Now he has three.

With a bogey-free four-under-par 68 at Albany, the mighty Texan posted a three-stroke victory in the 20-man unofficial event hosted by Tiger Woods.

The win comes after runner-up finishes to Viktor Hovland the last two years here. Beginning the day with a three-stroke lead over Matt Fitzpatrick, Scheffler cruised home in 20-under 268, three ahead of Sepp Straka, who tried to make it interesting with a closing 64 but simply started too far adrift. Justin Thomas, vying to remain in the top 30 in the world to qualify for early season signature events on the PGA Tour, was another stroke back after a 67.

“I’m very proud of how I played today,” a scruffy-faced Scheffler said. “Ted [Scott, his caddie] and I did a good job out there staying patient, kept the ball in play, gave myself a lot of looks. I didn’t feel like I gave the rest of the field much of, I don’t know if much of a chance is the right word, but I didn’t make any bogeys, so there wasn’t a ton of mistakes for them to kind of use as momentum. It was more of make them come and catch me kind of day. I did a really good job of not trying to force things, not trying to do anything outside of my comfort zone.”

Speaking of comfort, Scheffler won $1 million to cap off a year in which the 27-year-old collected a record $21 million on the PGA Tour. Not that anyone is counting.

Scheffler insists that he doesn’t really count wins, though he won’t deny the enjoyment from them. “I try not to place too much of my identity of what I shoot on the golf course or how many tournaments I’ve won,” he said. “Sometimes when you really struggle with something it kind of helps you reset to remember why I come out here to play this game every week and why I love to do it.”

He loves it because he’s really good at it. But, yes, he has struggled, too.

It bears pointing out that Scheffler avoided a three-putt this week on the slick greens at Albany. He began working with Phil Kenyon on his putting prior to the Ryder Cup and came armed this week with a new putter. It’s the worst-kept secret in golf that Scheffler was thwarted throughout 2023 by substandard performance on the greens. He can be forgiven for harbouring a woulda-coulda-shoulda mentality.

But that wouldn’t be him. He just knows that this win was the product of a complete game.

“Coming into this week I felt like I was in a good spot, but I didn’t really know because I hadn’t really played much tournament golf,” said Scheffler, who had been off since the Ryder Cup, where he went a tearful 0-2-2. “Got off to a pretty slow start the first day, but ever since I think probably after the first six holes I played some really, really great golf. Yeah, that [putting] why I’m walking out of here with a win versus coming out not with a win. I’m very pleased with how I putted, I feel like I rolled it solid. It’s definitely nice to see some early results with the stuff that Phil and I have been working on.”

While his consistency has been impressive—and puts him firmly in the conversation for repeating as PGA Tour Player of the Year—Scheffler won’t deny that there is satisfaction in closing out a victory, even the unofficial variety. “I like winning, winning is a tremendous amount of fun. It’s definitely nice to win and also nice to be consistent,” he said. “Finishing second is not nearly as good a feeling as finishing first.”

Scheffler came into the week feeling refreshed after setting his clubs aside for a spell. He will tell you that he is guilty sometimes of working too hard—and that definitely was the case as he battled to refine his putting much of the year. Now he’ll take another month off before the new season begins at the Sentry at Kapalua Resort in Maui.

The difference is that he’ll be equally refreshed but also more confident, given the proceedings at Albany.

“It’s nice to finish off the year with a win, and it will be good as we go home and get ready for Christmas and get ready for Kapalua to kind of have the momentum of this week,” Scheffler said.

The last thing this guy needs, besides another million dollars, is momentum. But he’s got both. In what has been a strange year in golf, this seems just about right.

Image: Mike Ehrmann

The post Hero World Challenge winner Scottie Scheffler learned a lesson to close out 2023. Here’s what it means for 2024 appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

To be clear, we are NOT saying pickleball is NOT a sport, either. In fact, as someone who happened to excel in it during P.E. class a couple of decades ago, I’d very much like to think that it is a sport. And an important one at that for my own self-confidence. But it’s a tough look when you’re World No. 1 gets absolutely worked over by the World No. 1 in another sport. Especially when that sport is golf.

And that’s exactly what happened at the Carvana PPA Tour Celebrity Showdown on Wednesday when Scottie Scheffler teamed up with Anna Leigh Waters in a match against former tennis player John Isner and current top-ranked pickleballer Ben Johns. Check it out as Scheffler and Johns become engaged in a rally at the net with the golfer coming out on top:

WHAT!? ? Scottie Scheffler just beat the world’s no.1 in a hands battle ?? pic.twitter.com/ToMwKO3HPP

— Carvana PPA Tour (@PPAtour) November 8, 2023

Scottie! What an athlete! Hey, the guy didn’t win the green jacket without having a golden set of hands.

