New $40m PGA Tour Bonus Scheme Revealed

A new Player Impact Progam has been launched by the PGA Tour, as reported by Golfweek, where $40m will be distributed to the Tour's 10 biggest stars

New $40m PGA Tour Bonus Scheme Revealed

Golf's richest stars are about to get richer.

The Premier Golf League shook up the world of golf with its announcement last year, where it hoped to tempt away golf's biggest stars from the PGA Tour and see them compete in a lucrative F1-style franchise.

Since then, we've seen golf's two biggest tours, the PGA and European Tours, combine with a strategic alliance and it looks like the PGA Tour has fired more ammunition to keep its stars on their tour.

The Tour has, according to Golfweek, created a new Player Impact Program, which will hand out $40m in bonuses to “recognize and reward players who positively move the needle.”

It began on 1st January and will see the most valuable player picking up a whopping $8m regardless of performance.

Who may that player be? You would have to think that Bryson DeChambeau may be favourite at the moment, having produced numerous viral moments this year including at Bay Hill where his monster drives over the lake on the par-5 6th were seriously impressive and gained the PGA Tour millions of views across social media.

There is actually a metric of how the funds will be distributed, with a five-point Impact Score being created according to Golfweek...

What is the Player Impact Program?

1 The player's popularity in Google Search.

2 The player's 'Nielsen Brand Exposure rating', which places a value on the exposure a player delivers to sponsors though the minutes they are featured on broadcasts.

3 The player's 'Q Rating', which measures the familiarity and appeal of a player’s brand.

4 The player's 'MVP Index rating', which calibrates the value of the engagement a player drives across social and digital channels.

5 The player's 'Meltwater Mentions', which refers to the frequency with which a player generates coverage across a range of media platforms.

Whilst Woods will not be featuring on any broadcasts this year, he will likely top all of the other ratings and therefore may still pick up the $8m bonus.

Brooks Koepka told Golfweek that Tiger should be number one on the bonus list as he is the "entire reason this sport is as popular as it is."

“Tiger should be No. 1 on that list no matter what,” Koepka said.

“He’s the entire reason we’re able to play for so much money, the entire reason this sport is as popular as it is, and the reason most of us are playing. Not even close.”

The PGA Tour circulated a document to its players earlier this year and provided an example of how it would have worked in 2019.

The list was, in order, Tiger Woods, Rory McIlroy, Brooks Koepka, Phil Mickelson, Rickie Fowler, Jordan Spieth, Dustin Johnson, Justin Thomas, Justin Rose and Adam Scott.

Of course, journeymen and players outside of that top-10 will not be overly happy about the scheme, including one anonymous multiple-tour winner who told Golfweek that "most players feel it is a shoo-in money grab" for golf's biggest names.

The player also pointed out that the biggest names are always the ones on PGA Tour Live, which the PGA Tour decides, and they're also the ones with the biggest social media followings.

Now that this is public, we will surely hear more from the players, both the bigger and smaller names, over the coming weeks and months.

Definitely a story to follow!