Jordan Spieth has offered his thoughts on whether or not the PGA Tour should increase the percentage of the prize purse winners receive.
Winners of PGA Tour events earn 18 per cent of the money put up each week. Jon Rahm took down a bumper $2.7m at the Sentry Tournament of Champions in the first "elevated" event of the tour's brave new era.
There is an awful lot of chatter at the moment in the game about world ranking points and money.
Adam Scott - who claimed LIV players knew what they were sacrificing before leaving - also addressed this topic before the Sony Open in Hawaii.
Scott believes there are issues and it's "time for a change".
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The Australian said one thing the PGA Tour could have done was increase the percentage a winner receives and not the purses.
Reward excellence, he said.
In response to LIV, the PGA Tour announced 13 events were to receive bumper prize purses, averaging $15m. The Players Championship will carry a $25m prize purse.
Scott told the media:
"I mean, potentially you could have weighted the win and not put purses up, you know what I mean? You could give them 40 per cent.
"Leave the purse the same size, but give the winner 40 per cent of the total purse and cut everybody else and look for -- reward excellence in a week."
He added:
"I think what all of this is showing is like the traditional structures that we've had in pro golf, it's probably time for a change, and there has to be different ways to look at it.
"I think with the world rankings they tried to do the right thing and go very objective, just purely based off strength of field, but we're seeing top players don't see the strength of field weighted the same as the numbers do."
Spieth was also asked about Scott's comments.
He said:
"Certainly winning is winning. It is very different. Second and fourth feels pretty similar. Third and sixth feels very similar. Winning feels very different.
"If that percentage were to go up a couple points I wouldn't be opposed to that at all if it aligned with world ranking system, that got adjusted to a strokes-gained system where somehow got aligned in what could be changed going forward on the world ranking, then maybe that would be the best way to do it."
So what about 40 per cent?
"No I don't think," Spieth said before being interrupted. "I just think..."
He continued:
"Yeah, I think there should be as much emphasis on winning as possible, and there is no bigger spread than between first and second.
"But I think that if you start to separate it so much I think it -- I just wonder as we go forward here -- I don't remember ever contending, even my rookie year in an event, and thinking about the difference in the money in first and second ever coming down the stretch.
"So does that add to it for the general, like the fan watching on TV? Maybe. I guess."
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Spieth added:
"But you're still just looking at who wins. You want to know who wins for the privilege of winning, not because of the difference in the paycheck. Until you get to the FedExCup.
"Then that's the bigger play and that's what's selling there. But that's tens of millions of dollars difference.
"I think that when you look, I guess last week [at Sentry] is probably a good way to look at it on how we're looking going forward with elevated events.
"There is a significant difference there in the money, enough to where someone might be thinking about it a little, and certainly the public is looking at it differently than when it was a million and 700 grand or 750 grand to 2.7 to whatever second was."
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