DUBLIN, Ohio — Three weeks out from a consequential vote to remodel the PGA Tour, CEO Brian Rolapp expressed optimism while acknowledging there’s still plenty of work before the proposal passes through the tour policy board.

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What appears clear is that the tour is likely to implement a hard-line two-track system with aggressive promotion and relegation protocols. The core of Rolapp’s plan centers on a Track 1 with 120-130 players competing in roughly 16 $20 million events with 36-hole cuts in addition to The Players Championship and the four major championships. The idea is to remove confusion about pathways, exemptions and which of the tour’s 36 regular-season events players choose to play, so all the best players are together for the same events.

Track 2 would theoretically include players Nos. 121 through whatever agreed-upon number, competing in a different track of 16 or so events with smaller purses as they attempt to earn promotion. A Korn Ferry Tour (the tour’s current development tour, one notch below the PGA Tour) would exist beneath Track 2. Meanwhile, a certain number of Track 1 players would drop to Track 2 at the end of each season.

Rolapp said it’s still being decided whether the proposed plan would include the ability to jump to Track 1 midseason or how much the weeks would overlap. He also didn’t divulge the number of relegation/promotion spots but said it will be “substantial enough to matter.”

“The amount of change and the questions we’re asking ourselves are not easy by design,” Rolapp said Wednesday. “But I think we’re making substantial progress. So, we’ll have a lot more to say about that on the 22nd or 23rd (of June).”

Rolapp outlined much of this plan to players in a Player Advisory Council meeting Tuesday night before the Memorial Tournament. He said another meeting is scheduled for June 9 to focus more on potential playoff proposals, with multiple formats being discussed, such as match play and/or exploring prestigious venues that don’t often host professional events.

The policy board vote is June 22, before the Travelers Championship in Hartford, Conn. Rolapp conceded that many of these changes likely wouldn’t be implemented until the 2028 season.

Rolapp made the fascinating decision to hold a large news conference in March before The Players Championship, declaring a self-imposed — and very public — June deadline, leaving himself vulnerable if his large reforms failed. He said it was in part to create a sense of urgency and transparency to improve the tour’s value, especially ahead of the upcoming media rights negotiations. The deal with CBS, NBC and ESPN ends in 2030.

That June deadline is fast approaching, but Rolapp said many players have come to agree with the direction. He has focused on transparency and communication with players, which Rolapp says is necessary after his predecessor, Jay Monahan, left players in the dark about a surprise framework agreement with the Saudi Public Investment Fund (and in turn LIV) in 2023.

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The other key piece of the puzzle that neither Rolapp nor the PGA Tour can discuss yet is which events would be granted Track 1 status. Surely, the nine current signature events will stay put, but that leaves only six to nine tournament spots for 27 events in the existing PGA Tour model. And although Rolapp doesn’t like phrasing it this way, that means plenty of current tour events and sponsors would essentially be bumped to Track 2.

“I think what we have found as we’ve talked to sponsors both for Track 1 and Track 2 (is) there’s a lot of demand for both,” Rolapp said. “And the price points will be different. The bigger events may not — not everyone can afford and may not be sort of consistent with their business goals. That’s great. There’s other price points too for it, and I think there’s plenty of demand for both Track 1 and Track 2 in that regard because there’s definitely people who want to invest different amounts in these events.”

Then there’s the question of making Track 2 feel like more than just a glorified Korn Ferry Tour.

The Tour believes this is where keeping the tracks primarily closed and transparent will add intrigue. In the current system, it’s difficult to know who will be in any given tournament. Sure, there are only 100 fully exempt cards right now, but there are another 50 with conditional status on top of unpredictable sponsor exemptions and other exemptions for past success. In this model, those might be gone. If the season ended today, players outside 120 (or 130 if that’s what they decide on), such as Luke Clanton, Lucas Glover, Emiliano Grillo, Chris Kirk and Nick Dunlap, would play full-time on Track 2.

“I think you’ll also see we’re leaning back into the meritocracy of the sport,” Rolapp said. “So the consequence of those events, trying to get their way up into Track 1, will be heightened. At the end of the day, sports is about how good the athletes are and what the competitive consequences are. I think you’ll see that in Track 2. And I think you’ll see people fighting to stay on Track 1. And I think we have lost a lot of that with the smaller fields, no-cut events.”

Rolapp was then asked the age-old question of what the tour will do with the $1.5 billion it’s been sitting on from the Strategic Sports Group investment in 2024. The tour has been patient in using it, but Rolapp provided perhaps the most transparent hint yet.

Courses.

“I think what you’ll see is when we get the competitive model right, there will be a lot of uses for that capital,” he said. “Because we’re going to need to do things to get our competitive model right. Whether that’s investing in courses or whether that’s buying courses, there’s a lot that we have in order to effectuate the model we want.”

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