The 19^th Hole

March 13, 2006

Colonizing the World (Golf Championships)

There is little question among golf fans that the United States PGA Tour is the premier professional golf tour in the world.  The best players from other major tours, including the European, Japanese, and Australasian tours, have been coming in droves to make their mark and lots of money in the States.  The defection of the European Tour’s most prominent young guns in recent years has further cemented the place of the PGA Tour in the golfing world.

On the other hand, though, the depth of global talent in the game has grown leaps and bounds in the past twenty years.  The European Tour has helped to produce and refine players that are routinely beating the Americans in the Ryder Cup.  Despite the European drought in major championships, they are prominent members of the PGA Tour.  Additionally, the game is growing in China and India – two places where golf was not even in the vocabulary for most just thirty years ago.

It is under these conditions that PGA Tour Commissioner Tim Finchem has decided to eliminate the “world” part of the World Golf Championships.  In the new contract period, all of the World Golf Championships events are being held in the United States.  It did not take very long for the domestic press to notice.  And, apparently, the rest of the world has taken notice and they are not happy about it.

To be fair, US courses have dominated as host sites for the World Golf Championships over the years.  Only 10 of 28 WGC events have been held outside of the United States – and most of those have been of the poorly attended World Cup.  But, at least the WGC had one token event in each cycle that was held outside of the United States.  Sure, the WGC has never been truly global, but there was an occasional attempt made to placate the global golfing community.

Now, it seems like the PGA Tour has decided to abandon the strategy of appeasement and simply convert the WGC events into regular Tour invitational events that serve as monthly anchors on the schedule.  For the US, this is not such a bad thing.  It actually provides a full schedule with one special tournament per month on the docket.  But, is having that worth angering the international community?

David Howell, Steve Elkington, European golf writers, and former Euro Tour commissioners have made it a point to call out Finchem for his scheduling decisions.  Tiger Woods has come out in support of a WGC event in China – or elsewhere.  They all claim, and I feel rightly so, that the Americanization of the WGC hurts the global growth of the game.  Also, having one county serve as site for a series events held under the guise of global competition creates a bit of a misnomer.  On top of it all, the WGC never really has fully represented the plethora of global golf talent.  Instead, the WGC simply features the Ryder and President’s Cup teams, US stars that are helped by a favorable World Golf Ranking formula, and a couple of token invites.  What a joke.

In his defense, Finchem has said that the decision to keep the USGC, er, WGC in the United States is because of sponsorship and money interests.  He has directly said to the media that it is easier for tournaments to make money and offer larger paydays to participants if held in the United States.  My question to Mr. Finchem, then, is simple – is the point of the World Golf Championships what you are claiming or is it in the spirit of growing the game globally?

If he believes his own gibberish he has been saying to the media, then he may want to contact the webmaster at the World Golf Championships website – http://www.worldgolfchampionships.com.  Why?  Well, according to the History page of the website, “The World Golf Championships were developed to enhance the competitive structure of professional golf worldwide while preserving the traditions and strengths of the individual Tours and their events.”

I’m not entirely sure that having the United States as lone host of the World Golf Championships fulfills this mission.  These high-profile events, no matter how much of a farce they are, do bring important attention to the game and could be very beneficial to professional golf abroad if held abroad.  They may be a blip on the radar in the United States, but I would bet that Australia (which is struggling to create excitement for its tour) and China (which is experiencing a huge surge in interest in the game) would love to host a WGC event.

I suppose that one strength of the PGA Tour is harvesting the best talent from around the world and paying them big bucks that just are not available in the same way on other tours.  In that sense, then, the Americanization of the WGC to maintain huge tournament purses for those lucky enough to get into the field does respect the stated mission of the World Golf Championships.  This rationale might come as a surprise to the other members of the International Federation of PGA Tours, though.  It is likely they would not have signed up for the WGC if they could see this would be the outcome of the series eight years into it.

The bottom line is this: the move to Americanize the World Golf Championships has rightfully drawn the criticism of global golf observers.  It is troubling that the PGA Tour is using its political clout as the tour of record to further its selfish agenda instead of looking out for the best interests of professional – and amateur – golf worldwide. 

It seems, then, that one of two things has to happen to remedy the situation.  One, the PGA Tour can revitalize the series into an expanded series of truly global events that actually does live up to the stated mission of the World Golf Championships.  Or, they can just drop WGC from the Accenture Match Play, the American Express Championship, the Firestone event, and the World Cup – simply converting them into “extra special” PGA Tour events.

One way or another, Tim Finchem must decide with whom his allegiances lie – the multi-billion dollar corporations that sponsor the PGA Tour or the global game.

Ryan Ballengee is host of The 19^th Hole Golf Show, found at The Golf Newsnet.com.  You can also get The 19^th Hole on the go through podcasting by clicking here Feedburner.com - The 19th Hole Golf Show.  Contact Ryan via e-mail at the19thholeshow@hotmail.com.

Selected 19th Hole Archives: