Capelle On Golf

Be honest folks. Do your ears perk up when a golf announcer tells you how many FexExCup (FEC) points Player X stands to win? Are your eyes glued to the screen when they show the standings? If more than one in 50 of you said yes, I’d be surprised.

The FEC did inject a little fun into the post major’s season last year. But as far as the season long chase to get into the cup? Boring, irrelevant, and silly are a few words that come to mind.

In the interest of fair play, however, I decided to give the FEC another chance. I started (and subsequently ended) my investigation with the FEC point system. The brain trust at PGA Tour headquarters believes that all non-opposing PGA Tour events prior to the “playoffs” (whatever that means) are worth almost the same amount. The table below gives the winners points in the five categories and the number of events that award that specific number of points. (Correction: the winners receive 18% of the amounts listed below. The percentage relative to each event still are the same.)

FedExCup Points
12,500 Events that oppose WGC tournaments and the British Open (4)
25,000 A typical PGA Tour event (25)
26,250 WGC tournaments (3)
27,500 The Majors + The PLAYERS (5)
50,000 The playoff events (4)

2008 First Place Points - WGR Points vs. PGA Tour Events with 25,000 Points
48, 50, 34, 60, 58, 40, 68, 48, 52, 62, 46, 52, 54

The tables above prove the bogus nature of the FEC allocations. Still, I’m going to press on to make my point. Majors are worth 10% more than a typical tour event. Righto. I’d wager that any pro would trade three regular tour wins, his house, and a bottle of Dom Perignon for one major. Major winner’s also receive only 4.8% more points that the winner of those decade old history laden WGC events. That’s sure fair.

Oh, I almost forgot. The FEC people think that the winner of the fifth major (The PLAYERS) deserves as many points as the winners of each of the four real majors.

WGR vs. FedExCup
As for the typical tour events, they award 25,000 FEC points to the winner. However, according to the WGR, the winners are anything but equal. Though the WGR has its flaws, I trust them infinitely more than this new fangled FEC point system.

The WGR awards 100 points to the winners of the majors. WGR points at typical tour events depend on the difficulty of the field. It’s here where the FEC point system losses any remaining shred of credibility. For example, D.J. Trahan picked up 25,000 FEC points for winning the Bob Hope. Because of the weak field, he earned only 34 WGR points. When Tiger Woods won the Arnold Palmer Invitational he too won 25,000 FEC points – but a whopping 62 WGR points (82% more than Trahan) because he played in a field loaded with the best players.

The WGR system recognizes disparities in the events and awards points accordingly. The FEC ignores strength of field because the PGA Tour wants us to think than all regular tour events are more or less equal. The existence of the Tiger Tour alone disproves this fairy tale.

There, I’ve finally got this FEC nonsense off my chest. I’ll watch the “playoffs” because I’m a golf junkie, and it’s a long eight months between the PGA and the Masters. And wedged in between playoff events this year is the Ryder Cup.

But who care how many FECs Tiger Woods or anyone else wins? If it’s named after a corporation, and if Palmer, Player, and Nicklaus never had a chance to win it, it can’t be all that important.