OK, so it’s just one point, but it was an impressive one at that. And apparently, Scheffler has really gotten into pickleball and is “pretty good” at the exploding sport, according to Waters, the top-ranked female player. So go on with your bad self, Scottie. And thanks for making all golfers look (a little) cooler.

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Scottie Scheffler may have left East Lake without any hardware on Sunday, but he knows he’s at least got a couple trophies coming to him following a fantastic season.

While the PGA Tour’s Player-of-the-Year debate will take a bit longer to settle and will likely go to Jon Rahm, Scheffler, the reigning POTY already locked up a couple season-long awards thanks to his adjusted scoring average. The stat, which takes a player’s true scoring average for all rounds plays and adjusts it based on the difficulty of scoring at an event, determines the winner of both the Vardon Trophy (given out by the PGA of America since 1937) and the Byron Nelson Trophy (awarded by the PGA Tour since 1980).

Scheffler’s adjusted scoring average of 68.629 in 2022-2023 edged out Rory McIlroy (68.777) and Rahm (69.037). That’s impressive in its own right, but as stats guru Justin Ray let everyone know on Twitter, it’s actually the seventh-best average since the stat was first kept in 1988. Well done, Scottie!

But as Ray also notes, one golfer holds down the top SIX spots. And you’ll never guess who it is. Just kidding! It’s Tiger Woods.

What an unbelievable stat and just the latest reminder of how great peak Tiger was. It’s also a reminder of how great Vijay Singh was in 2004, because his mark of 68.65 is what Scottie nipped for that seventh spot.

By the way, Woods’ top season in this metric was the 67.79 he put up in both 2000 and 2007. That’s .84 better than Scheffler this season. And outside of his top-six seasons, Woods also has marks of 68.66 (2005) and 68.81 (2001). Oh, and when it comes to winning Vardon and Nelson trophies, Tiger has nine. Of each.

So congrats to Scheffler on winning his first, and etching his name into the top 10. But Tiger’s record(s) in this category should be safe for a while.

The post Scottie Scheffler’s season scoring average will amaze you, but not as much as Tiger Woods’ record(s) for the stat appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Does Scottie Scheffler, who won the WM Phoenix Open and the Players Championship while amassing 17 top-10 finishes in 23 events, deserve the Jack Nicklaus Award? Or should it go to Jon Rahm, winner of four titles, two of which came back-to-back and one of which was the Masters for his second career major title?

“It depends what you value,” Rory McIlroy, a three-time winner of the award, said earlier in the week at East Lake. “I think it could come down to this week and who performs.”

It’s unlikely, however, that the results from the Tour Championship will influence players’ votes. Scheffler coughed up a two-shot pre-tournament lead to finish T-6 at 11 under. Rahm stumbled with a 74 Sunday to finish T-18 at seven under.

That’s not to take away from either player’s incredible season-long accomplishments.

Scheffler, 27, finished outside the top 12 just three times in his fourth season on tour. He also shared second at the PGA Championship and finished third at the US Open. Rahm, 28, had two runner-up results, one of which was a T-2 at the Open Championship, while he posting a T-10 at the US Open. For the season, the Spaniard had 10 top-10s.

While Scheffler has fewer wins, he ranked No. 1 in strokes gained/off the tee. He was also the best when approaching the green, gaining 1.3 strokes on the field per round with his irons. No other player, including No. 2 Collin Morikawa, gained more than 1.0. The 2.74 strokes Scheffler gained from tee to green was second only to Tiger Woods’ 2006 season, when he averaged 2.98 strokes.

“He’s hit the ball as good, if not better, than Tiger hit it in 2000, which is the benchmark for all of us,” McIlroy said.

But the Nicklaus Award is not about the ball-striker of the year. For many, it’s about winning, and majors weigh most heavily when casting their votes. Rahm has more of both this year.

“Because Rahm won a major and how hot Rahm’s year was, winning four alone in the calendar year and in the first four months, this year it’s got to be Rahmbo,” Tony Finau said at East Lake. “I still believe the hardest thing to do on tour is win; the second hardest thing is consistency. I’ve got to go with the guy who is winning more than the guy who is consistent.”

Added McIlroy: “Scottie’s won twice this year, Jon’s won four times. Jon’s won the Masters, Scottie’s won the Players. I think Jon probably has a little more to show for his year.”

