Golf/Colin Byrne Caddie's Role: Let's pretend you are the sponsor of a big professional golf event. You are trying to decide how best to spend the tournament budget to make your event as successful as it can be.

With over 45 events on the US PGA Tour schedule, it's not easy to make yours a special occasion.

It used to be a $5 million purse would guarantee a strong field. But that is small change these days, so the purse is no longer a recipe for success. The date your event falls on is vital. For example, traditionally the week after a major is guaranteed not to attract the top players, because they try to prime themselves to peak the week of the major.

In so far as many people feel that, up until this year, having the Irish Open the week after the British was a great date, the opposite was true.

With the success of the major tours, random dates don't work any more. The problem for most players is trying to select where not to play.

So let's say you sponsor the Irish Open, and say it was held the week after the British. What would you do to attract a better class of player? You would offer him large sums of money to appear. This, unfortunately, is the only option left to increase the profile of your event.

Two weeks ago at the Doral in Miami was a classic example of how to boost a flagging date. Last year there was whining in Miami about how weak the field was, because it was the first event on the Florida Swing. How did the sponsors boost their event? They lured the best players to Miami the old fashioned way: with a big cheque. Who could blame them?

We do live in a capitalist system, nowhere more so than the game of golf. If you don't perform you don't earn, unless your past performances suggest your mere presence will guarantee success. The classic duel between Woods and Mickelson a few weeks back gave Ford more airtime than they ever got in Doral in times past.

It was obvious the top players had been lured to South Florida, and who could possibly argue against this happening? To tie a sponsor's hand while supporting a huge event would not be fair.

Only the authorities, the guardians of the game, can regulate how far commerce can go before it interferes too much with the integrity of the game.

In most walks of life everyone is constantly being pushed closer to the edge in order to remain competitive. Golf tournaments are no different. It is up to the authorities to set the standard for the compromise between commercial success and the integrity of the old game.

There were arguments that the US Open last year at Shinnecock Hills was verging on crazy golf. There may be some truth to this, as it appeared that the guardians of the game felt they needed to show these millionaire golfers just who is in control when it comes to their national open.

What did it do for the game of golf? Did it provide a worthy winner and provide the global golfing audience with four days they will remember?

Likewise with appearance fees. Tour authorities should carefully consider just how damaging or beneficial the financial enticement to players is for the future of the tour and the game; the destiny of golf is largely in their hands.

Golf seems to have become a game of length, not only in hitting terms: the cheques written out to golfers are getting equally as long.

I am not complaining. But we must be vigilant to ensure that money does not become the only gauge of success in golf.

Perhaps it's time for the enthusiast, the fan, to look at the bigger picture in the professional game. There are over 100 talented golfers playing every week on the US Tour. They have all earned their positions. The perceived stars cannot play every week, so there are going to be weeks that are relatively superstar-free. The more successful you are the more choosy you can afford to be.

So instead of the fan only supporting the big four in Tiger, Vijay, Ernie and Phil, it's time to look beyond the star-struck facade and recognise the depth of talent among the rest of the field. Most of them hit the ball out of sight off the tee, hit plenty of greens and hole loads of putts. As the tour slogan used to be, "These guys are good". That means all of them.

How many movies with unknown actors have surprised us with their dramatic and entertainment value when we actually move away from the publicity drives that lure us towards the blockbusters and into something less mainstream? The same goes for a golf event. I don't know what kind of field the Irish Open has attracted this year. But anyone who can should go there and enjoy the golfing ability of the field, the quality of the course and the beauty of Carton House's grounds, and not solely the fame of the players.

Honda did not appear to adopt an open-chequebook attitude at their event in Palm Beach Gardens in Southern Florida last week compared to Ford the previous week. But they got two of the world's highest-ranked players in Vijay Singh and Padraig Harrington playing off for the title. Not quite the showdown that Ford produced the previous week, but I am sure it was a lot cheaper.

So what will they do next year? Probably make it more attractive to the star billings by doing what most capitalists do: reduce their risk as much as good information and money will allow.

By most standards the Honda was a resounding success, but if the Ford figures fare better than Honda's in the apres tournament tally then who could blame the sponsors for reeling in the stars next year? After all, it's the authorities who ultimately decide what happens on their tour; the rest just play by the rules.