How Have Fan-Free Events Impacted Performance And Results?

Fans or no fans? Impact on play or not? And what about the kids?

The obvious question after Collin Morikawa held off players like Matthew Wolff and Scottie Scheffler at the 2020 PGA: has it been easier adjustment in the pandemic era without loud, biased-to-veterans crowds or the inevitable adjustment to playing before large crowds?

And how to prove or disprove it?

Thankfully, that’s what someone like Justin Ray likes to answer. I finally got around to this and as always, enjoyed his approach and use of the data to answer an interesting question.

While plenty of younger players have found the winner’s circle since the season resumed after the pandemic hiatus, there hasn’t been a rush of new faces lifting trophies. The average age for PGA TOUR winners since last year’s Charles Schwab Challenge is 32.1 – right around average for recent seasons. It’s actually a slightly older median than the 2018-19 season (31.8), as well as every season from 2013-14 through 2016-17.

How about making the cut? From the beginning of the 2017-18 season through the 2020 Arnold Palmer Invitational, players age 24 or younger made the cut 53.6% of the time. In the mostly ‘fan-less’ tournaments since, that number has actually decreased, to 50.9%. That may be partly an effect of the Herculean fields that populated the TOUR shortly after the pandemic hiatus ended – an abbreviated season meant condensed schedules for the world’s best players.