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So, is everyone getting all excited about the upcoming World Golf Championship Tournaments? Well, I’m not. The field size of these invitationals ranges from 40 to 75, gleaned from the Sony World Rankings, with a few special invitations. The money is huge: 5 million dollar purses for each, with 1 million going to the winner. Everything about the tournaments is official: the money (for the final money list), the strokes (for the Vardon Trophy), Ryder Cup points, Player of the Year points, everything that leads to more exemptions and a better career. At this point less than 50 of the top players on the U.S. Tour will be competing in these events. Up to now, the only complaints have come from the players likely to fail to qualify for one or more of the WGC events, complaints that this writer believes are entirely justified.
I have been a player all my life. At one point I was deemed destined for Tour stardom. A succession of injuries kept me from realizing that goal, but not from continuing to compete in addition to making a living teaching the game. I know how hard it is to play top level golf. All of the players who attempt to make a living at the game will attest to the brutal difficulty in achieving the success they strive for. In golf, if you don’t perform, you get nothing. If you have excelled in the past, your window of opportunity to cash in on your successes is relatively small, depending on which tournaments you might have won. The pressure to maintain a high performance level is all-encompassing. Golf is one of the only endeavors a person can undertake where they have decent chance to wake up one morning and find that, just like that, their competence is completely gone. Just like that. This is the terrifying specter that drives the professional golfer. There is no guarantee that anything will last: just ask Ian Baker-Finch, Sandy Lyle, Gary Hallberg, Corey Pavin, or any one of a large number of winners, champions at the highest level, who are searching for the magic to return.
Given the ephemeral essence of the game, it is not surprising that none of the players firmly entrenched in the upper echelons of golf have raised any questions as to the efficacy of the World Tour. There are only a few players who march relentlessly to greatness without pausing in the purgatory of struggle. For every Tiger Woods or Justin Leonard there are many Tom Lehmans and Mark Calcavecchias. Those who are lucky enough to have never experienced the soul-wrenching that comes with prolonged failure have no idea what it feels like to question your very being every time a shot goes array, because every missed opportunity is one more nail in a slowly closing coffin that was once called “potential”. Those who have visited this barren landscape and have fought their way out of it through hard work and total, (many would say misguided) dedication are horrified at the thought of a return visit. No one should expect these players to come to the aid of those less fortunate. You won’t see any of the players who qualify for the WGC lobbying for larger fields. To do so would indicate that they have entertained the thought that once again they might descend to the ranks of the “middle class,” the “hangers-on,” the “journeyman.” They have made it, and their dearest wish is that they never have to go back. It is a completely human characteristic, however unfortunate it may be, that most successful people forget where they came from in the first place.
The same excuse cannot be made for star-loving sportswriters. I have been reading all too often about the “non-marquee” players that nobody wants to watch, about the “system that all-too-suddenly is rewarding solid-if-not-spectacular play,” referring to any player out of the top 40 who asks for any kind of respect as a whining ingrate who should be ashamed of themselves for focusing on anything but reaching the “holy grail” of a top 30 ranking, after which all good things will come. What these failed athletes fail to grasp is that every golfer who achieves exempt status on the PGA Tour is already a great player. Those who have never played the game for a living have no clue what it takes to get out to the big show. I never made it, although I certainly tried, and if one of these pious scribes ever tried calling me a loser I’d be tempted to give them more than a small piece of my mind. But some writers just can’t help themselves. Every level a player works himself up to has a dark side: “the best player never to win, the best player never to win a major” Just being there and performing well enough to stay out there is not good enough. Unfortunately, that’s exactly the attitude that’s being fostered by the press, and what’s worse, by the PGA Tour itself.
What can the hierarchy at PGA Tour headquarters be thinking? On one hand there is the Tour’s new advertising campaign, “These Guys Are Good,” on the other there are the World Golf Championships, where the motto is “only a few of these guys are good enough” to play in these new tournaments which will more than likely determine all the major awards for the year and virtually guarantee that anyone who qualifies to play in them will continue to reap the benefits for years to come no matter how well they play. It is obvious that the Tour, as are most major sports, is star-driven. Charles Zink, the PGA Tour’s chief financial officer, sums it up like this: “ There is no doubt that value is being created by the marquee players. This is capitalism in it’s purest form…We need to get the money to where the value is being created.”
But while the engine is powered by the elite, the train is long and is composed of the rest of the players who are all excellent in their own right. Where do they think “marquee players” come from in the first place? Most of them work their way up from the back of the bus. I for one don’t particularly want to watch the same guys every week. Every player who has qualified for the Tour is capable of winning. In a recent column Nick Price writes that one of the major obstacles to Tiger Woods’ quest for historical greatness is “the depth of talent” present in the world of golf. Mark O’Meara has stated that “there are no weak fields in a PGA Tour event.” In my mind, the most compelling tournaments are the ones where the dreams of the underdog are realized, not where Tiger wins for the umpteenth time.
What’s the problem with making the World Golf Championship events full-field events? Is the addition of 80 or 100 more of the best golfers in the world going to ruin the tournament? What exactly is the message being given to the “rest” of the players who don’t quite qualify. I’ll tell you what it is: it’s “you are no good, and if you want to be recognized as worthy of anyone’s attention you will just have work your way up to these arbitrary numbers we have set for you.” It’s garbage if you ask me, and the entire Tour, including the ones who have already qualified, should stand up and say no. These WGC events are no more than preening contests for already rich and famous, little clambakes to which only the present elite are invited. One of the ways the elite have historically protected their position is to create rules that reward themselves for being where they are.
I give it all a big “humbug.” I’d rather watch Tucson. If ‘these guys are so good’, I say let ‘em play. The PGA Tour needs to think hard about its own hypocrisy and support the players it is supposed to represent. And as for Tim Finchem, Charles Zink, the raft of sportswriters who trash anyone yet to achieve the title of “Marquee Player”, and even the players lucky enough to have their invitations already in pocket who ignore those they have been fortunate enough to leapfrog for the time being, I say that a small dose of humility and compassion for the players who make up the backbone of the game you all purport to love would be in order. Fill the fields. Give these wonderful players a chance to move up and enhance their careers. Add to the compelling drama inherent in the size of the purses by giving the lesser known a shot at greatness. Make these World Golf Championships live up to their names. Until then, just refer to them as “Finchem’s Folly.”