Rolapp Has PGA Tour Moving In The Right Direction

The PGA Tour finally has a leader in charge who seems to understand what fans want to see.

While I was originally skeptical of new CEO Brian Rolapp due to rumors about creating scarcity on the schedule and excessive NFL crossover, it appears he may be hitting the mark.

Rolapp addressed the media on Wednesday before The Players Championship to discuss the future of the Tour and, more specifically, the potential schedule and format changes proposed by the Future Competition Committee.

He focused on six key points, which we outlined and analyzed immediately after the presser.

While there is still plenty to find out moving forward, here is how I’m feeling about some of the news.

The promotion/relegation system could be genius

The details of this will be key but the Tour could finally implement a promotion system that makes much more sense in golf.

Within the Tour itself, it sounds like players will be relegated and promoted between an A Tour (the 21-26 elevated events) and the B Tour (the rest of the schedule). There is currently a system in place that sort
of does this with the AON Swing 5 but it’s confusing and hard to track.

What remains to be determined is just how often these promotions and relegations occur. Rolapp compared the potential system to English soccer but he also mentioned scarcity being about making every event matter.

This leads me to believe that players could be promoted or relegated within each event which could be a genius system. Golf is a game of form and it would benefit from much more movement across pro tours than it currently has.

Take a look at tennis. Players aren’t stuck on the Challenger Tour or low-level ATP events for an entire year just because they started the season there. If they play well, they can jump right up into top-tier events.

An event like the Cognizant Classic in Palm Beach offering 10 promotions to low-tier Tour players, and even Korn Ferry Tour players, into the upcoming Players Championship would be a fascinating watch for golf fans. It would also nail the scarcity factor that Rolapp seems to be focusing on.

Relegation is also important. There are far too many non-competitive Tour players who get starts in great events for an entire year. Sure, they may have earned their card but that shouldn’t lead to an entire year of guaranteed starts if they are failing to even compete for cuts.

These players should be relegated to lower-quality events until they find their game again.

And speaking of cuts …

Cuts matter again

There was no news that made me happier than hearing that no-cut tournaments will be gone. This is something we’ve reiterated at MyGolfSpy but it can’t be said enough how important cuts are in professional golf.

The Tour has essentially faked us out this year, giving us the cuts we want, but in small fields. That has resulted in around 20 players being cut from fields of 70 which isn’t what fans are looking for.

Rolapp is expecting fields of 120 players for the signature events which is right around the perfect number.

Any more players and we’re back to rounds never being finished by dark because of slow play. Any less and we don’t get quality cuts where players need to perform well to make it to the weekend, earn points and get a hefty payday.

A great measure of a quality, consistent player in the past was how many cuts he made and especially made-cut streaks—something Tiger Woods set a record for that we thought may never be broken.

Scottie Scheffler has been inching toward that record but the comparison is hard to make due to how many events he gets to play with no cut or a very easy cut.

This move back to full-field events with a cut will restore that measure of a player’s consistency and make Thursdays and Fridays much more interesting for players who are out of contention but looking to play the weekend.

Major markets and new courses?

The PGA Tour schedule has become stale.

Once the Tour finishes the West Coast and Florida Swing, there are very few events I look forward to each year outside of the major championships. In fact, most of the venues in the fall are more interesting than the ones in the summer.

It seems that Rolapp may be looking to change that with news that the Tour plans to visit more major markets. Cities like New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Washington D.C. and Boston have spectacular golf courses and massive fan bases that should be visited nearly every year, if possible.

Instead, the Tour continues to play way too many times in Texas and plays at boring venues in Minnesota, Detroit, Memphis and plenty more each year.

In 2025, one of the most memorable events of the year was a one-off visit to The Philadelphia Cricket Club for the Truist Classic which was moved from Quail Hollow because Quail Hollow was hosting the PGA Championship. The crowds were great and the course held its own with a winning score of 16 under.

The Tour could be invigorated by moving more tournaments to big cities with large crowds and classic courses, making each tournament feel more distinctive.

One thing LIV Golf has certainly gotten right is prioritizing events in larger cities and it seems Rolapp has noticed and will make an effort to do the same.

Rolapp seems to be focused on the right things after his first large presser. If he can continue to focus on the fans and what makes the Tour such a great product, he’s set to correct many of the mistakes Jay Monahan made and begin to push the Tour back in the right direction in the years to come.

What are your thoughts? Let me know in the comments below.

Top Photo Caption: Brian Rolapp gave a press conference this morning. (GETTY IMAGES/Tracy Wilcox)