For fans of the PGA Tour, these last two weeks have shown the great dichotomy that exists in the game today. While some people are trying to “grow the game” and include the newest generation as an active part of golf, there is still the tried and true traditions of the game with its sense of “properness.” At last week’s Phoenix Open there were close to 500,000 spectators, liquor sales had to be curtailed because of a bevy of over-served fans, and some of the pros got into shouting matches with the spectators over their unruly behavior. This week’s Genesis Invitational is being contested at the renowned Riviera Country Club, a former host of the U.S. Open and the PGA Championship. Historically known as the Los Angeles Open, the Genesis will have a smaller and much more traditional fan base in the galleries this weekend.
Both tournaments have a long and storied history on the PGA Tour and are among the seven oldest running events on the circuit. The Phoenix Open was first contested in 1932 under the leadership of Bob Goldwater (father of presidential candidate Barry Goldwater) and the Thunderbirds, a local group of movers and shakers. The Los Angeles Open initially teed it up in 1926 and it too has a great tradition of Hall of Fame champions.
When perusing the PGA Tour’s schedule at the time of the Roaring Twenties, the game was in good hands with stars such as Walter Hagen, Gene Sarazen, amateur great Bobby Jones, and Tommy Armour. The tour was able to survive the Great Depression regardless of the struggling times. Nowadays golf tournaments are largely sponsored by corporate giants such as Waste Management, Genesis, John Deere, and AT&T. Back in the 1920s and 1930s the tour went from one big city to another big city with multiple sponsorships provided by the many members of the local chamber of commerce.
If one were to look at the career wins of golfers of that era such as Sam Snead and Byron Nelson, one just might be surprised by some of the locales where they hoisted the champions’ trophy. Sam Snead won a pair of Oakland City Opens and also won tournaments like the Miami Open, the St. Paul Open, the Chicago Open, the St. Petersburg Open, the Rochester Open, the Richmond Open, the Jacksonville Open, and the Pensacola Open. Nelson won many of the same tournaments as well as the Phoenix Open and the Hollywood (Florida) Open. There were other long lasting tournaments on the calendar in those days such as the Canadian Open, the Western Open (now the BMW Championship), and the Greater Greensboro Open. The travelling caravan that was the PGA Tour visited cities within a day or two drive from one another. The West Coast Swing of that era not only included the L.A. Open and the Bing Crosby, but it also visited Seattle, Portland, Sacramento, Oakland, and San Francisco.
Major team sports have their minor markets nowadays like the Green Bay Packers, the Sacramento Kings, and the San Antonio Spurs. Golf seems to have gone away from major markets and holds many of its tournaments in either minor markets or in resort areas. While the PGA Tour used to make regular stops in large cities such as New York, Philadelphia, Boston, and Chicago, such is no longer the case. The two American majors that rotate sites are an interesting example of this. The PGA Championship will be contested this May in Louisville while the U.S. Open returns to the Pinehurst Resort in North Carolina over Father’s Day.
Sometimes the suggestion is made that there are too many tournaments on the PGA Tour’s calendar, normally somewhere in the neighborhood of 48 events annually. The PGA Tour of the 1960s used to have approximately 35 tourneys and there was an active off season of half of October and all of November and December with the tour resuming in mid- January. Yet the minor market stops on the PGA Tour are located in small cities, towns, and resort complexes that want to have a PGA Tour event in their locale and by no means want to give them up.
It is accurate to say the PGA Tour does visit many major markets such as San Diego, Orlando, Houston, New Orleans, Dallas-Fort Worth, Detroit, Minneapolis, Atlanta, Las Vegas, and Memphis, as well as the two most recent circuit stops at Phoenix and Los Angeles. Yet that only makes up one-fourth of the schedule and there is a whole lot of golf played in minor markets and resort areas throughout the calendar year.
The tour has already visited the Kapalua Resort course in Hawaii as well as Palm Springs and the Monterey Peninsula. The tour will make stops this spring in Jacksonville for the Players Championship, golf’s fifth major, as well as Palm Beach, Florida (twice), Augusta, Georgia, the home of the Masters, and Hilton Head Island. As we enter the nicer weather and turn north, the PGA Tour goes to Columbus, Ohio for the Memorial, the Myrtle Beach Classic in South Carolina, the Travelers in Hartford, the John Deere in the Quad Cities area, the Kentucky Championship in Nicholasville, the Barracuda in our neck of the woods in Truckee, and the regular conclusion of the tour season in Greensboro.
When the tour embarks upon its Fall Finish following the Fed Ex Cup playoffs, the pros will tee it up in such places as the Silverado Resort in Napa, the Sanderson Farms in Jackson, Mississippi, and the season concluding RSM Classic in Sea Island, Georgia. There are also PGA Tour stops beyond our borders in Mexico, Bermuda, the Dominican Republic, Japan, and the Bahamas. On top of all that, a somewhat new regular tour stop occurs the week prior to the British Open with the playing of the Scottish Open. Long gone are the days of the circuit’s car caravans. We are now in the era of frequent flier miles and private jets. If Ian Poulter has enough money to reserve his own jet to get around, then this is obviously the wave of the future. No reason to worry about delayed flights or lost luggage like golf clubs.
In many ways, minor markets such as the three Northern California stops in Pebble Beach, Truckee, and Napa alongside places like the Quad Cities and Sea Island are an integral part of those communities. They don’t have a home baseball team to root for and the current nature of PGA Tour economics is such that they are able to raise a boatload of money for local charities to the tune of millions over the years. Hospitals, education, and worthy programs are the main beneficiaries and they rely upon the support they get from the John Deere Classic and the Sanderson Farms. Yes, today’s world of professional golf is a big hit in the minor markets.
