Columnist Peter Benton: Dimes turn into dollars in pro game’s purses

Peter Benton

Wednesday, May 12, 2004 | 9:09 a.m.

Peter Benton's golf column appears Wednesday.

In 1968, Billy Casper won six PGA tournaments -- the Los Angeles Open, the Greater Greensboro Open, the Colonial National Invitational "500," the Festival Open Invitation, the Greater Hartford Open and the Lucky Invitational Open -- becoming the first professional golfer to earn more than $200,000 in a season.

Twenty years later, Curtis Strange broke $1 million when he pocketed $1,147,644 after winning four events: the Independent Insurance Agent Open, the Memorial, the U.S. Open and the Nabisco Championship.

Tiger Woods broke the $2 million mark in 1997, amassing $2,066,833 by capturing the Mercedes Championship, the Masters, the GTE Byron Nelson Classic and the Motorola Western Open.

In 2000, Woods accumulated a record $9,188,321 -- mind you, he won nine tournaments.

Last year's leading money winner was Vijay Singh, who amassed $7,573,907. The question now is just how much will the 2004 money leader earn as the purse on the PGA tour totals a record $240 million -- triple that of 1997, which was then a record $80,555,000.

The current $240 million (compared with what now seems a paltry $56,416,080 just 10 years ago) will rise even higher when the tour announces the purse increases for the remainder of this year's majors.

I think it is wonderful that the "World Tour," which was created through the formation of the International Federation of PGA tours, has its four WGC events again scheduled for this year. These tournaments are for the top 64 ranked players worldwide.

However, the downside is that the "fat cats" are going to get a lot fatter.

That's fair enough, I suppose, because they also must be considered the better players. But those top 64 in the world rankings are also the only ones eligible for the World Golf Championship tournaments -- with $1 million-plus of the $5 million purse going to the winner.

Add in the Tour Championship, where the top 30 money winners on the PGA tour's money standings will compete for a purse increased by more than $1 million, plus factor in the Players Championship, a full field event offering more than a $5 million purse, and one can readily see that those already making the big bucks are going to make a lot more.

Think about it: There's an extra $20 million-plus that wasn't there a few years ago.

It appears obvious that those below the top 64 mark (or the great majority of them anyway) will have little chance of improving their lot, let alone joining the top moneymakers.

The bottom line is nobody begrudges the top players for making their money. They earn it. Something, however, should be worked out to make things more equitable for those rank-and-file professionals.