But it’s not quite that clear. Rickie Fowler for one was still trying to make up his mind, sounding like he was leaning toward the consistency camp.
“If someone won two majors and another event and missed every other cut compared to someone who won three regular events and then played solidly throughout, you’d probably pick the one with the more consistent record,” Fowler said. “There’s such a value on majors, and that’s what you want to have a nice number in on your résumé at the end of your career, but I think a lot more goes into the overall package of consistent play. You can argue both sides.”

We’ll see which way more PGA Tour pros decided to lean when the winner next month.

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At 2pm local time on Thursday at the Tour Championship, World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler had a two-shot lead. Two hours later, he had a five-shot advantage at East Lake. But by the end of the day, he was, somehow, one shot behind.

“I’m obviously pretty frustrated,” the Texan put it mildly.

FedEx Cup leader Scheffler began Day 1 at 10-under using the Tour Championship’s adjusted scoring — two shots ahead of Viktor Hovland. After a front nine as hot as the sweltering temperatures around Atlanta, Scheffler cooled off on the inward nine. He carded bogeys at Nos. 8, 11 and 12. He made a triple-bogey 6 on the par-3 15th having rinsed his tee shot in the water before missing a three-foot putt for double-bogey. Until then, Scheffler, the Players champion, had not registered a single triple-bogey on a par 3 this season.

Things can change quickly ? pic.twitter.com/rJHvKiCH72

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) August 24, 2023

The 27-year-old birdied No. 17 and eventually signed for a 71 to fall to nine-under par. Collin Morikawa surged into a share of the lead courtesy of a 61 that elevated him nine shots to 10-under, alongside Hovland (68) and Keegan Bradley (63). Adam Schenk and Russell Henley were eight-under, while an injured Rory McIlroy dug deep for a 70 that kept him at seven under and three back.

The FedEx Cup is still wide open.

Scheffler lost 2.833 strokes to the field, his worst round of the season, and dropped 3.229 in putting. He needed 33 putts.

“I got off to a pretty good start, and then I had a few three-putts, which definitely is frustrating, and then I had the bad swing there on the par 3, 15,” he said.

“Just keep fighting.”

Perspective from Scottie Scheffler after a tough round @TOURChamp. pic.twitter.com/jRabjY07i3

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) August 24, 2023

The silver lining is Scheffler, a two-time winner this season, is still very much in the hunt for a maiden FedEx Cup victory. It’s a title he squandered last year to Rory McIlroy having arrived at East Lake as the FedEx Cup leader and Masters champion.

“I guess it’s a little bit of a blessing to have a pretty bad day and still be in the tournament,” Scheffler said. “So, yeah, go out there tomorrow and just keep fighting.”

The post Tour Championship: Scottie Scheffler picked a bad time to shoot one of his worst rounds of the year appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Easier to follow, but not the best. That’s the verdict on the Tour Championship’s staggered start five years into the current version.

In 2019, the PGA Tour introduced a handicapping system to structure the leaderboard for the 30 players who qualified for the FedEx Cup finale at East Lake. A quick reminder, FedEx Cup leader Scottie Scheffler will start Thursday’s first round at 10-under par, with Viktor Hovland at eight-under and Rory McIlroy at seven-under. The scores then regress down to where the final five in the standings start at even par.

“I don’t think it’s the best, but it is the easiest to understand,” said Jon Rahm, who’ll start at six-under par.

There’s one problem with the format though — the Official World Golf Ranking does not recognise the Tour Championship winner if he doesn’t shoot the lowest 72-hole score.

“It’s a little odd you get awarded world rankings points for a tournament you may not win or you may not celebrate at the end,” Rahm said.

Rahm is one of three players who shot the lowest 72-hole score at par-70 East Lake and claimed the most world ranking points without winning the Tour Championship. In 2020, Xander Schauffele posted the lowest score (265) but Dustin Johnson won everything. In 2021, Cantlay swept the tournament and FedEx Cup, but he won just 15.8 OWGR points while Rahm and Kevin Na (266) each took home 51 points. Last year, Rory McIlroy righted the ship, shooting 263 to take everything, including 38.8 world ranking points.

“It’s a bit of a strange format,” Scheffler said. The reigning Players champion has often joked that the World No. 1 ranking means little to him because the title doesn’t come with a head-start on tournament leaderboards, except at East Lake. “You show up this week and I do get some extra strokes. But it should be a fun week,” he said.

