Finchem Gets Big Raise In '06

Jon Show in the Sports Business Journal manages to get ahold of the latest Form 990 showing PGA Tour salaries for 2006.

Tim Finchem earned $5.2 million in salary and bonuses in 2006 as commissioner of the PGA Tour, an increase of $1 million from the $4.2 million he earned in 2005.

Well, cost of living is going up in Jacksonville...and wherever else he's got a second home.

Show also gets into the PGA Tour "Holdings" racket structure.

Without commenting directly on Finchem’s compensation, Ron Price, CFO of the PGA Tour, said executive compensation tied to PGA Tour Holdings varies depending on responsibilities within the subsidiary. “We look at how individuals actually spend their time during the year and come up with an allocation to Holdings,” he said.

Both entities pay most top executives a salary, annual and long-term incentive bonuses, and benefits payable after retirement. Bonuses are based equally on the performance of the company and individual performance, such as whether an employee met both financial and nonfinancial goals.

Finchem’s $3.9 million income from PGA Tour Inc. consisted of $922,500 in salary and nearly $3 million in incentive bonuses. The organization paid him $3.16 million in 2005 and $3.05 million in 2004.

Another $1.3 million of Finchem’s pay in 2006 was paid by PGA Tour Holdings, including salary, incentive bonuses and deferred compensation. PGA Tour Holdings paid Finchem $1 million in each of the previous two years.

The piece also lists these salaries and benefits and benefits payable after retirement: 

Tim Finchem Commissioner $5,222,240   $38,635  $1,018,016
Charlie Zink EVP, co-COO $1,308,162   $28,869   $189,334
Ed Moorhouse  EVP, co-COO  $1,308,144  $22,266  $202,490
Ron Price EVP, CFO $908,554  $22,686 $55,948
Tom Wade  EVP, CMO  $899,795  $25,284  $25,000
Henry Hughes  EVP, chief of operations  $621,195  $24,018 $23,400
Richard George President, Champions Tour; EVP, champ. mngt. $531,050 $17,501 $11,000
Bill Calfee President, Nationwide Tour $527,098 $20,545 $18,806
Richard Anderson EVP, chief legal officer $508,395 $16,648 $11,000
Bob Combs* SVP, public relations and communications  $372,494 $15,674 $13,053
Ty Votaw**  EVP, communications and international affairs $266,346  $8,470   $11,000

I'm running to catch a plane, but if anyone bored with a calculator would like to tally up that sum, it would be nice to know! 

Comments

[Smitty]

PGA Tour salary total -- $12,473,473
PGA Tour benefits total -- $240,596
PGA Tour benefits payable after retirement total -- $1,579,047

I need to get a job there! Proof positive that illegals take jobs Americans don't want!

[JSS]

I watched an interview with Jim Furyk yesterday and he raved over the job Finchem has done for the PGA tour.

[Mike B.]

Unfortunately, only the Top 5 on the list made enough to retain their Executive Bathroom Key ...

[Grassy Knowl]

Saddam's (deck of cards) lieutenants raved about him too!

Could we forget what a great guy Ken Lay was? President H.W. attended his funeral. "Your doing a great job Brownie, great job".....W

[Chuck]

So Tim Finchem was thrid on the 2007 Money List! Behind Woods, just behind Mickelson, and well ahead of Vijay. That means he didn't have to worry about keeping his card for 2008...

[JackM]

Timmy found a way to get Fedex to pump $35M into tax free accounts for, well, I don't know exactly why Fedex is paying $35M into tax free accounts. They just do it.

If I was a Tour player, I'd say Timmy is underpaid.

Stevie W probably made more than $1M for carrying Tiger's bag and being his workout buddy.

[Sir Real]

You can be sure Steve worked a hell of a lot harder for his money than Tiny Tim worked for his. How many does he have on his support staff? Finchem's pay is obscene...in the Top 5 in money...without taking a swing!

[JackM]

Geoff, how did you attract this band of socialists, class-warriors and eco-nutbags to your website. We are talking about golf here folks. Fer crissakes. people, other than goofy, small activities like yachting and polo, golf is the most exclusionary, elitist and richest sport there is. The core of the game is made up of the 6 or 7 or 8 (max) million hard core golfers, and almost all of those play at expensive private clubs and swan off to expensive resorts. It must be tough to follow golf and hate the rich at the same time.

