This year marks the end of Monday Qualifiers for many PGA Tour events, and this week’s Waste Management Phoenix Open is one such event that has staged its final last-minute entrance exam.
In total, 91 players teed it up yesterday hoping to earn one of three places in the field, 22 of whom advanced through the eight pre-qualifiers which had a total of 672 entrants.
Although Steven Fisk, Max McGreevy and Will Chandler, who finished first, second and third respectively, all have PGA Tour status of some description and have each played a minimum of two events already in 2025, the potential is always there that it could prove to be a completely life-changing experience for players and three-time major winner Pádraig Harrington is one player who thinks that removing Monday Qualifiers in the future is a travesty.
“This has to be one of the strangest decisions of the PGA Tour when it comes to being in the entertainment business,” he wrote on ‘X’ in response to a tweet by Ryan French, better known as Monday Q Info on the social platform.
“If it was up to me I’d be focusing more on Monday qualifiers. There’s a movie script story nearly every week. I’d give the leading qualifier a tv draw and get a tv crew to follow him for the week. I would do this even more so in the signature events. We could have a “tin cup” story any given week. Could you imagine a struggling pro finishing in the top 10 and winning half a million. Nobody would begrudge that payout.”
This has to be one of the strangest decisions of @pgatour when it comes to being in the entertainment business. If it was up to me I’d be focusing more on Monday qualifiers. There’s a movie script story nearly every week. I’d give the leading qualifier a tv draw and get a tv crew… https://t.co/Og5DI8Rczn
— Padraig Harrington (@padraig_h) February 4, 2025
From 2026 onwards, tournaments will have a maximum of 144 players and four Monday Qualifier places will be allocated for these, with two places up for grabs in the 132-player tournaments.
But in the 120-player fields, which the Waste Management Phoenix Open will be going forward, no qualifying spots will be available.
In 2019, Corey Conners won the Valero Texas Open having played his way in via the Monday Qualifier, and the chances of somebody emulating Conners’ feat will now be greatly reduced.
And as Harrington rightly points out, that’s a shame.
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