PGA Tour preparing these four solutions to curb slow play creating angst among fans

The PGA Tour on Wednesday acknowledged that it has heard complains from fans regarding slow play in its tournaments during a conversation with a small group of media members at the 2025 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am. The Tour said it has a number of solutions at the ready that, when deployed, should help address the issue.

Leaning on a fan-forward survey that the league sent out last year, the PGA Tour will begin testing rules adjustments to not only improve pace of play but the overall broadcast and viewing experience.

Four solutions were laid out by the PGA Tour.

• Distance-measuring devices: The adoption of rangefinders is nothing new in men’s professional golf as players are currently allowed to use them at the PGA Championship. The PGA of America first put this in place in 2021 as a way to improve pace of play, and the PGA Tour may not be far behind.
• Increased use of video review center: Rules questions often back up play and force groups off schedule. More efficient usage of the video review center should curb some of those delays and get get play restarted faster.
• Public embarrassment: Well, not exactly, but the PGA Tour plans to publicize a list of the worst slow-play offenders based on “average stroke time” data. 
• Accountability: By disclosing fines and penalties assessed to golfers who violate play-time rules, the PGA Tour aims to show fans that it is not letting players get away with slow play.

“I think, from my understanding, is the Tour is trying to do a lot of polling to the fans and also a lot of conversations with networks,” Jordan Spieth said. “Obviously linear television’s changed from the last time a deal was done to the next time anything can happen. Trying to figure out what’s the best product that we can put forward, whether it’s on the course here or it’s through other — different things like TGL and how do you reach a different audience. 

“Some people who love this product may not take into watching TGL. I’ve talked to others who love TGL that may not tune in on Saturdays and Sundays to a PGA Tour round. I think just broadening that to kind of bridge the gap and invite some new fans in.”

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Patrick McDonald

This past fall, the PGA Tour chose to adopt sweeping changes to its membership structure including the downsizing of tournament fields. One of the aims of this decision was to alleviate the pace-of-play problem on the PGA Tour, but through three full-field tournaments, it has had little to no effect.

The last group at The American Express took approximately 5 hours and 40 minutes to complete the final round at the Stadium Course at PGA West. This past week, pace of play did not get much better as players had to deal with the difficulty of Torrey Pines at the Farmers Insurance Open. The final threesome played the front nine in just under 3 hours and completed the round in 5 hours and 30 minutes.

“I think we’re starting to need a new word to talk about this pace-of-play issue, and it’s ‘respect’ — for your fellow competitors, for the fans, for broadcasts, for all of it,” CBS’s Dottie Pepper said following the group. “It’s just got to get better.”