McIlroy, a record three-time winner of the FedEx Cup (2016, ’19 and ’22), defended the format for rewarding the most consistent player each season.

“If anything, like, Scottie this year, he probably should have more of an advantage than a two-shot lead,” McIlroy said of Scheffler, who has finished in the top 10 in 16 of 22 events he’s played this season, including two wins.

Five years in, the riddle the Tour Championship faces is whether it wants to be fair, entertaining, or both.

“It needs to be both,” McIlroy said. “The players have to feel it’s fair, but if I’m thinking big picture, I would say entertainment has to be a big part of it.”

Scheffler is a generational ball-striker. The 2022 Masters champ could become the first person in the 20 years of ShotLink records to lead the tour in both strokes gained/off-the-tee and approach-the-green. But he is a stoic player, and the Texan running away with the Tour Championship after the second or third rounds would not exactly be box-office viewing.

Match play has long been suggested as a format that could manufacture drama at East Lake. Watching the final two golfers battling for the $18 million FedEx Cup winner’s prize would be exciting television. In fact, US Open champion Matt Fitzpatrick went as far as suggesting the three-event playoff series should all be match-play events to bring it in line with more aggressive knockout format in other US sports. But how would Tour Championship match play work? Would the entire tournament be match play, or would the tour need to style it like the US Amateur with a stroke play and match play component?

“That would be a great, but I just don’t think the tour would want that just because [golf] is not like tennis, where the top seeds always pretty much get to the Round of 16, the quarters, the semis and the final,” said Jason Day, a two-time winner of the WGC-Match Play. “A guy could lead the FedEx Cup the whole year and get knocked out the first round [if it were all match play]. But it’d be interesting.”

For now, the staggered start is the strongest format that players, and the tour, can come up with.

“Of all the iterations … I think this is the best one yet,” McIlroy said. “I can’t sit here and say I’ve thought of something better. I’m sure if it needs to be addressed in the future, it will.”

The post Five years into the Tour Championship’s staggered start, there’s still one obvious flaw appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

For all the jockeying for position over 72 holes at Olympia Fields Country Club, for all the drama as players moved in and out of the top 30 in the FedEx Cup points standings, only one player — Matt Fitzpatrick — was able to play his way into the Tour Championship on Sunday.

Fitzpatrick had hoped for more, of course, after beginning the final round of the BMW Championship tied atop the leaderboard with World No 1 Scottie Scheffler. He matched Scheffler with a closing four-under 66, but the Englishman couldn’t counter the magnificent charge of Viktor Hovland, who fired a course-record 61. Fitzpatrick had to settle for joint second place with Scheffler at 15-under 265. Nevertheless, the former U.S. Open winner moved up 30 spots and heads to East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta in 10th place in the standings.

“Yeah, played great. Can’t do anything about 61,” the Englishman said. “For me, just really pleased again that I played really well final round in contention with world No. 1, and I didn’t lose it. Someone else came from behind and won it. I feel like my game is definitely in better shape than it was, and yeah, looking forward to getting to next week and working on it some more, and hopefully still progressing.”
With a move up, one player had to be pushed out, and that was Atlanta native Chris Kirk, who suffered a miserable finish with bogeys on three of his last six holes, including the 18th. Kirk, winner for the first time in eight years at the Honda Classic in March, dropped from 29th to 33rd after a closing one-over 71.

“I’m not sure how I feel about it. I hit two of the best shots [approaches] of the day the last two holes and went par, bogey,” said Kirk after finishing T-29 at two-under 278. “I’d like to have one more week, but I feel like I’ve had enough golf for the next couple of months.”

Scheffler’s only consolation on the day was overtaking Jon Rahm for the top spot at East Lake, the first time in FedEx Cup playoff history that a player enters the Tour Championship with the lead in back-to-back years. He’ll start the tournament at 10-under par and with a two-stroke advantage over Hovland.

Rory McIlroy, the defending champion and the only three-time winner of the FedEx Cup, will start third and three shots behind Scheffler at seven-under in the staggered-start format. He was seventh a year ago and six shots behind Scheffler before a final-day rally.

“I’m playing great tee to green, the best I’ve played in a long time,” McIlroy said after finishing fourth with a closing 66 on the North Course while paired with Hovland. “Going to have to drive the ball probably a little straighter, but I felt like I found something on the back nine there today to go into next week. but overall I’m in a really good position going into next week, so excited for it.”

Rounding out the top five in the FedEx Cup standings are Rahm, who will start at six-under par, and Lucas Glover, who begins at five-under. Fitzpatrick is in a group with five others who will be staked to a score of four-under.

