With his PGA Tour season at serious risk, major winner calls format ‘silly’

Lucas Glover, his PGA Tour season at serious risk, was asked if he knew the scenarios to keep it alive. 

Not really, he said. 

“I’m just trying to, same as every week, try to win,” Glover continued. “Give it all you’ve got and see where the chips fall.” 

About a minute later, the 2009 U.S. Open winner was then asked what the pressure was like for him this week. 

None, he said. 

“Same as always,” Glover continued. “I mean, kind of play great, you get to play next week. If you don’t, you get to go home for a few weeks. It’s a win-win for me. I played so poorly early in the year, I was gone so much; you know, I hadn’t seen much of my family. So if I have to go home, that’s all right with me. If not, I’d love to play next week. Might change Sunday morning, but as of now, it’s kind of house money for me.” 

And then he was questioned about a format he was playing. 

To catch you up there, the Tour is playing the Wyndham Championship, the final event of its regular season. And from here, the top 70 both advance to the first leg of the playoffs and are guaranteed playing privileges for next year. But in previous years, the cut-off was 125.

And that drew Glover’s ire. And no, he said, it hadn’t nothing to do with the fact that he was 112th in the standings entering play on Thursday, though he has improved some after rounds of 66 and 64 at Sedgefield Country Club.

“Yeah, yeah, it’s very contrived to me, the whole thing,” Glover said. “I don’t even really understand it. I think if you finish in the top 125, I don’t know why you don’t get to play next week. That’s my opinion. Been pretty outspoken in that. I think it’s silly that it’s only 70. I think it’s silly that we’re playing 70 in these elevated events. I think it’s silly.

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“I think it’s taken a lot of these last few tournaments of the regular season, a lot of that drama, and I just think it’s silly.”

The change was one of several the Tour made ahead of the season. In a new format, the top 50 players after next week’s first playoff event are guaranteed playing privileges for next year, along with entry into the Tour’s big-money, limited-field (and, in some cases, no-cut) events; players 51 through 70 after next week are also guaranteed playing privileges and can gain entry into the first two big-money events through their play in seven fall tournaments; while players 71 and higher will have to work — the top 125 threshold still exists, but that won’t be finalized until after the fall circuit. 

Glover, meanwhile, had more thoughts, in an interview with Golfweek’s Adam Schupak — which you can and should read in full here. 

He continued to criticize the new set-up. He also said that he hasn’t bothered to talk to anyone about his concerns.   

“It’s a waste of breath, a waste of time,” he said. “I’ve been out here long enough to know that it doesn’t matter. The PAC’s [Player Advisory Council] useless. They’re going to do what they’re going to do.”

In the interview with Schupak, Glover also said “something was inevitable” in discussing the recent proposed deal between the Tour and the Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund. That arrangement would create a new, for-profit enterprise and end pending litigation between the Tour and PIF-funded LIV Golf.

“We couldn’t continue to go down the road we were going,” Glover told Schupak. “Anyone with a brain knows [the Tour] didn’t have the money. [LIV] was going to drag this lawsuit out as long as they could. The Tour can’t prop up $20 million purses forever, pretty sure the sponsors don’t want to do it either.”

Editor’s note: To read Golfweek’s extended interview with Glover, please click here.