The PGA Tour Doesn't Need a Rory Rule

The FedEx Cup does not have a Rory McIlroy problem and does not need a Rory McIlroy rule. In case you have not heard, Rory is the only player of the eligible 70 to not enter this week’s first leg of the playoffs, the FedEx St. Jude WGC Barclays Northern Trust Classic Championship. In any other walk of life, someone using their free will to pass on a mid-August trip to Memphis for outdoor activities would not raise an eyebrow. It would be considered sensible and obvious.

But Rory is the PGA Tour’s most popular player, and this is the start of the Tour’s playoffs, and the hometown courier service not only sponsors the event but the whole damn system. Rory is probably grateful for that patronage. No one has made more in the playoffs – $69,515,615 – to be exact. But those winnings are not all owing to one sponsor, and he had a hand in achieving those earnings. Just as he has a hand in deciding where and when he’ll play.

So he’s not there, and because he’s absent, we have discourse on loopholes that need closing and more playoff problems. Peter Malnati, who is also not in Memphis because he did not qualify, said he was “very concerned” about this development. This quote comes via an article by the excellent reporter Adam Schupak, who added in his article, with Malnati’s insights, that there are ongoing discussions to address this form of truancy. Schupak calls on new CEO Brian Rolapp to close this loophole with what could be called the McIlroy Rule, as his absence this week “damages the credibility of the FedEx Cup.”

I would gesture broadly at the last 19 years of the FedEx Cup damaging the credibility of the FedEx Cup more so than McIlroy’s one-week bypass. It’s been a constant state of change, from points predicaments to changing the total number of events to schedule swaps to a low-net tournament. We’re told next year will likely bring another overhaul with a new Tour Championship format. It’s not Rory’s fault the Tour, in its evolution where title sponsorship seemed most sacred, decided to abandon markets like New York and Boston in late September to drop anchor in the Sweat Seas of Memphis and Atlanta in August.

The playoffs can be tweaked and improved at the margins, but they are what they are. Rory skipping Memphis is not some great line that has been crossed to undermine the over-promoted cup. It was at the BMW Championship four years ago, where he is supposed to return next week, that Rory reiterated that “it’s hard to feel fresh at this time in the season,” so it was nice the playoffs could be distinguished as “more of an entertainment product rather than the majors.” I don’t mean to sound beaten down and defeated but … the Players is the Tour’s best event and has been admirably elevated in recent years, while the playoffs are an end-of-season money bath that give some animating purpose to the other events of the season but will never be anything close to the premiere events in golf, regardless of Rules, Corollaries, or Schedule changes.

Creating a Rory Rule is not changing shit, and this is before we open up the can of worms about forcing independent contractors to play certain dates. We’ve done five years of revolving door arguments and changes about that already. Besides, Rory might just be a true outlier based on his season, stature, and current place on the career timeline. He’s the only one who took a pass. If we’ve learned anything about the past five years, the pros like their money, and this week offers a large sum, guaranteed, and with no cut. That’s what the playoffs will continue to be, regardless of whether one’s presence is mandated or not.