Scottie Scheffler in landslide to win PGA Tour Player of the Year for third straight time
Scottie Scheffler added another trophy to his impressive display on Tuesday when he won the Jack Nicklaus Award as PGA Tour Player of the Year…
Scottie Scheffler added another trophy to his impressive display on Tuesday when he won the Jack Nicklaus Award as PGA Tour Player of the Year in a landslide, joining Tiger Woods as the only players to win the award three consecutive times.
Scheffler won 91% of the players’ votes and seemed like the obvious choice given the victories he has racked up, including an Olympic gold medal when he shot 62 on the final day.
His seven PGA Tour victories included a second Masters title, and he became the first repeat winner of the Players Championship. He also won the Tour Championship to win the FedEx Cup. His other four victories were all signature events against the strongest fields – Bay Hill and Memorial, Hilton Head and Hartford.
While no one could match that year, there was the question of how players would view Xander Schauffele’s rare feat of winning two majors in one year, at the PGA Championship and the British Open. Scheffler’s standard was too much to neglect.
Schauffele became the first player to win two majors and not be voted Player of the Year since the award began in 1990. Nick Faldo won the Masters and British Open in 1990, but he was not a member of the PGA Tour and ineligible for the prize.
Rory McIlroy was the third name on the ballot.
Woods is an 11-time winner of the award, winning five times in a row (1999 to 2003) and three times in a row (2005-2007).
McIlroy is the only other player to win the award three times, in 2012, 2014 and 2019.
“Scottie has met the challenges of the world’s best players on the biggest stages all season, and to be honored as PGA Tour Player of the Year is the ultimate sign of respect from his peers,” said Commissioner Jay Monahan.
Scheffler also won the Byron Nelson Award for the second year in a row for having the lowest average. He continued to win titles was his streak of 28 consecutive rounds under par to start the year.
He wasn’t finished in a round until Saturday at the PGA Championship, the day after his arrest he entered Valhalla while a traffic death was under investigation. The charges were dropped a few weeks later, a strange episode in an otherwise impeccable season.
The PGA Tour keeps a huge menu of statistics – one of them “from the edge of the fairway” – but Scheffler was around the top in most of the big ones involving strokes gained. He was for the first time overall and approaching the green, second off the tee. He was 77th, tried a new ‘claw’ that took over in the Bahamas last week and won the six-man Hero World Challenge.
He broke the PGA Tour results record, somewhat inevitable given the spike in prize money this year with 11 tournaments with prize pools of $20 million or more, not counting the four majors.
Scheffler has won just over $29.2 million in 18 official tournaments with prize money, as well as the $25 million FedEx Cup bonus and the $8 million season lead bonus regular.
___
AP Golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf
