"Certainly it won't be a World Tour--that's far too grand for me to come up with--but there might be a name change."

It looks like a couple of startling developments on this idea of the European Tour becoming a World Tour.

First this, thanks to reader Four-putt, which I missed over the weekend and was certainly a lot more interesting from George O'Grady's mouth than his Tiger-comes-to-Dunhill nonsense:

"The idea of amalgamating with other tours to put on a really attractive schedule, by whatever name we call it, is one that we are in the final stages of refining," European Tour executive director George O'Grady said Sunday.

"Certainly it won't be a World Tour -- that's far too grand for me to come up with -- but there might be a name change."

Fast forward...

"We're the European Tour and we're working with all our partners to make, I would say, a hugely strong alternative to the PGA Tour," O'Grady said.

AP's Doug Ferguson then looks at the escalating rhetoric between the Tours and drops this:

Ed Moorhouse, co-chief operating officer at the PGA Tour, recalls preliminary talks about a WGC event the week before or after the British Open, but it never got beyond that.

"It's fair to say we didn't go into a lot of details because it was fairly obvious they didn't want to entertain a WGC in Europe," Waters said in a telephone interview. "It was most disappointing."

The tournament that got most of the attention was Loch Lomond, home of the Barclays Scottish Open held a week before the British Open. Loch Lomond was interested, and Waters said he was certain Barclays would have been willing to up the ante.

One reason the PGA Tour balked was it had obligations to the John Deere Classic, held the same week in Illinois.

That's why the federation has run its course. It's hard to take it seriously when Finchem, who heads up the federation, has too many competing interests.

Whoa Nellie! Yes, Mr. Ferguson just declared the federation of Tours co-sponsorting the WGC's dead in the water.

Is it conceivable thatl the Euro/World Tour will pull out of the WGC sanctioning?

Frankly, I can't see how the WGC's are good for the game in any way at this point other than for making the top players a lot more money. 

And frankly part 2, wouldn't this all have been avoided if the WGC events were actually played outside of the United States on occasion?  

Comments

[JB]

The IFT Tour......International Federation Tour.......and The Timothy is not invited.

[Four-putt]

Let us not forget it was Greg Norman who rolled out in early 1996 his concept for a few in-season "world" championships, true international events for venues across the globe. He even had some of the sponsors lined up.

At which point the PGA Tour jumped in and said, "Wait a minute. You can't do that. WE had the idea first."

Not unlike earlier, when Mark McCormack and IMG announced it was scheduling a a Ryder Cup-style event for Septembers in non-Ryder Cup years pitting a Team USA versus the best players not eligible for the European Ryder Cup team.

At which point the PGA Tour jumped in and said, "Wait a minute. You can't do that. WE had the idea first."

Sound familiar?

4p

[Bob G.]

Wow!


International affairs, is there any reason to keep Ty Votaw around, George O'Grady seems to be covering home plate?

[General Doofus]

Australia -
South Africa -
Japan -
Europe -

One for you, one for you, one for you, one for you, and eight for me.

One for you, one for you, one for you, one for you, and eight for me.

[Sir Humphrey]

I fancy the name as WTWT.

World Tour Without Tim.

[Keith 86]

Don't get me excited no one is going to play down under we don't have a place on Tim's globe it's just as far from europe

[AHW]

Try to not miss the point just once, K86. Try using punctuation marks as well, by the way.

[Keith 86]

yes mum

[Jackie]

"Frankly, I can't see how the WGC's are good for the game in any way at this point other than for making the top players a lot more money."

Truer words were never spoken.