Hawkins: Alternatives To FedEx Structure

John Hawkins offers some great suggestions on fixing the clearly broken FedEx Cup. (And since they're good ideas, they have NO chance of flying.)

But I'm not in agreement with his idea of padding points for strength of field to encourage more play from top players.

Problem: Making the Players Championship worth the same number of points (27,500) as the four majors is yet another example of the tour’s petty arrogance. Please. It’s an excellent tournament, but the Players is not worthy of such status, and the harder Camp Ponte Vedra tries to ram the notion down our throats, the less credible it becomes.

John, be nice to the fifth of golf's four majors! They have a new logo that really...oh forget it.

Solution: The tour’s point-allocation formula is as follows: 27,500 for the majors and Players; 26,250 for World Golf Championships and 25,000 for “regular” events. My scale is 30,000 for the majors and 27,500 for the Players/WGCs. Weekly tournaments start at a base of 24,000, but for every player in the top 50 of the World Ranking in the field, the total increases, with a maximum value of 26,000.

This changes the distribution values as well. The tour will pay 4,500 points for a regular win, 4,725 for a WGC victory and 4,950 for a major title. My numbers are obviously slightly higher, which spreads the field and has a positive effect on player incentive. All I know is, the guy who wins Memorial should get more points than whoever wins Hartford. That’s just common sense.

Fair point, but as we've learned with MacDuff's points system, awarding equal points throughout the year actually rewards those who play well and play often.