PGA Tour Life Member Exemption - Scoring Requirement

[Frank-0-Sport]

Greetings ...

Many of you here may be familiar with the PGA Tour Life Member Exemption (#17 on PGA Tour Exemption Category List) , which gives any player with at least 20 official career PGA Tour wins -AND- 15 years as an active Tour member a free pass into all open and some invitational PGA Tour events.

Players like Tiger Woods, Vijay Singh, Phil Mickelson, Davis Love III, Tom Watson, Greg Norman, Lanny Wadkins and Johnny Miller are eligible for the Life Member Category.

What you may not know is that before an eligible player can use the Life Member Exemption in a given year, two things must occur. The first and obvious is that the player is not otherwise exempt for an event in some other category, usually those above that for Life Members. The second is that in the calendar year prior to the one in which an eligible player desires to use the Life Member Exemption, the player must meet a special scoring average requirement, the basics of which are ....

(1) That the player maintains a proper scoring average of three strokes above the field average in the tournaments that he plays in.

(2) That the player competes in at least one official PGA Tour event each calendar year.

If these conditions are not met, then the particular player -CAN NOT USE- the Life Member Exemption, and must therefore rely on other means to enter events.

March 14 2009 Blog Article Explaining the Scoring Requirement for Life Member Exemption

This is why you do not see names like Lanny Wadkins, Johnny Miller and Greg Norman listed under the Life Member category. None of them are playing events and meeting the scoring requirement, and so their PGA Tour status is that of Past Champion Members (Category-30), a classification so far down the priority selection list that it does not guarantee automatic entry into many PGA Tour events.

Thanx-A-Lot, Frank-0-Sport

[deasy55]

Seems fair to me

[sean_miller]

Good. There are so many guys bouncing back and forth between the Nationwide and Regular tour who need those valuable spots, why waste it on a veteran who has no intention of gaining full time playing status.

[Chilli Dipper]

Like most of the causes célèbres that the OP brings up on this forum, I fail to find any issue in how the PGA Tour conducts its business. It means that lifetime members should meet a certain standard of play to continue to enter into tournaments. There are only 17 living life members of the PGA Tour as it is; who do these standards really effect? Woods, Mickelson, Singh, and Love are all still active tour members whose lifetime member status is redundant in regards to what tournaments they are allowed into; Nicklaus, Palmer, Casper, Littler, Trevino, Miller, and Sanders all no longer play competitively; and Watson still plays well enough in the tournaments he plays to maintain his exemption. Those that remain are Player, Floyd, Watkins, Irwin, and Norman, all legends of the game; even if their life member status is inactive, it's not as if no tournament will provide them a sponsor's exemption if they show interest in playing in the odd event.

[Frank-0-Sport]

Greetings ...

Actually, this was posted to explain the specific nuances of the Life Member Category to those who may not be intimately familiar with it.

As it stands now, Tiger Woods, according to the 2011 PGA Tour Media Guide, is unconditionally exempt thru at least 2014, based on the combination of his 2008 US Open win, and winning at least one regular event in any year up thru 2013. He won at least once in 2009 (seven wins, Fed Ex Cup), so it is basically (I assume) a six-year exemption, unless the Tour knows something I don't.

Assuming his present status is thru 2014, then if Tiger adds wins a non-major event this year, his present status is extended to 2015. Winning the PGA Championship would take him to 2016. It is only -AFTER- that all the unconditional exemptions expire that Tiger has to rely on other means to enter regular PGA Tour events, which probably won't be a problem -- weather, authorities and knees permitting.

Phil Mickelson is unconditionally exempt thru 2016, by virtue of winning the 2010 Masters, and then the 2011 Shell-Houston Open.

All this information RE multiple event winner/add-on exemptions process comes from the PGA Tour Media Guide.

David Toms has been the biggest beneficiary of the multiple event winner/add-on exemptions process. In 2001 he captured the PGA Championship, worth by itself a five-year exemption. Over the next five years, Toms won five non-major events, and this extended his unconditional status five more years to 2011. It was in 2011 that he won the Crowne Plaza Colonial, so now he's good thru at least 2013. Had it not been for the multiple event winner/add-on exemptions process, he would been forced to take a Major Medical Exemption in 2009 following an injury-plagued 2008 campaign. To his credit, Toms did come back very strong in 2009 (19th in the Fed Ex Cup, 14th in money) and modestly so in 2010 (55th in Fed Ex Cup, 49th in money).

Thanx-A-Lot, Frank-0-Sport

[deasy55]

That information is great and all, but why are you posting it? I can't see the angle you're coming from

[Frank-0-Sport]

Greetings ...

In forums like this one, there are a few people who have been asking questions like "Since Tiger isn't winning anything right now, how much longer can he go on playing the tour as an exempt player?"

These postings are simply a means by which such questions can be answered, and also give people some insight as to how PGA Tour Exemptions work. I don't always have -ALL- the answers, but hopefully I've provided some here.

Thanx-A-Lot and Enjoy, Frank-0-Sport