Yes, I guess there are vestiges of muni golf, but it doesn;t count. Hell, SF wants to plow up their public "treasures". Most of the smart communities have sold or leased their courses to American Golf anyway.

Guys, can we not act shocked when people in golf pay themselves lots of money?

Besides if Tiger didn't want Timmy to get a raise, Timmy would not have gotten a raise.

I'm pretty sure Tom Wade could make lots more money at P&G. And any of those lawyers would make lots more money in private practice.

And. no, I am not "sure Steve worked a hell of a lot harder for his money than Tiny Tim worked for his." Steve lugged a bag 20 weeks last year. He did not work harder, nor did he create more value than Timmy.

[NRH]

Agreed Jack, but the sniping has more to do with their non-profit status and the poverty-stricken rank and file Tour players. As for Finchem earning his keep, it seems to be in line with other pro sports commish salaries mentioned in the article considering overall league revenues.

2007 total geoffshackelford.com ad revenue: $0

[Mike B]

Yes, the Commish may be paid on par (pun intended) with other pro sports but in those sports, the Commissioner is not #3 on the money list.

[GK]

What else was in that 990, I tried to pull it up on Guidestar and it was unavailable. I was wondering if it covers Finchem's perks, like cab fare and shoe shines.

[Smitty]

Uh, Mike B., the facility in question that you are referring to is actually known in these rarified quarters as the "Executive Washroom," not by the vulgar and scatological term that you depicted--we must not impune the character of these highly respected individuals of the golf community, nor anyone in today's corporate elite.

[ReverendTMac]

Smitty's right. Just 'cause it's attached to a hunk of 2x4 doesn't make it the shitter key...

[JackM]

Mike B.

Tiger makes more than $100M. Phil makes $50M. Veeg makes $45M. Furyk makes $15-20M. I bet Bubba Watson and Boo Weekly report more income than Timmy. All that off-the-course money is a direct result of the exposure PGA members get from playing on Timmy's tour.

Other than your indoctrination by marxist professors, why do any of you care - I mean - why are you foaming at the mouth outraged about how much money Timmy makes. Envy is an ugly sin, guys.

I could make the case that our viewing experience would be much better if purses were reduced to a tenth of their current levels. Low purses would require everyone to play hard so they don't have to sell insurance on the side. Talk about an incentive to improve shotmaking!

[Eric Stratton]

I think the issue is that the PGA Tour is a non-profit organization.

It appears that Finchem's pay package isn't totally without precedent in the non-profit space but the size is it is highly unusual.

See this link: http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=content.view&cpid=630

ES

[R. Thompson]

Eric Stratton-

What exactly is PGA Tour Holdings, and should it be called Tim Finchem ministries?

A non-profit owning a for-profit sends up a red flag. I'm no expert but its interesting that the PGA Tour divulges income earned from both the non and for-profit side of operations. Is there a form 990 filing on the Tour's for-profit? Finchem's pay being divided between the for-profit and non-profit, and a significant portion coming to him from the for-profit doesn't beg the question of what is Tim doing, but instead what the for-profit is actually doing? You know like what is its purpose, what's its mission. Who controls it, who is responsible for its oversite, are players within the non-profit included and represented in its existance, is there a seperate Board of Directors apart from the non-profit and whomight serve on such a board, are players represented on such a board.

Anywho, Finchem's pay package is surely one for the record books Eric, is he worth all that? Hard to say with half the business probably obscured within a for-profit.

[Trotsky's Icepick]

Aside from JackM auditioning to replace Rush Limbaugh when the latter finally self-destructs, the interesting thing here is at the bottom of the list.

Ty Votaw made less salary, bonus and retirement bonus than Bob Combs... WHO REPORTS TO VOTAW.

Color me confused here.

[Eric Stratton]

I don't know the details of the not-for-profit vs. the for-profit but imagine it's only a matter of time before Finchem's pay starts to attract scrutiny from regulators/tax authorities.