No fewer than six players were in the hunt for the final few berths in the playoff finale, with Sepp Straka perhaps coming up with the most clutch performance, carding a 66 despite a bogey on the 72nd hole. His two-over 282 left him T-37, but he stayed inside the bubble for the playoff finale in 30th place.

“You watch it, but ultimately it doesn’t really matter because most of it’s out of your control anyway,” said the 30-year-old Austrian native, who had booked two flights out of Chicago, one to Atlanta and one going on home to Birmingham, Ala. “You’ve just got to try to play a good round of golf and see where you end up.”

Straka, Jordan Spieth and Emiliano Grillo began the week inside the top 30 but found themselves projected outside the top 30 after 54 holes only to bounce back to the plus side on Sunday.

Grillo carded a 67, enough to finish T-31 at even-par 280 and qualified in 27th position. Despite bogeys on his final two holes, Spieth advanced. He had dropped as far down as 32 in the projections when he signed for a 71 before getting help from 2018 FedEx Cup champion Justin Rose and Denny McCarthy, who were inside the number as the final round began but couldn’t keep it. Spieth finished T-34 at one-over 281.

Sahith Theegala also figured in the matrix of things, giving himself hope with three straight birdies starting at the par-5 15th, bit then the second-year tour player bogeyed the last for a 67 and 274 total, tied for 15th, which left him in that agonising 31st position, nine points behind Straka.

Rose had played his way in from 34th at the outset of the week with middle rounds of 65 and 68 and then fell away with 73-276, placing T-22. McCarthy was projected in at No. 30 when his final round began, but his even-par 70 wasn’t enough to keep it, ending up 33rd with his T-10 finish at 273.

Here’s the field for East Lake and where they’ll all start on Thursday.
Scottie Scheffler (-10)
Viktor Hovland (-8)
Rory McIlroy (-7)
Jon Rahm (-6)
Lucas Glover (-5)
Max Homa (-4)
Patrick Cantlay (-4)
Brian Harman (-4)
Wyndham Clark (-4)
Matt Fitzpatrick (-4)
Tommy Fleetwood (-3)
Russell Henley (-3)
Keegan Bradley (-3)
Rickie Fowler (-3)
Xander Schauffele (-3)
Tom Kim (-2)
Sungjae Im (-2)
Tony Finau (-2)
Corey Conners (-2)
Si Woo Kim (-2)
Taylor Moore (-1)
Nick Taylor (-1)
Adam Schenk (-1)
Collin Morikawa (-1)
Jason Day (-1)
Sam Burns (E)
Emiliano Grillo (E)
Tyrrell Hatton (E)
Jordan Spieth (E)
Sepp Straka (E)
FedEx Cup payouts

How much each player will make based on their finish at the Tour Championship:
1. $18,000,000
2. $6,500,000
3. $5,000,000
4. $4,000,000
5. $3,000,000
6. $2,500,000
7. $2,000,000
8. $1,500,000
9. $1,250,000
10. $1,000,000
11. $950,000
12. $900,000
13. $850,000
14. $800,000
15. $760,000
16. $720,000
17. $700,000
18. $680,000
19. $660,000
20. $640,000
21. $620,000
22. $600,000
23. $580,000
24. $565,000
25. $550,000
26. $540,000
27. $530,000
28. $520,000
29. $510,000
30. $500,000

The post Who’s in, who’s out at the 2023 Tour Championship: All 30 qualifiers and where they start at East Lake appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

If you think Scottie Scheffler hasn’t won “enough” during the 2022-23 PGA Tour, you’ll probably say that the 27-year-old Texan “squandered” another title at the BMW Championship despite shooting a closing 66. But here’s the thing: Was there really any stopping Viktor Hovland on Sunday at Olympia Fields?

With 10 birdies, including seven on the final nine holes for a back-nine 28, the 25-year-old from Norway rallied with a course-record 61 to pass Scheffler and win the second leg of the PGA Tour Playoffs by two shots over Scheffler and Matt Fitzpatrick with a 17-under 263.

When Hovland finished his round, Scheffler trailed by one with two holes to play. But a bogey on 17 and a par on 18 left him with “only” his 16th top-10 finish in 22 starts this season.

If there’s a consolation for Scheffler, he still jumped to No. 1 in the FedEx Cup points standings, and put himself in a prime spot to win the title next week at the Tour Championship that slipped through his fingers a year ago.

