Readers Fix the FedEx Cup

Doug Ferguson of the Associated Press writes today that FedEx playoffs were great, but that the "Super Bowl" was a yawner. Tim Rosaforte in the new Golf World reports on some of the player suggestions.

Based on your letters, you think the whole deal needs fixing. The suggestions are varied, some more serious than others. A sampling:

__Play-off? Without a Championship game! Who are Tim and staff kidding? If it ain't broke, don't fix it! Golf has its four majors; enough! __ Jim Bradshaw Manlius, NY

The final should be match play. Use the FedEx rankings to qualify for the Tour Championship and to seed the players. Bring the top 32 players. Players seeded #1 and #2 -et first round byes. Fourteen play to move on and are joined by the top two seeds. Four rounds of matches later you have your champion on Sunday afternoon, with a lot more excitment, since any of 32 players has a chance at the start of the week. Jim Peplow Chico, CA

Understanding the FedEx Cup is beyond anyone's comprehension, be that the average golf fan, the PGA Tour professional, and in all probability the coats at the PGA Tour, so let's change the process:

--All participants keep their earned FedEx points throughout the year.

--Points earned in the last four events would be distributed in the same manner as points are for the four majors and The Players.

--All events would be 72 holes.

--To be eligible for participation a player must be in the top 126 on the FedEx points list before the start of the final four events.

--The second event would include 66 participants. Again, threesomes are a consideration, however twosomes would work well.

--The third event would include 32 participants who would play in twosomes.

--The final event would include sixteen (16) participants again playing in twosomes.

I do believe this would afford Joe Interested Golfer/Spectator an opportunity to keep better track of the year-long process. The top players would be more than likely to stay in the race until the end, or at least have the opportunity to do so, and those are the participants the public wants to see, and the PGA Tour wants to have in the final event. I also believe this would do away with some the mediocrity the event is presently breeding.

We all agree something must be done, as this final event at East Lake is now just another PGA Tour Stop which is too bad considering the venue and the history and the history it brings to the game.

Jon E. Jacobson

Blue Springs, Missouri

The FedEx Cup will not be a true playoff until it is structured so that the winner must win the Tour Championship. Season-long point accrual could be used to determine seedings or other advantages leading to the final tournament. The Final Field would consist of a limited number of qualifiers (The FedEx Finalists) who would start on equal footing. The current system does not need to be tweaked, it needs to be scrapped. The guy who took 44th place in the semi-final and who only had to show up for the final is the champion? You just can't sell that.>

Steve Kartchner>

New York, NY

Here's my two cents: Look at the LPGA's ADT Championship for a final format that works. (It's not too far from reader Peplow's suggestion above). To apply to the FedEx Cup, three events qualify and seed 16 players into a match-play final for the bulk of the dough. The biggest names would make sure they made it, so the issue of a "no-name" would be, one hopes, remote. No guarantees, of course, but it beats what happened this year and discourages players from taking a week off from the playoffs, as some did a year ago.

--Bob Carney