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I have to be honest about this year's Zurich Classic. When it was announced last year that the 2017 version would be a team event, I thought it might be a little bit hokey. It felt a little Shark Shootout-ish. Leave the team play for the Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup, I thought. Heck, put it in the Olympics before you put it on the PGA Tour. 

I was wrong. 

Despite getting some lesser names duking it out on a Monday morning in New Orleans, the first official team event on the PGA Tour since four years before I was born (1981) was an undisputed success. Heck, it was already a home run before the first ball was in the air Thursday as seven of the world's top 10 players showed up after years of the event sitting on the lower rungs of PGA Tour events.

One colleague noted to me that the field in this week's Wells Fargo Championship is far less robust. "Who would have ever though New Orleans would swipe star power from the Wells Fargo?" he asked.

The organizers of the Zurich Classic were wise to mix it up with two rounds of alternate shot and two rounds of best ball over the four days. This kept the scores reasonable (nobody needs to watch 47 under win a golf tournament) but made it entertaining at the end as golfers tried to pull off 60s and lower to hoist the trophy.

But it was more than the way the final round played out or the fact that Kevin Kisner chipped in from 95 feet to dramatically get himself and playing partner Scott Brown into a playoff. The entire tournament felt like something other than a methodical stroke-play PGA Tour event. Like it wasn't even a part of the PGA Tour at all.

Jordan Spieth warned this would happen before the week started.

"You're going to see personalities come out," Spieth said. "Like [playing partner] Ryan [Palmer] was saying, a lot of friends. And that's going to be enticing, too, to almost kind of feel like it's a little bit of a break. You can be competitive with your friend, but it's kind of a little bit of a break from what we normally feel in a Tour event."

There was a joviality there that is often absent from tour life. Part of that to me is that tour life can be little more than an exercise in naval gazing much of the time. Pros are so inward focused, because you have to be to survive, that it can create a surliness and selfishness that team sports don't, by their nature, create.

This is not to say that all PGA Tour players are self-serving and angry, but it seems to be a foundational principal of life that teamwork and community fosters energy and joy in ways solitude cannot. This is why we love the Ryder Cup, yes?

Players loved this week, too. Even those who missed the cut.

"I think the format is a unique format," said Jason Day, who partnered with Rickie Fowler and missed playing the weekend. "Missing the cut is not what we wanted, but walking away from this, I think they're heading in the right direction with regards to a different format that adds more flavor to the PGA Tour. You know what, it's a unique situation for us to be able to team up, and I thoroughly enjoyed my two days that I got to spend with Rickie. Hopefully I'll be back for many more and have a good shot at winning."

There is an opportunity to further tweak the event, too. CBS Sports broadcaster Ian Baker-Finch suggested that Saturday's alternate shot round could be a sort of customized version of alternate shot where both golfers get to tee off so fans can watch their favorite pros but you can only play one of the shots from that point forward. The permutations for this event are innumerable.

So are the possibilities. 

What if the Zurich Classic grows from being a cellar dweller in terms of popularity into one of the best events on the schedule? What if Rory McIlroy and Dustin Johnson show up together next year? What if Jon Rahm and Sergio Garcia team up? What if, gasp, Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson play together? 

I agree with Jason Sobel that not every event should go the way of the Zurich Classic -- although I'm frothing at the mouth over the idea of a 7-club event, as Tiger recently suggested -- but I commend the PGA Tour on its willingness to explore new ideas. For a sport that has often been accused of being behind the times (and rightfully so!) this is a step in the right direction.

I just hope they make several more of them.