PGA Tour Will Make Its Return In June — First Sport Back In The Fray

The Sheriff Of Nottingham (aka Tour Commish Jay Monahan) did what everyone suspected he’d do on Thursday — he declared the PGA Tour back in business come mid-June.

The Sheriff may want to check for leaks among his Sinister Henchmen, obviously there’s a mole up there at The Ponte Vedra Palace — GolfDigest.com beat The Sheriff to it on Wednesday and broke the news of the tour’s June restart.

So when The Sheriff broke out the revised Tour schedule yesterday, it revealed pretty much what everyone suspected.

The Tour will return to action with the first ball in the air at The Colonial on Thursday morning, June 11.  Which means Rickie and Tiger and Rory and J.T. and D.J. and everyone else better cease with the left-handed matches and get serious about returning to work shortly.

It’s all part of President Trump doing everything he can to get the good old USA back in business and nothing says back in business like giving us some sports on television.  Hey, anyone tired of watching re-runs on The Golf Channel?

By the way, did we mention the spectators can stay home?

Yes, golf may be the one sport that translates well to peace and quiet in the background.  Birds chirping, players hollering at the golf ball — “get up” or “get down.”

Here’s what the month of June will look like:

Up first is The Colonial, June 11-14.  It will be interesting to see who shows up, typically the event has been one the name players have skipped in normal times but we’re so far from normal, normal may as well be somewhere on the surface of the moon.

The Heritage, normally played the week after The Masters, will go June 18-21 there at Hilton Head Island, which is socially distant from most everything in the state of South Carolina.

Then it’s on to Connecticut for The Travelers, June 25-28 at TPC River Highland.

So that takes care of June on the PGA Tour.

July will be busy starting with The John Deere, July 9-12.  Most of the name players will skip that in favor of Jack’s tournament, The Memorial, which Jack correctly predicted more than a week ago, would be played July 16-19 at stately Muirfield Village.

From there, it’s the 3M up outside Minneapolis-St. Paul, July 23-26 at TPC Twin Cities.

Of course The Sheriff is going to “encourage” his big names to show up the following week, July 29-August 2, in steamy Memphis for the WGC-St. Jude, underwritten by The Sheriff’s favorite fat-cat courier company — Federal Express.  TPC Southwind is the course.

For the guys from the poor side of the Tour, if you want to call it that, there’s ye olde Opposite-Field event, the Barracuda, out in California, same dates at the WGC-St. Jude.

But it gets a little testy for The Sheriff and his favorite Tennessee Courier company with that July 29-August 2 date.  Problem is the first major of the re-designed season is the PGA Championship at Harding Park and that’s the week after Memphis, slated for August 6-9.  Here’s where it might get a little bit testy — will California allow the PGA to be played?  If not, Seth Waugh will have to pick up his little major and play it elsewhere.  Also, will the big names play the week before in Memphis with sweat pouring out of their bodies like water from the Trevi Fountain in Italy?

The Wyndham is the week after the PGA, and once again, it’s the last event before the playoffs.  August 13-16 and you wonder with the state of hotels financially in this crisis, if Wyndham will want to fork over that Wyndham bonus money.  Not a great idea, really.

Then it’s The Sheriff’s most wonderful time of the year — The Tennessee Courier (aka FedEx Cup) Playoffs.

Three weeks, three biggies:

Northern Trust, Boston, August 20-23.

The BMW, Chicago, August 27-30.

Tour Championship, Atlanta, September 4-7, where someone will walk away $17 million richer.

After that it’s golf vs. The NFL.

The U.S. Open will go September 17-20 at Winged Foot.

The PGA Of America slips the Ryder Cup matches in up in Wisconsin, September 24-27.

Then we’ll have to wait an excruciating six week until November 12 when the first ball is in the air at the first-ever fall Masters.

So there you have it.  We’ll have golf, maybe, virus retreat permitting, state governments permitting starting in June.

Spectators on the courses at some point?  Tough to say.

But let’s face it, the Tour HAD to get cranking, it was getting really testy up there at the Ponte Vedra Palace without any money-grubbing on the menu.