MEMPHIS, Tenn. – Monday’s rollout of the 2024 PGA Tour schedule was overshadowed by a particularly hectic week in professional golf and earlier reports of the circuit’s plan to create a better “cadence” to the season, but one anomaly that was largely overlooked was the positioning of the WM Phoenix Open.
Next year’s schedule is an example of how the Tour hopes to create a flow to the season with groups of “signature” events surrounded by full-field tournaments with the WM Phoenix Open being the lone exception.
The event at TPC Scottsdale – which has become a staple of Super Bowl weekend with Sunday’s final round serving as a pregame to the big game – will be played the week after the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am and the week before The Genesis Invitational, both signature events.
Although officials had hoped to avoid having a full-field event wedged between a pair of designated events, the WM Phoenix Open presented logistical challenges in 2024 that required the tournament remain in its traditional date (Feb. 8-11) for at least one more season.
“The Waste Management Phoenix Open, probably our biggest event in terms of just pure logistics, there were some practical realities in terms of the timing of rolling out the schedule model with other events in the Scottsdale area which caused us to keep it on that week,” said Tyler Dennis, the Tour’s executive vice president and president. “We want to achieve pairing events together, so which week everybody ends up in [in the future] I’m not 100 percent sure, but that’s our goal.”
Dennis also addressed another hole in next year’s schedule after Honda cut ties with the annual south Florida stop after this year’s event. The event is currently listed as The Classic in The Palm Beaches to be played Feb. 29-March 3 at PGA National.
“The tournament in Palm Beach is very important to us and has a great legacy there and it’s where the Nicklaus Children’s Hospital is, we have a lot of interest in that and we’re expecting to make an announcement about sponsorship soon,” Dennis said.