Playoffs

Watching the CBS coverage of the Wyndham Championship this afternoon, I kept hearing the announcers say that the top 86 are guaranteed entry into the first two playoff events. Well, if they are guaranteed for the second one, why have a first playoff tournament? I didn't pay much attention to the playoff system when it was first introduced at the beginning of the year, but now that we are a few days away I have to say it's looking kind of stupid. They start out with Tiger having 100,000 points and those following him having something like 500 points less as they go down the line. What's the theory of awarding 100,000 points??? Do they get points taken away? There's an idea, for every cuss word uttered on TV, take some points away. For every member of the gallery Tiger, uh, I mean a player, hits with a golf ball, take some points away. Then I could see giving so many points to start out with. If there are 144 players in the first event, then why not give Tiger 144 and the next guy 143 and so on? In the end, the top 30 will be in the last tournament, whether they have amassed 1 Million points, or 1000. Is the plethora of points just a psych-out? Gee, they have so many points, they did really great. It looks to me like there are a lot of useless points just out there for looks and not for any real purpose.

I think a true playoff system would be if no one started out with points and they earned them as they went during the four playoff events. I don't believe they spot basketball teams and football teams points during their playoffs.

And this whole bye thing has got to go too. It happens in many sports, such as tennis, and they've created a bye system in this playoff system in golf. In tennis, the top seeds get a bye in the first round of some tournaments because they play every week and it's just so tough on the players (boohoo - the men already play best two out of three instead of 3 of 5 and they still want that extra break). This playoff system for the fed ex cup has created the same kind of thing where the top players (Tiger for instance) could skip one or more of the events and still win the thing. That has got to go. If they are going to award $10 Million, then the winner had darn well earn it. If not, then I could use a couple million, they can just give me some money while they're at it.