Caddies sue PGA Tour in quest to share in bib money at every event.

Turn on any PGA Tour event, or really any professional golf tournament for that matter, and you will see the player & his caddy looking at a yardage book discussing the players next shot… and that caddy is wearing a bib.  Its a staple of the caddy’s uniform.  That uniform will also have a title sponser on that bib.  Yes the sponsor paid a ton of money to be on that bib, and the caddy who is sporting it, didn’t get any of that money. The question is should they get some of that money?

My feeling is no.  The player pays the caddy.  The player plays in a tournament to win prize money.  That prize money is given to the PGA Tour from the title sponsor.  FedEx puts up the Million’s of dollars in playoff money, should we ask them for more money to cover the bibs?  If the sponsors have to give more money to cover the caddy they might not do it, or worse the prize money goes down so each caddy can get x amount of dollars.  What would happen if your player didn’t make the cut, but the caddy for that player made $5,000 for waring the bib?  If you were a tour player would you let that fly?

Maybe the prize pool changes a little where a percentage of the money won by each player is given directly to the caddy? That seems like a good idea, except the players would be pissed.  And it is the players who hire the caddy.  Lets pretend that the players are cool with it, and the sponsor is cool with giving a portion of the money to the caddy, wouldn’t the players then pay them less?  Its not like the players are going to make less and give more to the caddy.

Honestly, the only thing that the caddies can do is strike, but in my opinion if the caddies strike, the players are just going to find anyone off the street to carry the bag.  Either way this is a lose lose situation for the players, and does nothing but hurt the game of golf.

Bottom line, the caddy is a part of the game, but it is not the right of the caddy to demand more money from the sponsors or the PGA Tour when they should really be asking more money from their boss…the players.