The Buy.com Tour is a step below the PGA Tour, but the players do not consider it minor league. Asked the difference between the tours, Tim Benton put his thumb and forefinger together.
“There’s a fine, fine line separating them,” said Benton, director of tournament business development and sponsor relations for the PGA Tour.
Playing up the quality of the field will be a continuing theme of the new LaSalle Bank Open, which will be Aug. 5-11 at Kemper Lakes in Long Grove. Formerly known as the Chicago Open, the tournament was announced Tuesday as an event on the 2002 Buy.com Tour.
The Buy.com, known in previous incarnations as the Hogan Tour and the Nike Tour, has been the breeding ground for top pros such as David Duval, Tom Lehman, John Daly and David Toms. Since 1991, players who once competed on the circuit have won 104 PGA Tour events.
The tour is betting that Chicago-area fans will want to see the next crop of new young players. This is the largest market Buy.com has entered.
“It’s a big step for us,” Benton said. “The growth of this tour is leading us to bigger markets.”
It also is a step up for the Chicago District Golf Association, which revived the Chicago Open in 1999. The tournament will have a $425,000 purse and will be televised by the Golf Channel.
“This is the continued evolution of the event,” said CDGA Executive Director Robert Markionni.
“We’re moving it up.”
The tournament will have a one-year stay at Kemper Lakes. It will move the next two years to the Glen Club in Glenview, coming the week before the U.S. Open.
