The PGA Tour kicked off the 2010 season from sunny and warm Hawaii with the SBS Championship.

Australian Geoff Olgilvy defended his title and pocketed a cool

$1.1 million. The tour moves to Waialae Country Club in beautiful Honolulu next.

The PGA Tour will have fewer events and a little less prize money overall than in 2009. That’s the first time that has happened since the arrival to the professional ranks of Eldrick “Tiger” Woods in 1996. Tiger has decided to take a slight respite from the rigors of the tour, keep a low profile and try to stay out of the headlines.

PGA Tour Commissioner, Tim Finchem is definitely earning his salary these days with the sluggish economy affecting corporate sponsorships and his marquee player attracting all the wrong kind of publicity. The PGA Tour staff is facing some of the same struggles as the rest of the country: how to maintain quality venues, with substantial prize money for the pros, and at the same time keep pumping money into the charities and local economies that host PGA Tour events.

Touring pros won’t need to hit the food stamp line anytime soon, however, 37 events are slated for the regular tour schedule offering more than $115 million in prize money. Players that qualify for the four playoff events will split another

$30 million and the fall series will add another $18 million to the pot. It will take somewhere in the neighborhood of $800,000 for a player to make the top 125 and keep his card for 2011.

There are some bright spots, some very good young players to watch in 2010. Anthony Kim, Camillo Villegas, Sean O’Hair, Rory McIlroy, Hunter Mahan, and Lucas Glover, to name just a few all garnered attention in 2009 and should continue to improve this year.

Young international stars Sergio Garcia and Adam Scott had less than stellar efforts in 2009 and will look to regain their championship form.

Phil Mickelson, the world ranked No. 2 golfer, finished 2009 strong after taking some time away from the game in the summer to be with his wife and mother who both dealt with cancer issues. With Tiger away, Phil will add some box office appeal early in the season just like 2009 when Tiger was recuperating from knee surgery. “Phil the Thrill” is always entertaining with off-the-chart shot making and his aggressive “go for it” style and is the closest thing to a NASCAR 20-car pileup available on tour.

The Ryder Cup will be contested at Celtic Manor in Wales in October. It should be interesting to see who will play themself onto the American and European Teams.

The Masters is still the Masters and Augusta National is still at the top of every golfer’s bucket list. The U. S. Open will invade breathtaking and treacherous Pebble Beach, while the British will return to hallowed St. Andrews. The PGA will visit windy and ever challenging Whistling Straits by the west coast of Lake Michigan.

Which brings us to the aforementioned Commissioner Finchem’s main question for 2010, “Where’s Tiger?” When Tiger skips events, tournament directors develop severe chest pains and dyspeptic acid reflux symptoms. The lack of Tiger’s presence in a tournament will cause that event’s financial health to take a bath in red ink, not to mention, TV ratings that head toward the South Pole, plunging as much as 65 percent. Corporate sponsors don’t like to sponsor events that no one wants to watch, especially when their advertising budgets are cramped in the first place.

Tiger usually starts the season with a couple of appearances on the West Coast at Torrey Pines and Riviera. The World Championship Match Play in the Arizona desert has been on his annual itinerary.

He may decide to forego these three stops and not start his season until the tour reaches Florida in March. Doral and Arnie’s shindig at Bay Hill, a home game for Tiger, if he still has a home, will give him a couple of tournaments to brush the rust off his game before heading to Augusta.

The most thing important thing to Tiger is major championships. Three of those majors are being contested on courses that he has had some significant success in the past. Does anyone remember 2001? Tiger won three majors in a row to complete the “Tiger Slam”: The Masters, the U. S. Open at Pebble Beach, and the British Open at St. Andrews. It would give Tiger added motivation to concentrate and focus even more during this self imposed hiatus to capture these three majors when he comes back. The headlines would all be about winning the “Grand Slam” going into Whistling Straits in August. Tiger would control the story and force the press to write about his golfing talent and not his extracurricular talents.

2010 should be another exciting year on the PGA Tour with new and exciting young stars trying to make a name for themselves while old tried and true players remind us why PGA Tournament Golf is adored and followed by millions of fans around the world. Keep your TV tuned to the Golf Channel and I’ll catch you on the “Back Nine” after the snow melts.

This entry was posted on Friday, January 15th, 2010 at 12:00 am and is filed under The Back Nine, Uncategorized.
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