Last month, Gary McCord was cleaning out his Colorado summer home when he stumbled upon something remarkable. An old leather briefcase sat collecting dust in the corner. Inside? A complete binder documenting his 1981 pitch for the All-Exempt Tour. “God damned if I haven’t got the binder with all of the information I had when I pitched the All-Exempt Tour in 1981, everything,” McCord told Golfweek. He spent seven weeks crafting that proposal over four decades ago.

The timing of this discovery feels almost prophetic. The PGA Tour just announced it’s reducing fully exempt cards from 125 to 100 for the 2026 season. And the man who fought to create that 125-card system? He’s completely on board with cutting it.

“It was exactly the right thing to do at this point,” McCord said without hesitation. This marks the first reduction since the All-Exempt Tour launched in 1983. Back then, McCord rallied over 100 players at a Holiday Inn in Tallahassee to support expanding exemptions from just 60 to 125. He pitched it as a grassroots uprising. The vote passed 7-2.

Now, 42 years later, the landscape has undergone a complete transformation. The PGA Tour officially approved these sweeping changes on November 18, 2024. Field sizes will shrink across the board. Most tournaments will feature 120 to 144 players instead of 156. The Players Championship drops from 144 to 120. Seven events will eliminate Monday qualifying entirely. Others will reduce Monday qualifier spots from four to just two.

The Korn Ferry Tour takes a hit, too. Only 20 players will graduate, instead of the original 30. Q-School cards drop from “top five and ties” to exactly five. Meanwhile, bubble players have voiced concerns about how these changes threaten their livelihoods.

McCord Questions PGA Tour’s LIV Response

McCord sees a fundamental difference between then and now. “When I did it, it was not competition,” he explained. In the 1980s, the Tour was struggling for basic financial viability. Players were broke. Travel expenses crushed them. McCord calculated that 76 percent of Tour competitors couldn’t break even after expenses.

Today’s fight is entirely different. LIV Golf arrived in 2022 with Saudi money and guaranteed contracts. Jon Rahm signed for $300 million. Brooks Koepka got $130 million. The threat forced the PGA Tour to create eight signature events with $20 million purses. These showcase concentrated star power, competing with LIV’s 14-event schedule.

But McCord questions the entire strategy. “My question is why do we need to genuflect to LIV? They have absolutely no one watching them on TV,” he said bluntly. The numbers back him up. LIV Golf averaged just 338,000 viewers on Fox in 2025. Meanwhile, PGA Tour Sunday broadcasts averaged 3.1 million viewers. That’s nearly 18 times more eyeballs.

The Tour’s official justification centers on the pace of play. Smaller fields mean faster rounds and Friday cuts. Commissioner Jay Monahan called it a “collaborative effort” to build a “stronger PGA Tour.” Yet players like Lucas Glover aren’t buying it. “And then hiding behind pace of play, I think challenges our intelligence,” Glover told reporters. He believes the real goal is appeasing top players to prevent more LIV defections.

McCord’s evolution from rebel to supporter reveals how drastically professional golf has changed. He fought for opportunity in an era of scarcity. Now he backs restriction in an era of excess. The irony isn’t lost on anyone. Yesterday’s rabbits became today’s mules. The fight for cards continues. But the magic number just dropped by 25.