The PGA Tour is certainly hoping for a huge impact. And the Tour will probably be happy if only four tournaments turn in great television ratings - the four tournaments that make up the FedEx "playoffs."
Television ratings for PGA Tour events traditionally tank in the late summer and early fall, when football starts showing up on American television screens. The FedEx Cup points series was created in large part as an attempt to reverse that by focusing the attention of sports fans on golf.
In theory, fans will be intently following the points chase, the way NASCAR fans follow the Nextel Cup points series. As the NASCAR season winds down, newspapers and sports news reports on TV are full of stories updating the points standings. That's what the PGA Tour wants from the FedEx Cup.
And it also wants golf's greatest players to be in the same fields on four successive weekends in late August and early September. A dream scenario for the PGA Tour would be Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson battling for the FedEx Cup points lead while fighting each other down the stretch in the "playoff" tournaments and Tour Championship.
And if that happens, then, yes, the FedEx Cup will be a huge success. But Woods and Mickelson have been playing the Tour together since 1997, and Doral a couple years ago is the only tournament that jumps into most fans' minds when searching for head-to-head Sunday showdowns between the two.
That scenario assumes Woods and Mickelson - the only golfers who move the ratings dial (Tiger a lot, Phil a little) - fully participate in the FedEx Cup, and especially its playoffs. That might not be a safe assumption. In the "regular season," none of the top golfers is likely to build his season around chasing points. They'll play the tournaments they always play, with schedules built around the majors.
And neither Tiger nor Phil plays much after the PGA Championship - and the FedEx Cup playoffs take place a couple weeks after the PGA. Will they show up for all four "playoff" events? In Year One, I guess yes on that question, but again, it's not a safe guess.
Even if they do show up for all four, Woods, Mickelson and the other top stars aren't guaranteed to win anything. This is golf, after all. And if Tiger and Phil aren't in the hunt on Sunday, then the TV ratings will be relatively poor, no matter what kind of points title is at stake.
The FedEx Cup will generate interest, perhaps a little more than golf is normally getting in late August and early September. It's a plan worth trying by the PGA Tour. But for me, I don't expect it to create the magic for which the PGA Tour is hoping.
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