Rory McIlroy has questioned proposed new changes to the PGA Tour schedule and admits the old system was ‘pretty good’ before LIV Golf’s emergence in the men’s game.
The PGA Tour continues to work towards a proposed new-look schedule, with further details expected to be announced later this month ahead of its launch in 2028, including two "tracks" of tournaments with promotion and relegation across a two-tier system.
Track one events would have elevated prize purses and stronger fields, effectively an increased number of Signature Events first introduced to the PGA Tour schedule in response to LIV Golf's emergence.
LIV Golf's future remains uncertain after Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund (PIF) confirmed they would stop funding the league after this season, while McIlroy admits that there's a new appreciation of the PGA Tour's previous calendar.
"I think, as they [PGA Tour] have done all this work, you start to realise that the way the PGA Tour was before LIV came along was actually pretty good," McIlroy said in his press conference ahead of the US Open, live on Your Site. "It was a pretty good structure and everything worked pretty well.
"LIV created this false economy where we had to up prize funds and had to cut fields and try to support the top players and all that stuff, which I think needed to happen because that was the only way to retain talent at the time.
"Now that LIV looks like it's less of a threat, I think the old ways of the PGA Tour weren't actually that bad."
There has been no confirmation on which events will fall into the second track of PGA Tour tournaments, although there are expected to be limited opportunities for players to move between the two tiers during the season.
The PGA Tour has boosted prize money for many of its events in recent years to try and prevent players from defecting to LIV Golf, with McIlroy warning that some iconic events may be negatively impacted by the changes.
"I guess, just recency, an event like last week, the Canadian Open, is potentially going to one of these track two [events], McIlroy added. "Track two is a glorified Korn Ferry [Tour] event. That's what track two is going to be, so I don't think the Canadian Open should be one of those.
"I just think there's going to be certain events that might lose their stature if a sponsor doesn't pony up $30m (£22m), so that's the tough thing.
"But I'm not in those rooms. I play my schedule and I'll continue to play my schedule, which is getting less and less as the years go on."
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