PGA Tour Fall Season Events Have Change in the Air: Big Guns Arrive

Can you smell it in the air? Opportunity for victory. Another notch in the belt. Another big check in the bank.  

Typically, this is not the time of year for the top players to show up. But last season, little-known Jimmy Walker won the debut tournament of the first-ever, wraparound season at the Frys.com Open, and he became a top player.

His results for the subsequent 12 months and the FedEx Cup points he earned—probably a combination of the two—got the attention of other prominent Tour players. So, it appears that several names everyone knows decided the fall is a good time to play after all.

While it is typically not the time of year to spot those at the apex of the world rankings, Walker was joined last week by Hunter Mahan, Matt Kuchar, Lee Westwood, Brandt Snedeker and Hideki Matsuyama. Others on the pairing sheets were veterans and past winners (some of them major winners) Vijay Singh, Davis Love III, Justin Leonard, Stuart Appleby, Mike Weir and Retief Goosen.

While Lee Westwood probably likes a good glass of wine as much as the next guy, it's unlikely he'd fly to Napa just because a golf tournament is being played in the middle of vineyards. It had to be the points and a chance for another victory in the U.S.

The known names are secure in their PGA Tour status. Typically a lesser-known candidate wins in the fall. But if more of the big guns start to play, it can change the landscape.

Last week, the winner was typical: Sang-Moon Bae. He prefers to be called Moon Bae, which always provokes a connection to Half Moon Bay, a famous golf course over looking the Pacific just south and west of San Francisco.

Bae is now the third Korean PGA Tour winner with more than one victory. He joins K.J. Choi, who has eight, and Y.E. Yang, who notched two—most famously in 2009 when he defeated Tiger Woods at the PGA Championship. But he's not in their category just yet.  

This week, it's Vegas, baby, where any dream can come true. Just ask Tiger Woods, who collected his first victory at this tournament.

Woods, was not lesser-known at the time, but professionally, he had not won and did not have his Tour card. He collected his third U.S. Amateur a few weeks earlier and then dropped out of college to turn pro.

His victory at TPC Summerlin, at the time, was the key to getting status on the PGA Tour. It was a guaranteed two-year exemption and meant he did not have to go to Tour Q-School. While it sounds ridiculous 14 majors later, that was actually a concern in the fall of 1996.

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The previous fall, Jim Furyk captured his first win in Las Vegas. At the time, he was finishing his first full season on the PGA Tour after playing on the Hogan Tour. Like those before him, he was taking advantage of the year-end opportunity when few of the big names played.

Both Furyk and Woods will have to live forever with winners' photos featuring the showgirls in their three-foot hats. But getting a guaranteed place to play for two years made the smiles sincere.

Those days of having Vegas or Frys.com as a first victory may be in the rearview mirror.  

This week, once again, some big names and veterans are dropping by to see if they can scare the rookies and non-winners.

The field includes former U.S. Open champs Webb Simpson, Lucas Glover and Retief Goosen; FedEx Cup champ and new dad, Billy Horschel; multiple major champs, Padraig Harrington and Vijay Singh; former British Open champ, Stewart Cink; former PGA Champ, David Toms; Jimmy Walker and Brandt Snedeker.

However, standing out there on the range warming up, putting on SPF 70 sunscreen, are Web.com Tour grads and players who do not have big resumes. Each one is hoping to hit the golf jackpot this week.

Kathy Bissell is a Golf Writer for Bleacher Report. Unless otherwise noted, all quotes were obtained first-hand or from official interview materials from the USGA, PGA Tour, R&A or PGA of America.