National Sports
Scottie Scheffler works out on in the putting area during a practice round for the Tour Championship golf tournament on Wednesday in Atlanta. (AP photo)
ATLANTA — Scottie Scheffler is having another big season going into the final tournament of the year at the Tour Championship. He picked up a $23 million bonus last week as the leading player in the FedEx Cup. His PGA Tour earnings are over $20 million for the fourth consecutive year.
And that’s not the full measure.
Scheffler loves to play when he’s at home in Dallas, whether that’s at Royal Oaks or any other course in town. That often involves Si Woo Kim, who said earlier this year of their one-sided money matches, “He calls me ATM.”
Kim isn’t alone.
“Si Woo’s getting a lot of hard grief losing to Scottie. I’ve never beaten Scottie in Dallas,” Gary Woodland said Wednesday. “He asked me if I hand him money every time he sees me. Fortunately, that’s been the case.”
Woodland now lives in South Florida but has returned to working with Randy Smith, the Hall of Fame teacher who has taught Scheffler since he was a boy. He occasionally goes to Dallas for what Woodland calls “training camp.” The last such trip was right before Scheffler ended a seven-month drought by winning the FedEx Cup playoffs opener by eight shots.
“I was giving him a hard time that he couldn’t handle the pressure,” Woodland said. “He parred the last three holes and shot 60 one day. That didn’t work out for Si Woo and I. He’s hard to beat out here. He’s really hard to beat in Dallas.”
What’s at stake
Now the “out here” is East Lake for the Tour Championship, the most lucrative event of the season. The winner of the 30-man field claims a $10 million prize in official money from a $40 million purse.
That will change in two years when the PGA Tour overhauls its schedule and ends with a two-week Tour Championship of match play on two courses.
For now, it’s up for grabs. Tommy Fleetwood had not won on the PGA Tour all year in 2025 until capturing his first title on U.S. soil at just the right time — the Tour Championship, making him the FedEx Cup champion.
That could fall to someone like Patrick Cantlay, whose runner-up finish got him into East Lake, or a dozen others yet to win this week. It’s a 72-hole shootout for a big prize.
But there’s more at stake for Scheffler this week than just more money, and it’s not his chance to end the 26-year reign of Tiger Woods atop the PGA Tour’s career earnings list. He is in a tight race with U.S. Open champion Wyndham Clark for PGA Tour player of the year.
Scheffler has won the award the last four years, and while his consistency is the standard in today’s game — five runner-up finishes to go with two victories — Clark already has three wins, including the major and last week’s BMW Championship.
Scottie Scheffler works out on in the putting area during a practice round for the Tour Championship golf tournament on Wednesday in Atlanta. (AP photo)
Scottie Scheffler works out on in the putting area during a practice round for the Tour Championship golf tournament on Wednesday in Atlanta. (AP photo)