I”m not telling you anything new when I say that the American economy is currently in bad shape. Foreclosures, gas prices and bankrupt financial institutions are making headlines on a daily basis. The current economic crisis impacts all other aspects of our lives. When times are tough, people have to make financial choices, and the end result is that entertainment takes a back seat to the mortgage and the PG&E bill. You end up going to the movies less often, not eating out as much or, for that matter, playing less golf than you”d prefer.
A similar fate could also occur to the multi-millionaires who make up the PGA Tour. Should the PGA Tour have to begin cutting back on its tournament schedule during the next few years because of the impact that the economy has upon its sponsors, fingers will be justifiably pointed at Commissioner Tim Finchem, and for some very good reasons.
Within the last five years, more than a handful of PGA Tour events with a long history have fallen by the wayside. The tournaments have been eliminated, and yet the reasons have not been financial, but because of the efforts of the Commissioner”s office to attract other sponsors. The CVC Charity Classic in Rhode Island was the first victim of the new direction. Regardless of the efforts of local professionals Billy Andrade and Brad Faxon, the CVS lost its tour spot and was relegated to a Monday-Tuesday two-man best ball exhibition event.
The introduction of the Fed Ex Cup series played a major role in shaking up the status quo on the PGA Tour. The BC Open in Endicott, New York, a long-running tour event that historically played opposite of the British Open and attracted a secondary field, also was eliminated. The Greater Milwaukee Open lost its prime time July spot and was relegated to the BC Open slot. The BC Open people were obviously upset that they lost their tournament and the Milwaukee people were equally irritated that their event was moved to a less advantageous weekend with a diluted field.
The International, the Stableford points PGA Tour event that was contested at Castle Pines just outside of Denver in August, was an extremely popular tournament with pros and golf fans alike because of its unique scoring method. The tour attempted to move it to a bad weather date later in the year and, as a result, the tournament director closed up shop. The 84 Lumber Classic was going to be relegated to a less enticing date during the Fall Finish, so its sponsors decided to withdraw the tournament from the PGA Tour calendar.
The strangest story of all revolves around the Western Open and the city of Chicago. First contested in 1899, the Western was the oldest tour event after the British Open and the United States Open. The tournament was contested in Chicago, a golf crazy city, during Fourth of July week. Finchem eliminated the Western Open because of the Fed Ex Cup series and replaced it with Tiger Woods” AT&T Tournament in Washington, D.C.
As a small consolation, the Western”s principal charity, the Evans Scholars Foundation, a long-running caddie college scholarship program founded by former U.S. Open champion Chick Evans, was allowed to affiliate itself with the Fed Ex Cup”s BMW Championship. However, Chicago”s economy was the big loser as the BMW rotates between the former Western Open site, Cog Hill, every fourth year. Other years the BMW goes to St. Louis, like it did this year, Indianapolis and Minneapolis.
All of this would be of little importance if the economy was good and Tiger Woods was healthy. However, Tim Finchem and the PGA Tour hierarchy may very well rue the day they turned their backs on the likes of the BC Open, the 84 Lumber and all the rest.
There”s not much that the tour can do about Tiger Woods and his knee surgery, and the reality of the situation is that the world of professional golf has always had to move on as golfers such as Arnold Palmer and Jack Nicklaus aged and left the limelight. Nonetheless, when Tiger doesn”t play, television ratings are down and commercial time is less expensive. There”s little the PGA can do about that scenario.
However, the situation is much more serious with regard to the financial stability of PGA Tour sponsors. The aforementioned Milwaukee tournament is sponsored by USA Bank. Northern Trust sponsors the long-running tour event in Los Angeles. The second week of the Fed Ex Cup playoff series in Boston has Deutsche Bank as its sponsor. The week before, the first week of the playoffs is the replacement tournament for the old Westchester Golf Classic. It is now played in northern New Jersey at Ridgewood Country Club and is sponsored by Barclay”s Bank.
These four tournaments are just the tip of the iceberg. Other financial institutions sponsor tournaments, including the just-sold Wachovia (Greater Greensboro Open), FBR (Phoenix Open), Banco Popular (Puerto Rico Open), Zurich (New Orleans Classic), Morgan Stanley (The Memorial), Travelers (Greater Hartford Open), Royal Bank of Canada (Canadian Open, the tour”s fourth-oldest tournament), and Merrill Lynch (The Shark Shoot Out).
That makes an even dozen tournaments that are sponsored by banks or investment houses. A typical PGA Tour sponsorship is somewhere in the neighborhood of $5 million and on top of that, these financial institutions also advertise heavily throughout the year on televised tour broadcasts. The Champions Tour and the Nationwide Tour are in similar straits with sponsors including Alianz, Liberty Mutual, Commerce Bank, Charles Schwab, and HSBC.
Professional golf is heavily dependent on sponsorship dollars and advertising revenues. Mere ticket sales would not only impact the charities that affiliate themselves with tour events, but would also impact the bank statements of well-known golfers. The economy is partly to blame, but the heavy handedness of the Finchem administration has also turned loyal tournament sponsors away from the PGA Tour. It”s a bad precedent.
