Golf legend Jack Nicklaus expressed concern about the future of the PGA Tour schedule as he spoke to reporters Tuesday ahead of this weekend’s Memorial Tournament at Muirfield Village Golf Club.
“I don’t want to comment on the tour’s schedule because I’m not exactly in favor of what they’re doing right now,” Nicklaus said, before proceeding to do just that by sharing what he sees as potential challenges for the tour moving forward.
“I hate to see tournaments bunched too much together with too many big tournaments too close together. That’s a problem, I think. And I think that’s going to be a problem for the tour in the future,” Nicklaus told reporters at the press conference in Dublin, Ohio.
Nicklaus, whose 1976 inaugural tournament was a first-of-its-kind event at a time when active golfers didn’t host tournaments, said the current PGA Tour schedule makes it harder for individual tournaments to stand out.
“If you looked at the schedule, we’re involved in the Cognizant down in Florida, and, you know, we have Pebble Beach and Los Angeles, Tiger’s event, and then Cognizant, and then we had Bay Hill and The Players. I mean, what chance does that tournament have? I mean, it sits right in the middle of those. They don’t have a chance.”
The 18-time major winner said he also believes the schedule is potentially too much activity in a short amount of time for the players.
“The other tournaments also say, you know, I got four out of five. It’s hard for guys to play that. See, the problem is not so much from the standpoint of players, it’s hard for the players to really be focused to play that much and be on top of their game,” Nicklaus said.
“I look at it from the way I was as a player. I could play a couple weeks in a row, maybe three weeks in a row, but I needed some time off to be able to recharge the batteries. And I think everybody needs to recharge their batteries. So to jam it all in in one period of time, and then leave the rest of the year open, I think it’s tough.
“I don’t think it’s a problem yet, but I think it will be if we don’t address it.”
Nicklaus said he hasn’t yet had a conversation on the topic but wants to with PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp and outgoing commissioner Jay Monahan, adding, “I probably shouldn’t have brought it up here. I’ll get chastised for that later.”
