Smith — and the players-only meeting called by Woods on a tarmac in Delaware that drafted a bold counterattack to save the sport.
If this year’s Players follows the same tact, it’s easy to see what has Monahan so excited. From the outset, the tone of Players 2023 sounded entirely unlike the year before. Forget an excoriating presser — the Tour started the week by ratifying changes that would change the schedule as we knew it. Now, the designated event structure would look more elegant — no cuts, smaller fields, consistent scheduling. One by one, players stepped up to voice their support (or disdain) for the changes, none of which came with the threatened undertones of the year before.
