It was always going to be a different year in golf with the PGA Tour trying to blow up a model that has been around longer than the sand wedge. So it seems only fitting that 2026 begins with a soggy coincidence.
The Sentry, the PGA Tour’s season opener since 1999, was canceled due to water issues, including a dispute over how water is delivered to Kapalua. On what should have been the first official day of tournament week, Maui was under surveillance Monday.
Go figure.
The PGA Tour season begins next week on a different island and a weaker field amid concerns about the future of the Sony Open, in the final year of its title sponsorship and waiting to see if The Sentry returns to Kapalua.
There are a lot of moving parts and still one central figure – Scottie Scheffler – whose last run at world No. 1 began two weeks before the PGA Tour announced a framework deal with Saudi Arabia-backed LIV Golf. Both seem much longer ago.
Here are the key topics to consider as golf enters another year.
Four days after Rory McIlroy won the Masters to become the sixth career Grand Slam player – and first in 25 years – Scheffler was asked: “Who’s next?”
“Technically, I only won one,” he said of his two Masters titles. “I’ve been playing some really good golf and I’m not even close.”
Now he is. Scheffler won the PGA Championship (by five shots) and the British Open (by four shots) and suddenly looks more equipped to get the final stage than McIlroy did for a decade. His first opportunity came at the U.S. Open at Shinnecock Hills, the only U.S. Open for which Scheffler has not qualified in the past 10 years.
He’s already had a near accident. Scheffler had the lead going into the back nine at The Country Club in 2022, missed a 25-foot putt on the 18th and finished one shot back.
At the Saudi International last November, the discussion was whether Koepka would be part of the LIV Golf League or whether he would look at a schedule of some European Tour events to accompany the four majors.
Now that he’s no longer a part of LIV, the focus is on his path back to the PGA Tour.
In his favor, he let his PGA Tour membership expire when he joined the Saudi-funded league in 2022, and he was not among the LIV players listed in the antitrust lawsuit against the tour.
The PGA Tour bringing him back this season – ahead of the one-year mark since his last LIV appearance – could lead to a divisive precedent among loyalists, even if his return would only benefit the tour.
The European Tour schedule is not attractive in the weeks leading up to three of the majors: South Africa and Asia before the Masters, Turkey and Spain before the PGA Championship, the Dutch Open two weeks before the US Open.
Nelly Korda became the first player since Tiger Woods in 2010 to go from seven wins in one year to none in the next, which is extremely strange considering Korda had no significant injuries or personal drama aside from her engagement at the end of the year.
She finished second by two strokes at the US Women’s Open, which seemed to take away a lot of momentum. Perhaps most alarming was how little chance Korda had of winning after that.
Korda isn’t the first No. 1 women’s golfer to go from unbeatable to sought-after. Lydia Ko experienced such a fate. Yani Tseng and Ariya Jutanugarn practically disappeared a year after being number one.
There appears to be no cause for alarm with the 27-year-old Korda, but his next win will be a big one.
The buzzword when Brian Rolapp started as CEO of PGA Tour Enterprises was “scarcity,” which seemed to indicate a tighter schedule to place greater emphasis on tournaments. And then over the next few months, the tour announced fall stops in Austin, Texas, and Asheville, North Carolina.
Where will all this lead?
The big acronym for the tour’s GH (Global Home) is FCC (Future Competitions Committee), headed by TW (Tiger Woods). And the big question is whether a new model can be defined in time for 2027 or whether there will be a bridge year. It is also worth considering the media rights which, according to the current contract, extend until 2030.
Is the PGA Tour waiting until after the Super Bowl to start? There is also a desire to penetrate larger markets. The U.S. Open (New York), PGA Championship (Philadelphia) and Presidents Cup (Chicago) have combined to give golf a presence in the top five media markets in 2026. Next year, the tour will not have a presence in five of the top 10 markets.
This could shape up to be a breakthrough year for Jordan Spieth, who hasn’t qualified for a U.S. team since the 2018 Ryder Cup. He hasn’t played on the last two teams.
After undergoing surgery on his left wrist in August 2024, Spieth narrowly missed qualifying for the second FedEx Cup playoff event, which would have qualified him for the $20 million marquee events. And then he took the whole fall off with the goal of having his mind and body ready for 2026.