Being the No. 1 seed means Scheffler will have a two-shot advantage on Hovland, now No. 2 in the standings, and a 10-shot edge on the final five players in the 30-man field when play starts at East Lake. This was the case a year ago, too, with Scheffler held a six-shot lead heading into the final round only to stumble home and watch Rory McIlroy walk off with the win, the FedEx Cup and the $18 million bonus. Needless to say, Scheffler hopes to make up for those mistakes this time around.

As for the BMW, here’s the prize money payout for each golfer who competed this week at Olympia Fields.

Win: Viktor Hovland, 263/-17, $3,600,000
T-2: Matt Fitzpatrick, 265/-15, $1,760,000
T-2: Scottie Scheffler, 265/-15, $1,760,000
4: Rory McIlroy, 268/-12, $990,000
T-5: Brian Harman, 269/-11, $790,000
T-5: Max Homa, 269/-11, $790,000
7: Sungjae Im, 270/-10, $695,000
T-8: Russell Henley, 271/-9, $620,000
T-8: Xander Schauffele, 271/-9, $620,000
T-10: Corey Conners, 273/-7, $480,600
T-10: Harris English, 273/-7, $480,600
T-10: Tom Kim, 273/-7, $480,600
T-10: Denny McCarthy, 273/-7, $480,600
T-10: Andrew Putnam, 273/-7, $480,600
T-15: Patrick Cantlay, 274/-6, $332,000
T-15: Wyndham Clark, 274/-6, $332,000
T-15: Adam Svensson, 274/-6, $332,000
T-15: Sahith Theegala, 274/-6, $332,000
T-15: Cameron Young, 274/-6, $332,000
21: Tom Hoge, 275/-5, $262,000
T-22: Lucas Glover, 276/-4, $229,000
T-22: JT Poston, 276/-4, $229,000
T-22: Justin Rose, 276/-4, $229,000
T-25: Eric Cole, 277/-3, $179,750
T-25: Tommy Fleetwood, 277/-3, $179,750
T-25: Rickie Fowler, 277/-3, $179,750
T-25: Collin Morikawa, 277/-3, $179,750
T-29: Keegan Bradley, 278/-2, $156,500
T-29: Chris Kirk, 278/-2, $156,500
T-31: Emiliano Grillo, 280/E, $139,000
T-31: Si Woo Kim, 280/E, $139,000
T-31: Jon Rahm, 280/E, $139,000
T-34: Tyrrell Hatton, 281/+1, $122,000
T-34: Adam Schenk, 281/+1, $122,000
T-34: Jordan Spieth, 281/+1, $122,000
T-37: Tony Finau, 282/+2, $108,000
T-37: Patrick Rodgers, 282/+2, $108,000
T-37: Sepp Straka, 282/+2, $108,000
40: Cam Davis, 283/+3, $100,000
T-41: Kurt Kitayama, 284/+4, $94,000
T-41: Brendon Todd, 284/+4, $94,000
43: Byeong Hun An, 285/+5, $88,000
44: Adam Hadwin, 286/+6, $84,000
T-45: Jason Day, 287/+7, $78,000
T-45: Lee Hodges, 287/+7, $78,000
47: Nick Taylor, 290/+10, $72,000
48: Seamus Power, 294/+14, $70,000
49: Taylor Moore, 298/+18, $68,000
WD: Hideki Matsuyama

The post Here’s the prize money payout for each golfer at the 2023 BMW Championship appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

As he navigated the short staircase to the podium for his post-round press conference on Sunday at the BMW Championship, Viktor Hovland tripped slightly, caught himself and laughed at his own clumsiness. It was about the only misstep he made during a record-setting afternoon defined by one of the most remarkable feats of clutch scoring in the 2023 golf season.

Having shown steady growth as an all-around golfer since turning professional four years ago, Hovland took a giant leap forward as a scary force to be reckoned with by shooting a course-record nine-under 61 at Olympia Fields to win the second leg of the FedEx Cup Playoffs. The performance, fueled by an inspired surge of ball-striking, included a back-nine 28 on the North Course featuring seven birdies, none longer than 13 feet.

The incomparable finish made a hard-luck loser of Scottie Scheffler, who led for much of the final round but could not come up with the requisite answer as Hovland stormed to a two-stroke victory. Scheffler, who closed with a 66, had to settle for his 13th top-five finish of the season that includes a pair of wins, one of them the Players Championship.

“To win at a place like this and amongst the best players in the world, it’s pretty cool,” Hovland said after finishing at 17-under 263. “And to do it that way, making seven birdies the last nine holes, and yeah, to beat those guys, that was pretty cool.”

