Rory McIlroy sees the Genesis Scottish Open as the “blueprint” for how the PGA Tour should treat its national opens. Then came the warning. Change too much, he said, and these events stop being national opens at all.
This is Rory McIlroy‘s first start since the US Open. Fourteen of the top 20 in the world showed up to join him at The Renaissance Club. The Open follows next week at Royal Birkdale.
The concern is the schedule. From 2028 the PGA Tour splits into two tiers, a Championship series for its leading players and a second-tier Challenger series, with promotion and relegation between them. Win two Challenger events in one season and you go up. Championship players cannot drop into Challenger events, and the reverse holds too.
The Scottish Open would not qualify for Championship status, which means many of the big names teeing it up this week could be shut out in three years.
McIlroy put the Scottish Open’s rise in quality down to the co-sanctioning deal. The PGA and DP World Tours have shared it since 2022. Rank high enough on either tour and you get one of the 156 spots.
“For these strong National Opens, this, to me, is the blueprint of what it can be and what can happen. This is a perfect lead-in to The Open Championship,” McIlroy said.
His warning followed close behind.
“We’ve got to be careful with that because then these national opens lose the fabric of what they are,” McIlroy said. “You can’t call yourself a national open any more if it’s a closed-off tournament and there’s a certain number of guys.”
He drew a hard line between this event and the standard tour stops. “These events need to be treated differently than the Travelers Championship or RBC Heritage or whatever else is going to be in the Championship series.”
Money is the other flashpoint. PGA Tour CEO Brian Rolapp’s approved plan sets Championship fields at around 120 players competing for at least $20m. The Scottish Open, by comparison, plays for £6.7m.
Bob MacIntyre, the best Scottish player in the field, wants an exception carved out for his home Open. He isn’t panicking about it, though.
“I personally think the Scottish Open is going to be totally fine,” MacIntyre said. “I don’t see it being a $20m event. I see it being a Rolex Series/European Tour event. It would be a bit mad to put a $20m event in Scotland given the world we live in today. It’s not the same as America.”
World number one Scottie Scheffler, the reigning Open champion, wants the Scottish Open kept inside the top tier. Plenty of Americans use the week to sharpen their links game before The Open.
“It’s an important one that we keep it in the Championship Series just because you get so many guys that come over here and play the week before [The Open],” Scheffler said.
The 30-year-old admitted the field question is harder to answer. “Golf is so difficult to rank players when they are not playing together all the time,” he said. “Having similar guys playing against each other on great golf courses week in and week out is the best way to set up our schedule. To have this tournament fit into that mould would be really nice.”
For now the debate stays open. So does McIlroy’s week, with The Open at Royal Birkdale seven days away.
