Tidy ending to the new golf schedule
Rory McIlroy celebrates with the FedEx Cup after winning the 2019 Tour Championship. Photo: Butch Dill/USA TODAY Sports
Just six weeks after the Patriots won their sixth Super Bowl, golf crowned its first almost-major champion of 2019. Rory McIlroy outlasted the field and TPC Sawgrass with his victory in the Players Championship on – fittingly – St. Patrick’s Day. It appeared the game’s planets would finally align perfectly for the Northern Irishman in 2019, especially with the Open Championship slated for his home turf in July. Fast forward to Aug. 25 at East Lake. A year after playing wingman to Tiger Woods in his 80th PGA Tour victory, McIlroy would close the season the Tour Championship title and bag $15 million by winning the FedEx Cup. In between these bookend victories by the 30-year-old McIlroy, we saw Brook Koepka nearly pull off his own Slam after going runner-up, winner and runner-up in the Masters, PGA Championship and U.S. Open. By the way, Woods also won his fifth Masters.
What made all of this so special is that it occurred neatly and routinely after and before football season. The PGA Tour Powers That Be nailed it with this year’s “Championship” schedule. Every fourth or fifth Sunday, golf fans were guaranteed appointment television during football’s absence. The schedule change was one that screamed common sense, at least as far as TV viewers are concerned. No one was forced to choose between Tiger and a GOAT this September like they did during Woods’ historic victory at the 2018 Tour Championship last Sept. 23. This year, Tiger and the rest of the 2018-19 PGA Tour campaign was long finished before Tom Brady and the NFL’s 100th season got underway.
— Bill Speros