The 25-year-old Norwegian was the coolest of them all on a sweltering afternoon, eclipsing by one the course record Max Homa and Sam Burns had posted in previous rounds. Hovland established a record for low score in a FedEx Cup playoff event as well as his career low while winning his fifth PGA Tour title and second this year to go with his victory in the Memorial Tournament.

Hovland moves on to the Tour Championship in Atlanta ranked second in the season-long FedEx Cup standings behind Scheffler and will begin the playoff finale two shots behind the World No. 1 player in the staggered-start format. He remains fifth in the Official World Golf Ranking. For now.

Matt Fitzpatrick, who shared the 54-hole lead with Scheffler, had two late birdies and managed to tie Scheffler for second at 15-under 265. When he saw Hovland outside the scoring room, he grabbed his European Ryder Cup teammate by the shoulders and said something that made him burst out laughing.

“I said he was a little [expletive],” Fitzpatrick said. Actually, he was very big.

The moment Viktor Hovland became a winner @BMWChamps ? pic.twitter.com/megiBh3ZSk

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) August 21, 2023

For much of the day, Scheffler appeared unstoppable, immediately separating himself from Fitzpatrick and keeping his nose ahead throughout the tense afternoon by going five-under through 13 holes. But Hovland, who began the final round three behind, just kept coming with an inward nine of eight 3s and a birdie at the par-5 15th that cut a four-shot deficit at the turn to one. But putting, which has held Scheffler back on many occasions this season, again became his undoing.

After failing to birdie 15, Scheffler missed a seven-footer for birdie at 16, leaving the door open, not that Hovland was obliged to knock it down anyway. A 9-iron to eight feet at 17 and a pitching wedge to six feet at 18 set up the birdies he needed to leapfrog the Texan. When Scheffler three-putted the 17th from 26 feet, the dye was cast. Scheffler added a sixth career runner-up finish to go with six career wins.

“Yeah, pretty amazing round of golf to win this tournament like that,” said Scheffler, who for the second year in a row will enter the Tour Championship as the leader. “I’m just a bit frustrated. I think that would be the way to describe it. I mean, Viktor went out and really just beat me today and played a fantastic round. I can hold my head high and just … I did my best out there today and fought hard. Just ultimately came up a couple shots short.”

Hovland, who didn’t miss a cut this year and finished in the top 20 in all four majors, won the Memorial in large part thanks to a blossoming short game. At Olympia Fields, he had everything going, and that was, perhaps, the most pleasing aspect of the week … other than the $3.6 million pay day. He didn’t lead in any single strokes-gained discipline, but he ranked among the top four across the board.

“If you take everything into account,” he said, “it’s just putting all of that together, and then being clutch at the right times at Memorial and obviously this week and having a chance to contend in those major championships, I think I’ve taken a big step this year compared to other years.”

A course-record 61 for the win! ?

Viktor Hovland is victorious @BMWChamps with a thrilling Sunday performance!#FedExCup pic.twitter.com/8L6WLiPJxa

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) August 20, 2023

Of course, there’s one more step to take, at least this year. Hovland, who has reached the Tour Championship in each of his four seasons on tour, has momentum and a prime seeding as he goes for the $18 million bonus that comes with winning the FedEx Cup. A long season is wearing on all 30 qualifiers to East Lake, but Hovland will go there with a definite spring in his step.

“Well, I’m about to pass out right now,” Hovland said, alluding to the toll the gruelling final round had on him. “But no, just a good night’s sleep, and we’re right back at it next week at East Lake. I’m sure it’ll be hot, and we’ll be sweating a lot, so I’m definitely feeling that it’s been a lot of golf, but it seems like the more I’ve played recently, I seem to play better. Just need to lean into that and hopefully we have another good week.”

If nothing else, he’s proven eminently capable.

The post Unpacking BMW winner Viktor Hovland’s mind-bending final round at Olympia Fields appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

A late burst of crazy piled on top of some exceptional golf on a windy Saturday at Olympia Fields Country Club contributed to a leaderboard top-heavy with players who own PGA Tour victories this season.

World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler, who last year saw his FedEx Cup title hopes slip away to Rory McIlroy on the final day of the Tour Championship, appears poised to return to East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta as the top seed after grabbing a share of the 54-hole lead in the BMW Championship. Scheffler’s six-under 64 on the North Course propelled the Texan to 11-under 199, tied with Matt Fitzpatrick who shot a 66 that included a bizarre bogey on the par-4 home hole.

