ABU DHABI, UNITED ARAB EMIRATES | There is an elephant-sized reward in the DP World Tour this season. While the players are very mindful of it, they are also trying their hardest to ignore it.
It’s 2023, and the expanded 13-year strategic alliance between the PGA Tour and DP World Tour kicks in this year. Apart from enhanced prize funds, the biggest reward for the players from the joint venture is the provision that the leading 10 players on the Race to Dubai Rankings, apart from those already exempt, will earn PGA Tour cards for 2024.
With the prize funds going up dramatically on the PGA Tour, and Official World Golf Ranking heavily favoring players on the other side of the Atlantic, the cards are massive carrots for the players. However, each of them is acutely aware that it would take a whole season of good golf to get anywhere near that.
“Obviously, it’s an amazing opportunity. There’s massive money and world-ranking points over in America, and it would be a dream to play over there at some point,” Scotland’s Connor Syme said after his sparkling 8-under-par 64 on Saturday en route to a T28 finish at the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship. “But it’s a long way away, and I am trying to keep my goals small. If something like that comes of it, then obviously it would be amazing.”
Australia’s Min Woo Lee, ranked 58th and considered one of the hottest talents to emerge from Down Under in recent times, tried to get a PGA Tour card through the Korn Ferry Tour Finals last year.
“I played all the KFT Final Series events and tried to get through there. But obviously, the European (DP World) Tour has done a really good job of having this alliance, and to be one of the top-10s and get that card would be cool,” said Lee, the 24-year-old brother of LPGA superstar Minjee Lee and a co-runner-up Sunday here.
“I think this is a much better way to get there. You don’t have to take a few weeks off from the DP World Tour schedule. We have a few big and important events during that time of the year. But if you ask me, it is a lot easier to get a card through the Final Series. You need to have just one good week and you can be inside the top 25. Now, you have to play good golf through the whole season.”
India’s Shubhankar Sharma, who would have been the 10th person to get his card if the alliance existed in 2019, is one of nearly everyone else on the tour who is just focused on his next shot and not trying to look forward to the end of the season already.
“I think it’s a great opportunity for the players. Getting on the PGA Tour is everyone’s dream. It’s the biggest tour in the world, and that’s where all the best players in the world are,” said Sharma, who was 29th in the Race to Dubai last year and tied for seventh here Sunday. Scotland’s Richie Ramsay, who finished 19th in the 2022 standings, would have taken the last card after nine players ahead of him already were qualified for the U.S. tour.
“However, there is a long way to go. Although there are 10 available cards, it is going to be one heck of a fight for it. Thinking about it now is not going to help. Of course, it would be an honor to be one of those 10, but I am thinking only about my next golf shot. I will start worrying about it in November.”
Syme, 27, had similar thoughts and gave the analogy of his own third round at Yas Links Abu Dhabi. He started with a bogey and a three-putt par on two of the easiest holes on the golf course, before making nine birdies en route to a T28 final result.
“It’s tough obviously not to think about it, or the Ryder Cup which is also this year, because everyone has dreams of doing both of those things,” said the man from Kirkcaldy. “Sometimes your mind will drift, but it’s about getting it back and focusing on what you can do. If you have a good start to the season, it will help. But even if you don’t, you have the whole season to get back into contention. It’s just like my round today. You have to believe and keep at it.”
World No. 29 Séamus Power of Ireland, who entered the week leading the FedEx Cup standings on the PGA Tour after his victory in the fall in Bermuda, remarkably had played only one full-field DP World Tour event before his T20 in Abu Dhabi: the Irish Open last year. But he was part of the Great Britain & Ireland team in the Hero Cup recently in Abu Dhabi, where his team lost to Continental Europe, and he is impressed with the quality of golf he saw.
The 35-year-old Power turned professional in 2011 and played his way through mini-tours and the Korn Ferry Tour before cementing his place on the PGA Tour.
Asked whether he might be slightly jealous of the players who have an opportunity that he never got, Power said: “If you’re a top player – which to get one of those 10 spots, you have to be – I think you’ve earned a right to be able to play in tournaments. So, I think it’s going to be fantastic for these players. The players I’ve seen, they are going to be world-beaters no matter what tour they are going to play on. I think it’s great, and this strategic alliance kind of makes sense.
“Definitely not jealous of them. I think we all have our own journeys in life and in golf, and for some of those guys, that’s going to be theirs. They are going to win some tournaments here and they are going to earn their right, and you’re going to see them turning into worldwide players like Tommy (Fleetwood) and Shane (Lowry).”
Power said he’d probably have a different career route if he had this opportunity in his younger days.
“You would see it as an access. When I turned pro, it was out of the question financially to play both Q-schools. With this avenue, you certainly would have looked at it maybe as the No. 1 option instead,” Power said.
“It’s tough to tell in hindsight, because anyone that’s been through it, those 10 spots are not going to be easy to get, and you’re still going to have to play well to get through Q-School and Challenge Tour just to get on the DP World Tour for those 10 spots.”
"... for guys like, say, the Højgaard twins (Rasmus and Nicolai), it could be career-changing because it is tough to get on that tour without those 10 cards. It is a very closed shop."
Thomas Pieters
One European player who would have gotten a card through his performance in 2022 is Belgian Thomas Pieters. The new dad is probably the only one who is not overly excited at the opportunity.
“That would be a nice little bonus at the end of the year for the players. I will not be playing full time on the PGA Tour in the future, just because I like where I live, and it’s impossible to travel back and forth,” said Pieters, who is No. 38 in the world and played collegiately in the U.S., winning the 2012 NCAA title with Illinois. “I will continue to support this tour. I love playing my home open, and I love playing tournaments like the Dutch Open. We are going to be playing for a lot more money even in Europe as well.
“But for guys like, say, the Højgaard twins (Rasmus and Nicolai), it could be career-changing because it is tough to get on that tour without those 10 cards. It is a very closed shop. We have a really good tournament like this week, but when you look at the opposite field at the American Express, it’s off the charts.”
Pieters thinks another good way of playing on the PGA Tour was to stay inside the top 50 of the OWGR, even though it did not guarantee a full schedule.
“I want to be in the top 50,” he said. “I want to get as high as possible because you’re not going to get to become the world No. 8 or No. 7 without winning trophies.
“I’ve got a good schedule right now. Being top-50, I can still pick and choose where to go. I would love to see a couple more tournaments in America be invitationals and guys like me being able to enter. Sometimes I just can't get entry, which is frustrating, but that’s just the way it is.”
E-MAIL JOY
Top: Abu Dhabi runner-up Min Woo Lee has his long-range eyes on earning a PGA Tour card.
david cannon, getty images