Justin Thomas: “I’m not out here for a popularity contest”

Justin Thomas has said that he won’t be “paying any attention” to the PGA Tour’s newly-introduced Player Impact Program but admits he does support the scheme.

It was revealed last week that the PGA Tour has launched a $40million bonus cash pool that will reward the game’s top players for driving fan and sponsor engagement.

Thomas, 27, due to his standing in the game, would most likely be one of the top players to take a cut of the ringfenced cash come the end of the season.

That said, the 14-time PGA Tour winner won’t let his head be turned by the lure of the program’s extra cash.

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“I’m not going to pay any attention to it,” said Thomas. “It would be great to be the most popular, if you will, but I’m not out here for a popularity contest, I’m out here to win golf tournaments and win as many as I possibly can. 

“I’m not going to do anything differently. I’m already pretty active on social media. I’m already pretty active in trying to help out media outlets or other organizations, charities, whatever it is, whether it’s internally or known.

“I’m just trying to play good golf, and the rest will take care of itself.”

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Despite his indifference towards the scheme, that will see the player who leads the standings at the end of the year receive an eye-watering $8million, Thomas admits that it’s good to see deserving players receive recognition.

“It’s a cool deal, it’s fascinating, and obviously a lot of people have a lot of different opinions and thoughts on it,” added Thomas. “I mean, guys like Tiger and Phil that have pushed the game and got the purses where they are, got the game of golf where they are, they deserve to be on that list. Anybody that thinks otherwise, I just highly disagree with it.”

Justin Rose also spoke about the new scheme launched by the PGA Tour last week and has given it his full support.

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“I think you want to incentivize the top players to create content,” said Rose. “It’s very easy for the top players to say no because it doesn’t serve them. 

“So, if it serves the fan and if it serves the game of golf, and it gives the guys a much better reason to say yes to something, then it’s probably a good thing for everybody. Hopefully, that’s the way it’s intended.”