Tiger Woods on how less is going to be more for the PGA Tour
Ahead of the Genesis Invitational, Tiger Woods is asked about potential changes to the PGA Tour schedule, which may have fewer tournaments.
Tiger Woods is heavily involved in reshaping the PGA Tour’s future schedule and competitive model.Potential changes include starting the season later, focusing on major U.S. markets and owning the summer schedule.Changes could be implemented as soon as 2027, with some events possibly moving to the summer.
PACIFIC PALISADES, Calif. – As the chairman of the PGA Tour’s Future Competitions Committee, Tiger Woods has been logging his share of Zoom calls and the like to help reshape the future direction of the Tour and its schedule.
“I thought I spent a lot of hours practicing in my prime. It doesn’t come close to what we’ve done in the board room,” Woods said during a press conference ahead of the Genesis Invitational, a signature event that he hosts at Riviera Country Club and for which the Tiger Woods Foundation is the chief charitable beneficiary. “We’re trying to do the right thing. We’re making some great strides. The player directors have been unbelievable with their time and their focus and the depth of knowledge and perspective.”
Information about some of the potential changes – such as the Hawaii events dropping off the schedule and not starting the season until February after the Super Bowl to avoid going head-to-head with the NFL – have dripped out into the public and the pros and cons have been debated. Last week, Players Championship executive director spoke to Front Office Sports and hinted that the Tour would like to play more tournaments in the largest U.S. markets, and that “starting the season big,” and “owning the summer” are among the top priorities for PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp.
The question remains how soon will changes be implemented? Woods acknowledged that they could be enacted as soon as next season.
“We may have to roll it out over a couple-year period. We may not be able to implement all of it in 2027, but there will definitely be parts of it integrated or changed than from what it is now in ’26 into ’27,” he said.
Among the rumors being bandied about is moving events at Pebble Beach and Riviera to the summer and potentially as part of the FedEx Cup Playoffs. During a press conference announcing that Genesis had re-upped with the Tour through 2030, Jose Munoz, Hyundai’s President and CEO and parent company of luxury brand Genesis, said his company is open to moving the date of the event.
“We are all discussing how we can make this better, and as Tiger mentioned, it needs to be good for everybody, for them, for the sponsors, for the customers and mainly for the followers,” said Munoz. “I think this is a possibility. We’re very open minded and willing to make things better.”
Woods was asked to explain how the concept of scarcity that Rolapp pitched in August during his inaugural press conference at the Tour Championship would translate into less being more for the Tour.
“We’re going to get more top players playing and we’re going to make it more competitive. We’ll have fewer cards, so that in itself is going to make it more competitive just to be out here,” Woods suggested. “We’re trying to create opportunities for that turnover coming from the PGA Tour U or it’s the Korn Ferry and trying to get more youth out here because eventually they’re going to take over the game. So, trying to create that opportunity, trying to create the right competitive model and the environment to foster that, that’s been the greater challenge of it all.”
Part of the challenge is trying to please so many constituencies, and inevitably someone will be unhappy. But Woods noted that even with so many “moving parts,” they are making sure no stone goes unturned.
“It’s trying to serve literally everyone, from the player side of it, from our media partners, from all of our title sponsors, from the local communities or even changing venues and going to bigger markets. It’s what do we need to do from a competitive model to make our Tour the best product it can possibly be each and every year and still have room for development. How do we do all of that at the same time?” Woods said.
It’s become such an all-consuming task for Woods that he isn’t sure if has enough bandwidth to give the job of U.S. Ryder Cup Captain the commitment it deserves.
“That’s been driving me hours upon hours every day and trying to figure out if I can actually do our team, our Team USA and our players and everyone that’s going to be involved in the Ryder Cup, if I can do it justice with my time,” he admitted. “Serving on two boards and what I’m doing for the PGA Tour, I’m trying to figure out if I can actually do this and serve the people that are involved and serve them at an honorable level.”
Rolapp was in the room for the Genesis Invitational sponsorship extension on Tuesday and scheduled a player meeting for later in the evening but it’s unclear if he will be sharing any details with attendees. As one PGA Tour tournament director noted, there have been so many iterations of what the revised schedule could look like that the best plan is just to sit back and wait until there’s something more concrete. That could be shared with the world at Rolapp’s next State of the Tour press conference during the week of the Players Championship, the Tour’s flagship event. A lot could change between now and then.
“Some things that we’ve taken a look at we’ve nixed off the table and there’s other opportunities that have grown and we’ve flushed out,” Woods said. “It changes day-to-day, so if you ask me tomorrow, that might change.”