FedEx Guy On Year-Round Schedule: "That was an important part of our discussions"

The pieces are all coming together and after letting it slip today that FedEx was attracted to the year-round schedule concept (and therefore year-round talk of the FedExCup), that was a piece for the company in ponying up through 2017 as John Nicholson reports in a brief AP note.

And the news only got a brief AP note because of the inexplicably horrible idea to announce the new deal on one of the premiere golf days of the year: day one at the match play. The PGA Tour's media folks are way too savvy to insist on doing this press conference today, so I have to assume this was a stubborn, perhaps removed-from-reality Commissioner or FedEx drone wanting to push an announcement at the worst possible time to get the attention it deserves.

In his (also brief) story, Alex Miceli talks to Adam Scott, who uses a nice child rearing metaphor to describe the FedExCup, one which the EVP's might want to steal.

“It's had some teething problems, I guess you could say, but everyone’s got the gist of it now, and on the whole, everyone’s pretty happy on how it operates," he said. "It’s an incredible opportunity for us as players, and it's great for the game of golf to have a company like FedEx committing for five years, putting a serious amount of money into the game.”

Reading the transcript, there appears to have been hilariously awkward moment with FedEx's Mike Glenn, who was on the phone line (he wasn't even there...what's the rush!?).

Q.  This is for Mike.  Mike, was there any hesitations or concerns in regards to the proposal that the Tour has right now about extending the season out and starting in the fall, basically making this a year‑round Tour?

MIKE GLENN:  We're very pleased with the Tour's decision to extend the season and allow the FedExCup to be a year‑round competition.  That was an important part of our discussions, and we were very happy with the outcome.

Uh oh...Commissioner Growth and Value to the rescue!

COMMISSIONER TIMOTHY W. FINCHEM:  Although we're not finished with those discussions yet.  But clearly if we go in that direction, it generates more value to‑‑ it makes the FedExCup bigger, and it generates more value to FedEx.  But this agreement is not contingent on that in any way happening.  We're moving down that road and we're feeling better and better about the possibilities.

So there you have it...more value for FedEx. So we know who had the leverage in these negotiations.

There was one other assertion from the Commissioner that I found mildly disturbing as a sports fan.

Q.  Tim, obviously you've heard over the years the critics of the FedExCup.  Where do you think in the years that you've had this structure now that you've answered the critics the best?  Where do you feel the most comfortable in saying, no, you know, that's not necessarily the way it is, this is going pretty good.  What's worked the best, do you think?

COMMISSIONER TIMOTHY W. FINCHEM:  Well, I think that, first of all, we don't ever want to really totally answer all the criticism, because criticism means controversy, and controversy means people talk about it.  And like I've said many times, everybody complains about the BCS, but the BCS keeps college football in the conversation.

No, the BCS keeps bowl game directors and college presidents in the conversation instead of the athletes.