WM Phoenix Open won't be the same under new PGA Tour structure

The PGA Tour is changing its competitive structure, and that could have implications for the Phoenix Open.

Tour officials announced this week that starting in 2028, there will be two separate series of tournaments. The Championship Series will feature the top-ranked golfers, while the Challenger Series will run concurrently and include the next tier of golfers. But there will also be a promotion/relegation system, meaning golfers can move up and down based on their performance.

The PGA Tour said it has identified 10 of the 15 Championship Series events — meaning there are only five slots left. And the Phoenix Open has not yet made the cut.

Senior reporter Brandon Brown has written about this for the Phoenix Business Journal. He joined The Show to talk more about it.

Amber Victoria Singer

/

KJZZ

Full conversation

MARK BRODIE: Brandon, good morning.

BRANDON BROWN: Good morning.

MARK BRODIE: This seems like it could be a pretty big deal for the Phoenix Open depending on where it lands, right?

BRANDON BROWN: Phoenix hasn’t been mentioned by the PGA as being part of the Championship Series, is what they’re calling the top level, the top tier. But if it’s not in there, the Phoenix Open could see big, big changes. Instead of having the top players play there, it’s going to have a lot fewer players play there, and they’re going to be playing for less money.

MARK BRODIE: Well, so it seems like it could be, depending on where the Phoenix Open ends up, it could be really good in the sense that if it’s in the Championship Series, all the top golfers will be there, which is not necessarily the case every year now.

But if it turns out to be in the Challenger Series, none of the top golfers will be there. It seems like the status quo will not stay. It’s either going to be really good or less good.

BRANDON BROWN: Yeah, in 2028, the Phoenix Open will look very different than it has for the last few years. And the question is, is do all the people who go to the Phoenix Open are they going there because of some of the top golfers that are there, or is it because of the atmosphere and everything else? And so if it gets bumped down to that second tier of tournaments and it’s not having the best golfers in the world there or some of the best golfers in the world there, will it draw the same crowds, will it impact the economy the way that it has?

MARK BRODIE: And as you’ve reported, the PGA is looking at some other — in addition to the tournaments that they’ve already said are going to be in the Championship Series, there’s some other locations, it sounds like that they’re looking at putting tournaments in. Phoenix does not seem to be among them.

BRANDON BROWN: Yeah, they said that they have about 10 tournaments already picked out. They didn’t say which ones. There’s some that like Pebble Beach, the Travelers Championship, that already have a very high purse, that are that are assumed to kind of be there.

But then they said they’re looking at other markets where the PGA doesn’t have a have a presence in, like Denver, New York, Seattle, some big markets where they don’t have a presence. And they haven’t mentioned Phoenix anywhere in this.

MARK BRODIE: OK, so you mentioned the purse, the amount of money that golfers win depending on how they do in the tournament. That has an impact here as well. Like, where does that money come from, and could the Phoenix Open bump up the amount of money they award out, which could, in theory, help them keep up in that top ranking?

BRANDON BROWN: Yeah, so they said that the Championship Series is going to need a purse of $20 million. That’s all the money that gets sent out to the golfers. The winner gets the most. The Phoenix Open has a purse about $9.6 million right now. That’s what it was this last year. So they need to more than double it.

That money comes from sponsor mostly from sponsorships. So WM, Waste Management, who sponsors the tournament now, they pay right now, it’s reported between $13 and $15 million a year, and so is that company willing to double the amount they give to the tournament? Are they able to bring in more sponsors to do this? Are they able to charge more money for the luxury seating that’s there? And finding all that way to find the money is where it will be tough.

MARK BRODIE: Do you have a sense of how big of a component the money will be? Like, how important it might be for the Phoenix Open to come up and sponsors to come up with $10-plus million in the next year or so to keep this as a top-level event?

BRANDON BROWN: Yeah, from what I’m hearing is the PGA of the existing tournaments and these other cities are kind of putting together bids and saying, "Hey, this is where we’re going to have our money from. This is how we’re going to be able to do this. This is how we want to be one of the top-tier tournaments."

MARK BRODIE: What would it mean for the Valley — I mean, the Phoenix Open is obviously a huge event with, you know, hundreds of thousands of people who go to this every year, and it’s got this sort of reputation, for better or worse, on the PGA Tour. What would it mean for the Phoenix Open if it were, let’s say, all the top golfers were guaranteed to come there? And what would it mean for the Phoenix Open and the Valley if it were in that second tier?

BRANDON BROWN: With how big the tournament is now, it’s kind of hard to imagine it getting any bigger. They don’t give out attendance numbers, but it’s, you know, known to be upwards to, you know, over 700,000 people are there all weekend long.

And so by having all the top tournament people there, with all the top players there, you can probably charge more money, they can probably generate more income revenue for it, and then they can also probably get better viewership on TV.

If they don’t have those top players, there’s a chance that the demand’s not going to be as high. So the prices might go down, but there might not be as many opportunities to be there, and it might dwindle in its size.

MARK BRODIE: Well, to the point you were just making, it kind of would answer the question to some extent, are people going there for the golf? Are they going there for the scene? And are people coming here because it’s February and it’s not snowing in Phoenix like it might be in other parts of the country?

BRANDON BROWN: That’s exactly right.

MARK BRODIE: So, when will we have an answer on this?

BRANDON BROWN: The PGA said that they are they’re looking to make an announcement before the end of the year on what the ’28 schedule is going to look like. Before the end of the summer, sorry. So in the next few months, we’ll probably have an idea of what the 2028 Phoenix Open is going to look like.

MARK BRODIE: And presumably based on that, we’ll have a sense of what the 2027 Phoenix Open might look like because it could be the end of an era, or it could be the end of something that is going to get even better.

BRANDON BROWN: Yeah, for sure. The 2027 will be the last one, the last tournament that’s it been in a really long time.

MARK BRODIE: All right, that is Brandon Brown, senior reporter with the Phoenix Business Journal. Brandon, thanks as always, appreciate it.

BRANDON BROWN: Thank you for having me.