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Mark Schlabach, ESPN Senior Writer
The final three-week stretch of the FedEx Cup season is here.
Many of the best golfers in the world will not only have to deal with grueling heat and humidity at the FedEx St. Jude Championship in Memphis, Tennessee, and the season-ending Tour Championship in Atlanta, but also elevation at the BMW Championship outside Denver in between.
“You want to be peaking at certain times of the year, and this is definitely one of the times of the year where you want to be peaking,” Patrick Cantlay said.
Everyone in the 70-man field is chasing world No. 1 golfer Scottie Scheffler and two-time major winner Xander Schauffele, like they have done throughout the 2024 season.
Here’s a look at the playoff tournaments and formats and what’s at stake over the next three weeks:
The FedEx Cup playoffs tournaments
FedEx St. Jude Championship
When: Thursday-Sunday
Where: TPC Southwind, Memphis, Tennessee
Purse: $20 million ($3.6 million to winner)
Defending champion: Lucas Glover
The top 70 players in the FedEx Cup points standings are back at TPC Southwind for the first leg of the playoffs. Last year, Glover defeated Cantlay in a playoff at the FedEx St. Jude Championship for his second straight win. Glover won’t be around this year to defend his title; he missed the playoffs after finishing 77th with 596 points this year.
Also missing the playoffs: No. 71 Davis Riley (647), No. 72 Andrew Putnam (625), No. 73 Kurt Kitayama (603), No. 81 Nicolai Hojgaard (532) and No. 107 Rickie Fowler (374).
Matt Kuchar, who was the only player to make every playoff since 2007, had his streak end when he finished 104th with 382 points.
Scheffler’s dominance this season continued when he came from behind to win a gold medal at the Olympics in Paris. With 5,993 points, he has a nearly 2,000-point lead over Schauffele (4,057) and more than twice as many as Rory McIlroy (2,545).
The winner of the first two playoff events collects 2,000 points, so Scheffler’s work isn’t done yet. Scheffler hasn’t had much success at TPC Southwind. He doesn’t have a top-10 finish in six career starts. He tied for 31st last year, eight strokes behind Glover and Cantlay.
BMW Championship
When: Aug. 22-25
Where: Castle Pines Golf Club, Castle Rock, Colorado
Purse: $20 million ($4 million to winner)
Defending champion: Viktor Hovland
The top 50 players in points after the FedEx St. Jude Championship will advance to the BMW Championship — the second leg of the FedEx Cup playoffs — and they’ll secure spots in each of the signature events in 2025.
The tournament will be the first PGA Tour event played in Colorado in a decade; nearby Cherry Hills Country Club hosted the 2014 BMW Championship. The PGA Tour last visited Castle Pines Golf Club for the final version of The International, a modified Stableford scoring event, in 2006.
Hovland caught fire in the last two weeks of the 2022-23 season to win the FedEx Cup. At the BMW Championship at Olympia Fields Country Club outside Chicago, he came from behind to finish 17 under, 2 shots better than Scheffler and Matt Fitzpatrick. Hovland carded a 9-under 61 in the final round, a course record, with 10 birdies and one bogey.
After tinkering with his swing during the offseason, Hovland’s game remains a work in progress. He is 57th in the FedEx Cup standings with 854 points, so he’ll have to play better in Memphis to advance to the BMW Championship. Hovland was solo third at the PGA Championship (his only top-10 finish in 13 starts on tour this season), but missed the cut at the Masters, U.S. Open and The Open. He tied for 30th at the Olympics.
Given Hovland’s recent form, he doesn’t feel like a contender to repeat as FedEx Cup champion.
“I feel like maybe I’ve been an underdog in some way my whole life, so I guess I’m kind of used to that position,” Hovland said. “But it’s not something that I think about too much. I’m just trying to control the things that I can control.
“I know that I’ve slipped up a little bit this year. I haven’t been playing as well as I would have liked. I’m just working on the things that I need to work on to get back to where I was last year. Then I believe I can do some great things again.”
Other golfers who need to fare well in Memphis to advance to Colorado include No. 51 Harris English (969 points), No. 55 Justin Rose (881) and No. 63 Jordan Spieth (782).
Tour Championship
When: Aug. 29-Sept. 1
Where: East Lake Golf Club, Atlanta.
Purse: $100 million ($25 million to winner)
Defending champion: Viktor Hovland
Since 2019, the PGA Tour has used a starting-strokes system for the season-ending Tour Championship. The player who has the most FedEx Cup points after the BMW Championship will start the final event at 10 under, ahead of the rest of the field.
The player in second place will start at 8 under, the No. 3 player at 7 under, No. 4 at 6 under and No. 5 at 5 under. Players from sixth to 10th will start at 4 under, players 11th to 15th at 3 under, players 16th to 20th at 2 under, players 21st to 25th start at 1 under, and players from 26th to 30th start at even par.
The player with the lowest scoring total after 72 holes will be crowned the FedEx Cup champion. In addition to collecting a whopping $25 million bonus, the champion also gets a five-year tour exemption. The runner-up wins $12.5 million, third place gets $7.5 million, fourth takes home $6 million and fifth walks away with $5 million.
