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Time for the Seniors to Get Real Tougher setups are a start, but here's what else needs to be done
By Gary Van Sickle
The Senior tour was invented for superstars like the Big Three and Lee Trevino. We had a chance to watch them win all over again. That was fun for a while, but now they're done, and it's time to move on. Nostalgia was big in the '90s, but so were the Spice Girls and Newt Gingrich. With apologies to Tom Watson, we're all out of superstars, so it's time to put the fossils back in the museum and let the guys who are still competitive play golf because -- you know what? -- they're pretty damn good. That much was obvious at this year's tournament in Naples, where the rough was up, and at most of the other Senior tour venues, where the pins have been tucked and the fairways fast and hard. This hasn't been a fluke. In a survey conducted last fall, three fourths of the Senior players said they favored tougher conditions. The tour, believe it or not, listened to them. "We can't have a putting contest every week," Nicklaus said earlier this year, defending the conditions. "Most of the courses we play I've skipped all my life -- where you have to shoot 25 under to make the cut." Turning the courses from cupcakes into prime rib is only the first step in the evolution of the over-50 circuit into a real golf tour. Here's what else needs to be done. Increase the field. Seventy-eight players -- about a third of them in the nostalgia category -- isn't enough. In fact, limiting the field like that isn't fair. Let's allow 110 players, with the top 60 on the money list exempt, not just the top 31. At least 25 full exemptions should be available at the Q school instead of the current eight. Open the doors and give any 50-year-old with a dream a reasonable chance. Hasn't golf had enough exclusion? Plenty of former Tour players and club pros have the game to win on the Senior tour but they can't get in because it's a closed shop. Why? Because too many washed-up players are riding this gravy train and they don't want the competition. Sorry, gramps, the free lunch is over. Add a cut. That's right, just like in a real tournament. The field will be cut to the top 60 and ties after Saturday's second round. Those missing the cut will get $1,000 for the effort. Separate the Super Seniors. The over-60 guys, whom some fans still want to see, currently play two events in one. They cash a check for the two-round event for players 60 and over, plus another one for the three-rounder because there's no cut. On my Senior tour, there will be no more double-dipping. We'll bump up the purse for the old-timers, but they'll have to choose between the two competitions. The new Super Seniors will use forward tees, go off first on Fridays and Saturdays, and play in a Wednesday pro-am, leaving the Thursday pro-am for the younger Seniors. These changes will make for a better life for some of the players who now feel compelled to play every week to keep their seats at the table. Last year seven players teed it up in at least 37 of the Senior tour's 39 events. "This tour absolutely makes you play golf [because it has so few exemptions]," says Dana Quigley, the tour's reigning iron man with 124 consecutive starts. "That's not the way the tour planned it, and I think a lot of guys wish it weren't like this. For guys like me, though, it's a godsend to have something to play for every week." A reason to play? Sounds good. I think that could translate into a reason to watch, too.
Issue date: April 9, 2001
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