Fitzpatrick pulled his second shot from a right fairway bunker across into the left rough near the gallery where a marshal allegedly moved Fitzpatrick’s ball by stepping near it or slightly on it, which adversely affected the lie.

“Like [he] didn’t fully stand on it, but definitely brushed it because you could see the grass was completely moved,” said Fitzpatrick, who chopped his ball out short of the green and got up and down for bogey. “It definitely sat further down than when I got there. They didn’t see it, and they can’t confirm that, so I wasn’t going to be like … I wasn’t going to fight for it, really.”

The fight comes on Sunday, with a posse in pursuit that includes Open Championship winner Brian Harman just one stroke back after a 67. Second-round leader Max Homa recovered from a triple-bogey on the seventh hole to shoot 71 to come in at 201. His day included the conversion of a five-foot birdie putt at the 17th while a fan shouted at him to “pull it” as he was in the midst of his stroke.

“There was a probably drunk, I hope for his case, or else he’s just the biggest loser there is,” Homa said, “but he was cheering and yelling at Chris [Kirk] for missing his putt short, and he kept yelling that he had … one of them had $3 for me to make mine, and I got to the back of my backstroke, and he yelled: ‘Pull it’ pretty loud, and I made it right in the middle.”

Homa and his caddie, Joe Greiner, yelled back at the man as they exited the green.

McIlroy, ranked second in the world and three-time winner of the FedEx Cup, and Viktor Hovland, who is fifth in the world, are tied at 202 after 67 and 65, respectively. Sam Burns leads a large group at seven-under 203 after tying Homa’s day-old course record with a 62.

Driver off the deck ?

This tracer from Scottie Scheffler is ridiculous! pic.twitter.com/Usz1gAgLLr

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) August 19, 2023

Scheffler, who has two wins this season, including the Players in March, has been on the cusp of a monster season in which he has finished in the top five 12 times. From his first win of the year at the WM Phoenix Open until his T-23 at the British Open, Scheffler didn’t finish worse than T-12.

The ball-striking maven, who leads the field in strokes gained/off the tee, tee to green and approach the green, finally got an assist from his putter, building confidence from one-putting the first five greens.

“It’s definitely been fun,” Scheffler, 27, said of his consistency. “I like being in contention.

It’s why I practise as hard as I do. On the flipside of it, yeah, it’s very draining, especially with this year, I felt like I’ve … this is now the second year where I’ve really been in the spotlight a lot, and yeah, I’d say there’s definitely challenges to it.”

And disappointments. Scheffler, who could become the first player to enter the Tour Championship first in the FedEx Cup standings two years in a row, knows he hasn’t capitalised on his extraordinary tee-to-green performance this year.

“I’m going to look back on my career and I’m going to think I could have nabbed way more tournaments than I’ll end up with. It doesn’t matter if I won eight times this year or if I won twice or none. There’s always more out there,” he said. “You’re never fully satisfied with the results. Tiger Woods won I think 83 times [82 actually], and if you asked him, I’m sure he’s trying to think about getting No. 84. It’s never enough.”

Fitzpatrick, meanwhile, has been disappointed in his season a bit, too, after beating Jordan Spieth in a playoff to win the RBC Heritage. He entered the second FedEx Cup playoff event 40th in the points standings and needing a strong showing to qualify for the Tour Championship. So far, so good for East Lake and maybe salvaging his year.

Tree? What tree? ?@MattFitz94 grabs the solo lead in sensational fashion @BMWChamps. pic.twitter.com/CvkjcuexKh

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) August 19, 2023

“Pretty high, yeah. Pretty high, definitely,” Fitzpatrick said of his frustration level this season, especially with a driver that has been holding him back. “After winning Harbour Town, I felt I kind of got a lot more out of my irons all of a sudden in two weeks at Augusta and Harbour Town. They just felt so much better than they had been probably since the US Open. I felt I could really kick on then.

“I’d probably say it wouldn’t match where my expectations of myself can be.”

At the lower end of the battle for the top 30 and a berth in the Tour Championship, Denny McCarthy, after a 65, clings to the last spot. He is one of three players to move from outside the qualifying number to a potential date at East Lake in Atlanta along with Fitzpatrick and Justin Rose, who shot 68 on Saturday and has moved up six places to 26th.

Jordan Spieth, Emiliano Grillo and Sepp Straka occupy places 31-33, respectively, to fall outside the top 30 with 18 holes potentially left of their season.

The post Wild final round on tap at BMW, with clustered leaderboard and Tour Championship implications appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.