Monahan: U.S. Open Still Trying To Play Before Fans

In his pre-Memorial media session—which came after a virtual luncheon…these strange times—Commissioner Jay Monahan said the likely next event to be played before humans will probably be the U.S. Open at Winged Foot.

JAY MONAHAN: You know, obviously we've canceled -- we're not going to have spectators and we're not going to have pro-ams through the TOUR Championship in Atlanta. Right now you look at the PGA TOUR schedule, the next event up is the U.S. Open, and I know that the USGA continues to work with the state of New York and is making plans to return fans. If I had to guess, that would be the first week that we would do so.

I think to give a little more texture to your question, we're spending a lot of time in each of the subsequent tournaments or each of the tournaments in the fall working on a number of different ways to stage the event, which includes full capacity, partial capacity, and obviously the way that we're operating now, which is no spectators, and that will be largely dependent on what we hear from the communities where we play.

As noted yesterday, New York’s newly imposed quarantine restrictions on visitors from pretty much any place with a population seem like a bigger issue for mid-September’s rescheduled U.S. Open at Winged Foot. That said, even a small crowd would make a huge difference in giving the event a major championship field—if safe to do so. Oh, and help move some 2020 merch.