He has another chance to win a career Grand Slam at the PGA Championship outside of Philadelphia (his parents grew up in eastern Pennsylvania).
He has played 50 consecutive major tournaments and has been exempted for 49 of them since the 2013 US Open. He enters 2026 without his place yet assured for the US Open at Shinnecock Hills.
It has become an annual question for the FCC chairman due to injuries and surgeries, particularly after his first year as a professional, in which Woods did not play a single tournament.
Woods turned 50 on Dec. 30, making him eligible for PGA Tour Champions. He can ride a cart on the senior circuit. Woods never liked the idea of driving a cart in a real competition. On the PGA Tour, Woods has not finished within 16 shots of the winner in the 11 tournaments he has played since his February 2021 car crash outside Los Angeles.
The target is April for the Masters, where Woods has never missed the cut as a pro.
At the heart of his 2026: Does he have any interest in becoming Ryder Cup captain for Ireland in 2027?
On The Fringe breaks down the biggest stories in golf throughout the season. AP Golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf
FILE – Tiger Woods bites his club after missing a putt for par on the 18th green during the final round of the Arnold Palmer Invitational golf tournament, March 25, 2013, in Orlando, Fla. (AP Photo/John Raoux, File)
FILE – Brooks Koepka of the United States waves to the crowd on the 5th green during the first round of the British Open golf championship at Royal Portrush Golf Club in Northern Ireland, July 17, 2025. (AP Photo/Peter Morrison, File)
Chris Bassitt remains in the AL East.
The Baltimore Orioles agreed to a one-year, $18.5 million contract with the right-hander on Wednesday, according to a person familiar with the matter. The person spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because the deal was pending a physical. The deal includes a $3 million signing bonus, and Bassitt can earn $500,000 in performance bonuses if he starts at least 27 games.
Bassitt, who turns 37 on Feb. 22, has reached that number of starts in each of the last five seasons.
ESPN was first to report on the contract.
Bassitt went 11-9 with a 3.96 ERA for AL champion Toronto last year. He’s pitched at least 157 1/3 innings in each of the last five seasons, and only once in the last eight seasons has he posted an ERA above 4.00.
Bassitt joins a Baltimore rotation that includes Shane Baz, Trevor Rogers and Zach Eflin. Baz was acquired in a December trade with Tampa Bay and Eflin re-signed with the Orioles on a one-year, $10 million contract.
After two straight years in the playoffs, Baltimore finished last in the AL East with a 75-87 record in 2025. It made a splash in free agency by signing first baseman Pete Alonso to a five-year, $155 million contract in December.
But the Orioles could benefit from an improved rotation after last year’s starters ranked 24th in the major leagues with a 4.65 ERA. Team president Mike Elias said in November that the team was trying to determine “whether it was the ‘top,’ ‘forward,’ or ‘top half’ of the rotation, all those buckets.”
That was after Baltimore traded right-hander Grayson Rodriguez in a deal for outfielder Taylor Ward — and before the Orioles landed Alonso. They have since added Baz and brought back Eflin.
Yet after Ranger Suárez (Boston) and Dylan Cease (Toronto) signed elsewhere in the division, and with Framber Valdez now in Detroit, little seems to have changed in how Baltimore approaches its rotation. The Orioles have not made significant, long-term commitments to their starters, instead adding to the rotation via one-year deals or trades.
Before last season, Baltimore signed Charlie Morton, Tomoyuki Sugano, and Kyle Gibson to one-year contracts, and the overall result from those three was pretty disappointing.
Bassitt comes in with a better recent track record than Gibson, and he’s much younger than Morton. The Orioles can also hope for better health from Kyle Bradish, who made six starts last year, and a full season from Rogers, who went 9-3 with a 1.81 ERA over 18 starts in 2025.
The Orioles hold their first full-squad spring training on Monday.
AP Baseball writer Jay Cohen contributed to this report.
This version has been corrected to show that Rogers had a 1.81 ERA.
AP MLB: https://apnews.com/hub/MLB
FILE – Toronto Blue Jays pitcher Chris Bassitt throws a pitch against the Los Angeles Dodgers during the seventh inning of Game 4 of the World Series of Baseball, Oct. 28, 2025, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Brynn Anderson, file)
