It’s certainly become more challenging to stay on the PGA Tour now. Unless you’re an elite golfer, you will find it difficult to maintain your membership every season and be qualified for any event you want to play. Ryan Moore is experiencing the drawbacks of it as he was forced out of the big leagues after 2024. However, his biggest concern isn’t leaving the PGA Tour, but the lack of opportunities in the Korn Ferry Tour.
Speaking to Golfweek, Moore said, “Make that a nice sort of place to fall down to. I would have so much less issue if there was some developmental tour where more than a handful of guys can make a living. Am I going to lose money on Korn Ferry so I can play against a bunch of 20-year-olds that hit it 50 yards farther than me? It doesn’t make any sense.”
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Moore lost his PGA Tour membership after he finished 146th in the FedEx Cup in 2024. He only got the opportunity to play one event, the Procore Championship, last season. Since then, he has been trying to make a living elsewhere. But the 43-year-old has quickly learned that it’s not financially viable to play in the Korn Ferry Tour if you can’t win regularly. Especially considering the low prize money offered in the events there. So he had some advice to give to Brian Rolapp & Co.
“What about that makes any sense, except I maybe might be able to work my way back. That’s not a great system for me toward getting my way back on. So, that’s why I’m not doing it. The Tour’s done nothing to actually support people that are scrapping and fighting, trying to make it. It’s very, very silly, everything that they’re doing.”
Instead of focusing on creating more $20 million events, the PGA Tour should diversify its funds to build better pathways. Sustainable channels will help young golfers or even returning players like Moore to take the risk and give their best in the Korn Ferry Tour. That will increase the value of the product and hopefully make it more engaging.
Moore has been quite vocal about the limited opportunities provided by the PGA Tour. He also discussed the reduced field size of 2026. Let’s understand his views on the subject.
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The PGA Tour is not for everyone anymore, according to Ryan Moore
The restricted opportunities offered by the PGA Tour are not limited to the prize money. Ryan Moore also thinks the field size reduction have had a huge impact on how they deal with the pros.
Moore told Golfweek, “The Tour doesn’t know at this point. They have no idea what they’re doing. They keep saying a lot of things that turn out to be very wrong. If you go back three or four years ago with the exact same status, I would have played in at least 12 tournaments, maybe as much as 14-15, with fall [events] and with opposites and all that kind of stuff. But certainly a solid 12, and I think I got in four last year.”
“Everything they were telling us was that the past champions and those types of status should theoretically have been better this year because there’s less people with cards. I think missing through this whole process is they’ve taken away so many spots [in fields] that people that do have status have to play every tournament. There’s no like, ‘Well, I’ll just take the week off.’ People just have to play way more because they’ve taken away so much.”
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The reduced field size and PGA Tour memberships have really cut things down for everyone. It has also made it difficult for the Tour to manage its talent. They nearly ran out of alternate players at the Farmers Insurance Open after eight of the ten substitutes had to join the field due to multiple withdrawals. This is not the kind of situation Rolapp & Co. should be in when they are planning for the future of the Tour.
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