Three-event Q school
series almost finalized
�� The Tour Championship is, at last,
the final official event of the PGA
Tour season—starting in 2013. Yet
many PGA Tour players will have
another week of work ahead of them
at that time next year. That’s because
the finale of the proposed three-tour-nament Web.com Tour series is going
to be the following week.
The playoff series in which Web.com
players and PGA Tour players vie for
25 PGA Tour cards is scheduled to
end on Sept. 29, the week after the
Tour Championship in Atlanta. That
“playoff” event has a strong chance of
being staged at PGA Tour headquarters in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla.
It’s all part of evolving developments on tour as it gears up for
sweeping changes to the schedule
starting next year. Those changes
include a split-calendar season and
the elimination of qualifying school as
a direct route to the tour.
This year’s Web.com Tour ends
Oct. 28 with the Tour Championship
at TPC Craig Ranch in McKinney,
Texas, meaning there’s work to be
done to rearrange the junior circuit
schedule, including playoffs, to finish
two weeks before the 2014 PGA Tour
season starts Oct. 10, 2013 at the Frys.
com Open.
“That is one of the challenges,”
Bill Calfee, president of the Web.com
Tour, said. “We have to cut the season
by a month, which is proving to be dif-
ficult. But we’re getting there.”
Tour officials also are making prog-
ress in identifying the three sites for
the playoff series, each of which offers
a $1 million purse. Those events will
be open to the top 75 on the Web.com
Tour and 75 more from the PGA Tour
who finish 126-200 on the regular
season FedEx Cup points list.
Calfee said five sites are under
consideration, and he confirmed that
existing events in Columbus, Ohio,
and Ponte Vedra Beach are in the
mix. The latter currently is the site
of the Winn-Dixie Jacksonville Open
presented by Planters at the Valley
Course at TPC Sawgrass.
“I don’t think it would be any
surprise that we’d love to have the
season-ending event be here at PGA
Tour headquarters and home to our
sponsor, Web.com,” Calfee said.
He added that officials of the
Nationwide Children’s Hospital
Invitational have approached the tour
about hosting the first playoff event in
mid-September. The tournament is
staged at Ohio State’s Scarlet Course.
Another venue under consideration
is the Neediest Kids Championship
presented by Under Armour at TPC
Potomac at Avenel Farm in Potomac,
Md. As for the remaining contenders,
not all are at existing sites.
“There was a push to have at least
one event on the West Coast, but the
logistics are pretty tough,” said one
player. “The main idea is that you
can’t have three events in the same
geographic location. You want to give
them different kinds of courses, dif-
ferent grasses, etc.”
An announcement on the final play-
off schedule could come in the next
month. —Dave Shedloski
ryder cup
Sluman, Verplank to
assist Love at Medinah
�� During his day-after-the-PGA
press conference, U.S. Ryder Cup
captain Davis Love III said, “I look
forward to September 4, picking four
more guys. … And then, I obviously
am going to need a lot of help with
those decisions.”
With that, Love announced the ap-
pointment of Scott Verplank and Jeff
Sluman as assistant captains, joining
Mike Hulbert and Fred Couples (who
had previously been announced) in
that role. Verplank recorded a 4-1
record in a pair of Ryder Cups as a
player (2002, ’06) while Sluman, who
never played on a Ryder Cup team,
served as a vice captain for Corey
Pavin’s 2010 U.S. Ryder Cup squad.
Prior to that he was an assistant
captain for Jack Nicklaus at three
Presidents Cups (2003, ’05, ’07).
Experience aside, Love had other
reasons for choosing the pair. “These
are guys I trust,” he said. “They are
close friends of mine. They are very
engaged already, [and have] given me
a lot of great advice. In fact, Sluman’s
going to get over to Medinah this
week and take a look around.”
—E. Michael Johnson
