Scottie Scheffler is accustomed to holding a No. 1 ranking, and on Sunday, the top active player in the world became the highest-earning player in PGA Tour history. With his second Tour Championship and FedEx Cup victory on Sunday at East Lake Golf Club, Scheffler took home $10 million and surged ahead of Tiger Woods to grab the top spot on the PGA Tour's all-time money list. Scheffler entered the week $600,000 behind Woods' $120,999,166 career total, and he will now move well clear of Woods after earning $14.1 million over the last three weeks.
Tiger remained in the top spot for nearly a quarter century, originally taking over No. 1 on the all-time list on Feb. 13, 2000. Scheffler has now earned $130,390,661 in his career, standing more than $11 million ahead of Rory McIlroy among active PGA Tour stars. McIlroy similarly inched closer to Woods with a $1.7 million check for a T4 finish that got him to just over $119.5 million in career earnings.
Another victory -- or multiple high finishes -- will push Rory past Tiger and into the No. 2 spot sooner than later. It's a testament to Woods' dominance that he remained atop the money list for so long, given the exponential growth of PGA Tour purses over the last decade-plus. While Scheffler has been uber-successful over the last few years, he has been able to stack massive winner's shares that Woods did not, even as Tiger's presence and success were among the main reasons the game exploded financially for players.
It was Woods' popularity that laid the foundation for those purse increases, but the introduction of the FedExCup Playoff and eventually signature events -- the latter combating one-time rival LIV Golf -- led to regular eight-figure purses throughout the PGA Tour season. It was only a matter of time before Tiger was passed, but Scheffler more than earned his place atop the list given his absurdly consistent play over recent years. At just 30 years old, Scheffler will have plenty of time to set a new mark to beat on the career money list.
With the introduction of the PGA Tour Championship Series in 2028 -- where each event will carry a $20 million purse -- he could clear $200 million in on-course earnings relatively quickly should he continue his quality of play, potentially creating a Tiger-like gap between himself and the rest of his peers.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
