Campbell on FedEx Cup Announcement

That's Steve of the Houston Chronicle writing about last week's announcement, making this excellent point:

The tour announced its plan in considerable detail last week. If details escaped your notice, it's because the tour showed an astounding tone-deafness to the world around it.

Finchem laid out the points system and how the playoffs will work last Wednesday — the day before the scheduled start of the U.S. Women's Open.

Was it a display of hubris, a clumsy attempt to steal the thunder of the marquee event in women's golf? Was it obliviousness? Or was it a calculated decision to lay out a plan in a setting where it wouldn't get the sort of scrutiny Phil Mickelson gets when he picks his driver with a one-stroke lead at the 72nd hole of the U.S. Open?

Whatever the motives, what could have been a huge splash barely caused a ripple.

Make no mistake: A clumsily timed unveiling doesn't doom the FedEx Cup to folly status. At the same time, it doesn't give the impression the tour quite knows what it's doing.

And this is fun.

"The conversation," Finchem said, "goes something like, 'Let me understand this. If I win six times between Mercedes and Greensboro, and I've got $10 million in prize money, and I've an 8,000 lead in points, you're telling me I'm now going to start over again, basically, with just a little edge on everybody else?'

"And the answer I give is yes. And then in a couple of cases, I've had a follow-up question, 'Do you think that's fair?' And my response is, 'If the New York Yankees win 115 games and win the American League East, they start over.'

"And every player with whom I've had that conversation's response to that is, 'I get it, I get it, it's great; let's tee it up.' "

That's right, Tiger and Phil and all of the other guys who play less than 20 times are going, "Yeah! I get, I get. This means I don't have to play more events in 2007! Whew! Had me worried there for a while Timbo!"