ATLANTA -- Instead of FedEx, maybe it would be more appropriate if Burger King sponsored the PGA Tour's annual playoffs.
You know their motto: "Have it your way."
As part of the promotion, everyone would determine their own final result, like one of those choose-your-own-adventure books we all read as kids.
Want to reward players who had a strong regular season? Go for it. Prefer to make this a true playoff system, with only the top finishers advancing through each round? You can do that, instead.
Don't get too excited. This would never work logistically; it's simply a tongue-in-cheek idea to counter all the criticisms leveled against the format over the years.
As you'll recall, when the FedEx Cup was implemented in 2007, there was an outcry over the fact that players could skip one round of playoffs and still win the $10 million first-place prize -- which was exactly the case for Tiger Woods that year.
Since then, the points system has been tweaked and re-tweaked, and while it's still possible for a contender to skip one and win, the final four events now hold more statistical weight. As a result, a guy like Charley Hoffman -- who owned exactly two top-10 finishes in the season's opening eight months prior to winning the Deutsche Bank Championship -- can put himself in position to clinch the title.
And you know what? Those criticisms are still being leveled, leaving the PGA Tour with a sense of damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't.
When it comes to this topic, opinions are like 5-irons: Everyone has one, no one is very consistent with it.
Don't get me wrong. I'm not pimping the current structure of the playoffs, which still moves in mysterious ways. For example, Steve Stricker entered at No. 3, only to finish top-10 in each of the first three tourneys ... and drop to fourth on the overall list.
"Whatever point system you come up with, there is always going to be some sort of issue," Stricker said. "I don't know if it's right, I don't know if it's wrong, but I think we're going to take a look at it and see if we can improve it a little bit."
I've always been a proponent of the school of thought that says you can't trash one idea unless you have a better suggestion and quite frankly, I don't have a better suggestion. Stricker's quizzical case and a few others notwithstanding, the current format seems about right.
Ernie Els can enter these four events as the No. 1 seed, then fail to contend in the first three but still cement his place in the field at this week's Tour Championship finale, while Hoffman can propel himself into the thick of the race by winning one of 'em.
All of the points-gathering minutiae, though, underscores a more obviously persistent problem. Throughout its existence, the playoffs have failed to generate the excitement intended when first instituted. Let's face it: The words, "I can't wait to see who wins the FedEx Cup!" aren't proclaimed nearly as frequently as, "Who cares about the FedEx Cup?"
Whether this apathy stems from the antiquated notion of these events as "playoffs" (it's really more of a late-season series) or due to the overlap with football season (funny, the original goal was to end before then), it remains an innovative substitute for the previous schedule, which ended in November and saw the game's top two players eschew the festivities at East Lake Golf Club.
Whatever the case, any continuous panning of the FedEx Cup for its supposedly failing format is unworthy. As Stricker stated, "I don't think you need to understand the points system to really follow it. I mean, I don't understand the NASCAR points system but I still enjoy following it."
Maybe that should be the tagline for the final four tournaments of the PGA Tour's regular season. You don't have to comprehend how it works to enjoy it.
Isn't that the epitome of "Have it your way"?
Jason Sobel is a golf writer for ESPN.com. He can be reached at Jason.Sobel@espn.com.
