ST. SIMONS ISLAND, Ga. (AP) \u2014 Sunday at Sea Island was supposed to be looked upon as doomsday for so many PGA Tour players who left the final event of the PGA Tour season without a full card.<\/p>\n
This was the year the\u00a0tour eliminated 25 cards, lowering the bar to No. 100 in the FedEx Cup standings<\/a>\u00a0to retain full status for 2026. The developmental Korn Ferry Tour offered only 20 cards to the big leagues, down from 30 cards the previous year. The fields will be smaller next year.<\/p>\n It just didn\u2019t feel like the end, perhaps because the next chapter remains so uncertain.<\/p>\n Lee Hodges had a 10-foot birdie putt he missed on the final hole that would have moved him into the top 100. Ricky Castillo thought he got it done with a closing 62, only for Max McGreevy to make a 30-footer birdie putt on the last hole that knocked him out.<\/p>\n Both are likely to be in Honolulu for the Sony Open on Jan. 15 for the start of a new season.<\/p>\n Has anything really changed? Not yet.<\/p>\n There might not be as much opportunity, but there are tee times. And that\u2019s all anyone can ask in a game where success is still tied to a score.<\/p>\n PGA Tour officials have been crunching numbers and their best estimate is the leading 10 players who missed out on the top 100 will have access next year to about 16 of the tournaments. That doesn\u2019t include the eight $20 million signature events, the four majors, the three FedEx Cup playoff events and The Players Championship.<\/p>\n A few of them can still play their way into the big stuff. Otherwise, they might feel like they\u2019re playing on a different tour.<\/p>\n Perhaps that was the idea all along.<\/p>\n \u201cI know it\u2019s going to get tougher and tougher, and the goal posts are moving a little bit,\u201d Harris English said last week. \u201cI know it\u2019s going to get harder for me. I\u2019m 36 years old. I\u2019m not getting any younger. But we\u2019ll see where it goes. Everybody is in for the good of the PGA Tour and to make our product the best it can be.<\/p>\n What that product looks like remains to be seen.<\/p>\n English shared what amounted to water cooler conversation when he said \u201cthe talk of the tour\u201d was perhaps waiting until the Super Bowl was over to start the season. That sounds like one of the options the Future Competition Committee chaired by Tiger Woods is contemplating.<\/p>\n English usually doesn\u2019t make headlines unless\u00a0his caddie can\u2019t get into the U.K.<\/a>\u00a0or\u00a0his name is slipped into the Ryder Cup envelope<\/a>\u00a0that keeps him from playing singles.<\/p>\n \u201cJust speculation,\u201d he said with a shrug before teeing off Sunday.<\/p>\n Such a move is plausible considering how often Brian Rolapp, the new CEO of PGA Tour Enterprises, talks about \u201cscarcity\u201d in a bid to make the golf season worth watching from start to finish.<\/p>\n