Troy Merritt out lasted Rickie Fowler and Aaron Baddeley in a one-hole playoff to win the Kodak Challenge and the $1 million prize that goes along with it. The million dollars is probably nice to have in the bank, but I wonder if he is happier he was able to keep his PGA Tour card for 2011? Merritt finished as the last player inside the cut line in order to retain his tour card, which ended up being a total of $786,977 in earnings this year.
The Kodak Challenge is a season-long competition which designates 30 holes throughout the PGA Tour schedule and the player with the lowest cumulative score on 18 holes wins the $1 million. I personally think the competition is interesting. The players seem to like it and you really don’t hear much complaining about it in the media. The million dollars is a nice prize and Kodak gets good exposure.
I think the PGA Tour should do more things like this during the year. They are struggling to keep sponsors and I think corporations will sign up for the kind of exposure Kodak gets during the year. It’s less of an investment compared to a title sponsor of a tournament. Maybe other things will be included in the future.
But congrats to Troy Merritt for taking home the cash and more importantly, keeping his tour card for 2011.
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