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SOUTHAMPTON, N.Y. — One week before the PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp is expected to give an update on efforts to dramatically shift the future structure of the tour’s playing schedule, Rory McIlroy questioned the pending changes.
“As they’ve done all this work, you start to realize that the way the tour was before LIV came along was actually pretty good,” McIlroy said Tuesday during his pre-tournament press conference ahead of the U.S. Open. “It was a pretty good structure, and everything sort of worked pretty well.”
The PGA Tour is targeting 2028 to fully revamp its annual schedule, moving to what Rolapp has described as a first- and second-track model.
“Track 2 is a glorified Korn Ferry event,” said McIlroy, referring to the PGA Tour’s feeder league, the Korn Ferry Tour. “That’s what Track 2 is going to be.”
The new Track 1 will likely incorporate 12-16 top-tier PGA Tour events, in addition to the four major championships, the Players Championship, PGA Tour playoff events—and the biennial Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup.
Track 1 purses are expected to be around the $20 million mark that the PGA Tour’s eight signature events per season have had since launching in 2023. Track 2 tournament purses are likely to be under $10 million, but also higher than the $1 million purses on the Korn Ferry Tour.
“LIV created this false economy where we had to up prize funds and had to cut fields and try to support the top players and all that stuff. Which I think needed to happen because that was the only way to retain talent at the time,” McIlroy said. “But now that LIV looks like it’s less of a threat, I think, as I said, the old ways of the PGA Tour weren’t actually that bad.”
LIV Golf launched in 2022 with $25 million purses, which increased to $32.3 million per tournament this season. However, LIV purses are expected to drop significantly next year after the Saudi PIF stops funding the league.
Rolapp will hold a press conference early next week at the Travelers Championship, the final signature event of the 2026 PGA Tour schedule. He will give an update on what has been discussed by the Future Competition Committee, which has been leading the schedule shift. The FCC is chaired by Tiger Woods, who has been absent from those discussions since stepping away from competitive golf following his rollover car accident in March.
The PGA Tour will likely announce its full 2027 schedule in August at the season-ending Tour Championship, although many tournament dates for next year are already set.
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