This year, in addition to Atlanta’s heat and humidity, golfers will also be challenged by a redesigned golf course. East Lake Golf Club underwent an extensive renovation after the conclusion of last year’s Tour Championship. Architect Andrew Green used a previously unknown aerial photo from 1949 as inspiration, according to the club.
“I know he’s a big fan of taking trees out and sort of changing bunkering and going back to what the course used to look like,” Schauffele said. “I’m not sure how the course is going to look. The photos look majestic online, the few shots of the course. The photographer did a nice job taking those photos at that time of day. The course looked like it was in a fairy tale, but it looked different. The greens are going to be different.”
The new greens won’t be as receptive as they’ve been in the past. Schauffele compared it to the new greens at Colonial Country Club in Fort Worth, Texas.
“They’re new, greens are concrete, balls are bouncing everywhere,” Schauffele said. “That’s not how we’re used to playing East Lake. We’re used to being rewarded if you’re in the fairway and you can’t bounce a ball up any hole because the Kikuyu is going to stick. I think they changed the grass around the greens and on the greens. I’m looking at it like I’m going to be there for the first time.”
Presidents Cup watch
Qualifying for the Presidents Cup, which will be played Sept. 26-29 at Royal Montreal Golf Club, ends with the final round of the BMW Championship. There are six automatic qualifiers for both teams, and Jim Furyk (U.S.) and Mike Weir (International) will each have six captain’s picks. Rosters will be finalized after the Tour Championship.
If the teams were selected today, Scheffler (13,184 points), Schauffele (8,717), Collin Morikawa (5,893), Wyndham Clark (5,219), Sahith Theegala (4,522) and Cantlay (4,481) would automatically qualify for the U.S. team based on the Presidents Cup points standings.
Tony Finau (3,865), Russell Henley (3,835), Max Homa (3,808), Brian Harman (3,757), Akshay Bhatia (3,384), Chris Kirk (3,337), Sam Burns (3,301), Eric Cole (3,086) and U.S. Ryder Cup captain Keegan Bradley (2,939) are also within striking distance of the top six.
Bradley has already been named one of Furyk’s vice captains. He could be a playing vice captain if he performs well in the playoffs.
“Right now, my team is my focus and I’m seeing how they shape out,” Furyk said. “It’s a puzzle, right? I don’t know if necessarily you’re trying to find the best 12 for a group [but] how am I going to make a group of 12 and come up with the best team that I possibly can.”
Longtime international competition veteran Justin Thomas is 15th in points with 2,982, and Spieth is 25th with 2,421. Last week, Spieth hinted that he might need offseason surgery to repair a tendon injury in his left wrist, so he might not be available to play anyhow.
Japan’s Hideki Matsuyama (4.1002) leads the International team points standings, followed by South Korea’s Tom Kim (3.3888) and Sungjae Im (3.3151), Australia’s Jason Day (3.0527) and Adam Scott (2.8322) and South Korea’s Byeong Hun An (2.8068).
Canadian golfers Corey Conners (2.6055), Nick Taylor (2.3372), Adam Hadwin (2.2853), Taylor Pendrith (2.2049) and Mackenzie Hughes (1.9146) are also in the mix.
South Africa’s Christiaan Bezuidenhout, who is enjoying his best season on tour, is 10th in points (2.3433)
“I’m not really going to do anything different than what I’ve been doing over the last six months,” Bezuidenhout said. “Obviously, the Presidents Cup is in the back of my mind. I would love to be on Mike Weir’s team in a month’s time. But I’m not going to put extra pressure on myself to make that side.”
The U.S. team has dominated the Presidents Cup since its inception in 1994, winning 12 of the 14 matches and tying once. The U.S. won the most recent match 17½ – 12½ at Quail Hollow Club in Charlotte, North Carolina, in 2022.
Player of the Year debate
Scheffler might have ended any doubt about him being the best golfer on tour when he captured a gold medal in Paris — or maybe not.
Scheffler has won six times on tour this season, including his second victory at the Masters. He captured four of eight signature events — Arnold Palmer Invitational, RBC Heritage, Memorial and Travelers Championship — as well as another win at the Players Championship. He has collected more than $28.1 million in on-course earnings, along with an $8 million bonus for finishing first in the Comcast Business Tour top 10.
Last year, Scheffler became the first back-to-back winner of the Jack Nicklaus Award, as voted by his peers, since Tiger Woods was player of the year three straight times from 2005 to 2007.
“I’m sure a lot of people start to ask themselves when voting comes for Player of the Year, so I think some of it will be decided by how they play these next three weeks,” Cantlay said. “But Scottie has played unbelievable golf. With the amount of tournament wins he’s had, it’s just been super impressive.”
Schauffele has won twice this year, capturing his first two majors at the PGA Championship and The Open. He was runner-up at the Players Championship and the Wells Fargo Championship. He has 17 top-25 finishes in 18 starts.
When a reporter asked Hovland which season he would take, Scheffler’s six victories or Schauffele’s two majors, he replied, “I mean, two majors. That sounds pretty nice to me.”