Finchem: Contraction on the PGA Tour unlikely
June 30, 2010
NEWTOWN SQUARE, Pa. (AP)—Even as the economy continues to lag and the PGA Touris looking for a half-dozen title sponsors, commissioner Tim Finchem doesn’tenvision a smaller schedule in the next few years.
Over the last two years, the tour has either renewed contracts or found newtitle sponsors for 12 tournaments. The immediate goal is to find title sponsorsfor Hilton Head and the World Golf Championship at Doral. Finchem said Wednesdaythe tour is having “conversations” with various companies that are interestedin those events and “we feel good about where we’re headed.”
As for contraction?
“We have to have sponsorship to put on events, so if it got to a pointwhere sponsorship wasn’t available, it’s always a possibility,” he said. “Butcandidly, we are on track with where we are in most years, good or bad economy,in terms of the amount of work we have to do either to renew sponsors or bringin new sponsors.
“I think the market is soft generally,” he added. “But for our product,it continues to perform well, and we don’t anticipate any need forcontraction.”
A full schedule—the tour has 47 tournaments over 44 weeks—means gettingplayers to compete in more events. One proposal is to designate tournaments withweaker fields and require top players to play in at least one of those.
Finchem said that was still a few months away from being ironed out, with noguarantee it will be done. For it to be approved for the 2011 season, he saidany plan would have to be approved twice by the policy board. He also would wantthe fourth quarter of the year to explain it to the players.
“I would suspect in the next two months—90 days, maybe—we need tofinish it up,” Finchem said. “Certainly by September.”
LONG DAY: Kevin Sutherland can’t say he didn’t get a good look at Aroniminkbefore the AT&T National.
Sutherland was the first alternate for the morning pro-am, meaning he had tobe at the course by 6:30 a.m., then wait until the final group was done beforehe could leave. He told his wife and son he would probably be back by about10:30 a.m.
But instead of letting a beautiful morning go to waste, Sutherland decidedto play the course ahead of the pro-am. So he teed off 10 minutes ahead of TigerWoods and had the course to himself.
But not for long.
“I’m on the seventh green when I get a tap on the shoulder,” Sutherlandsaid.
One of the players had withdrawn, and Sutherland had to take a cart back tothe first tee, meet his three amateur partners and tee off for a five-hour roundof 18 holes.
“I wound up playing 25 holes today,” he said before heading back to hishotel.
No one was more surprised than Brian Smith, the caddie for Justin Leonard.They were on the back nine when he looked over and saw Sutherland playing alongon the seventh green. When Leonard was on the third green, Smith noticedSutherland teeing off on No. 8, this time with three amateurs.
TIGER’S DEFENSE: Tiger Woods tends to play the same tournaments each year.He also tends to win a lot.
When he tees off Thursday at the AT&T National, he will be trying tosuccessfully defend his title for the 23rd time on the PGA Tour. But this mightbe tougher than some of the others.
In his 22 previous title defenses, Woods won back-to-back on a differentgolf course only five times—the PGA Championship (Medinah in 1999, Valhalla in2000), the American Express Championship (Ireland in 2002, Atlanta in 2003), theBritish Open (St. Andrews in 2005, Hoylake in 2006), the American Express (SanFrancisco in 2005, London in 2006), and the PGA (Medinah in 2006, Southern Hillsin 2007).
Tee it up with Yahoo! Sports Fantasy Golf 10