There are still PGA Tour events that are for-profit, not many, but a handful are grandfathered in. I'm positive Bay Hill is one, fairly certain The Memorial is another, Kingsmill used to be, and there were 2 or 3 others as well.

Stay tuned...

ES

[R.B.]

Mike B. makes a great point, those other Commissioners are not third on the money list. That got me thinking about Nationwide Tour President Bill Calfee's salary. Bill's take home is greater than the Nationwide Tour's leading money winner. The title of President might be an understatement, at least financially he appears to be the King of the Nationwide Tour.

For a non-profit the PGA Tour brass does exceptionally well. Or, isolated, insulated and entrenched is a better way of defining the Tour's (GRAFT) governance.

[JackM]

"Color me confused here." No crap, Toothpick.

Ty joined the tour during the year and this a partial years pay.

So, you guys have carefully calibrated how much money people should make working at a nonprofit? Well,
put down Das Kapital for second.

If you pay less money, you get lousier administrators.

Sure, you say, "that's the point we must cap their pay!!!"

Well, the Tour players benefit from smart guys increasing their purses and exposure and the charities benefit from better-supported tournaments. Everyone makes less money with dumber administrators. Sorta like public schools.

Who cares if some tournaments are for-profit? Is "for-profit a swear word?

And Toothpick, Why oh why do you care how much money other people make? I am quite sure that Timmy does not care how much money you make. He does not care about your opinion of his salary, you are not a member of Tim's constituancy. He cares about Tiger.

[JackM]

Was it Stalin or Lenin that wrote "you get what you pay for". And then stole everything anyway.

[JC]

JackM, it wasn't Stalin or Lenin, it was Finchem in a players meeting explaining how the new FedUp Cup was going to be installed (pun intended). When he asked for pac board input he flushed that down the toilet and proceeded to do it the Finchem way, on his own. Hence the reference to "Executive Bathroom". If he's so smart (or just clever) how does his salary keep going up and tv ratings going down? Maybe it's you that is not so smart?

[JackM]

JC: Not sure I follow your potty "humor" about Timmy explaining how there would be another $35M per year in the players tax free accounts. I'm sure the bathroom stuff cracks you up. My son loved it too, when he was 7.

While Timmy ostensibly works for the players, the Tour is not a democracy. They have a governence structure and Timmy has lots of power. Deal with it.

"how does his salary keep going up and tv ratings going down?" Well, let's see, the ratings may be a problem for the networks but they are not really Timmy's problem (in the short and medium term anyway). Purses seem to be rising smartly and lots of Euros and Aussies are trying like hell to play our tour.

Didn't we just see lots of articles saying Tour players have way too much money to bother accepting a free private plane ride to Hawaii to play a no-cut event at a lavish resort. Timmy is providing a platform (MBA-speak) for his members to make a fortune. I see Tiger is up to $112M per year.

Did I mention $35M?

Please remember what Timmy's job is and who he works for.

And again, WHY DO YOU CARE HOW MUCH HE MAKES?

[Eric Stratton]

JackM,

1. as a "not-for-profit" entity the Tour is tax-exempt for the most part...that's why the "for-profit" or "not-for-profit" is an important distinction. Addditionally, PGA tournaments are "sold" collectively under the guise of a "charity" angle and if the tourney isn't actually delivering on this it should be known.

Hpothetically speaking, if a tourney cleared $1,000,000+ on profits and gave $60,000 to charity...what would you think?

2. the NYSE had "not-for-profit" status and such status brings with it certain limitations on compensation of key executives. This is a snippet from the NYAG's release announcing lawsuit against Dick Grasso who was CEO of the NYSE.

--"The compensation provided to Grasso was not "reasonable" according to state law.
New York Not-for-Profit Law requires that compensation for executives be "reasonable" and "commensurate with services provided." In this case, however, the compensation far exceeded what would have been permitted by that standard."--

These are some of the reasons why we care...

ES

[R. Thompson]

Rush Limbaugh, er... eh JackM-

Love the numbers you toss around, do you work for PGA Tour?

Wanted to let you in on something factual, FedEx is not putting up $35 million a year, they only kick in $8 million. The other $32 million making up the $40 million FedEx Cup is set aside by PGA Tour Inc.

There is nothing wrong with making a mistake, people do it all the time.