Why Scottie Scheffler will win $8 million without playing this week

It’s going to be a rain-soaked (and delayed) regular-season finale at the Wyndham Championship this week, adding another layer of difficulty to those trying to earn their way into the PGA Tour's postseason. But one of the week’s biggest winners already has been decided, and he won’t even be teeing it up.

That would be Scottie Scheffler, fresh off his gold-medal conquest in Paris. Though his Olympic triumph doesn’t confer any FedEx Cup points for the PGA Tour, Scheffler has six official tour wins this season, highlighted by his second Masters title and becoming the first player to defend the Players Championship. Scheffler’s other four victories—the Arnold Palmer Invitational, RBC Heritage, Memorial and Travelers Championship—were all signature series events, which carried higher FedEx Cup points allotments.

In short, Scheffler boatraced his competition in the tour’s season-long standings, his 5,993 points nearly 2,000 points ahead of Xander Schauffele and 3,500 in front of third-place Rory McIlroy. With this week’s Wyndham awarding 500 points to the winner (and with Schauffele sitting this week out), Scheffler has locked up the Comcast Top 10 pole position.

The prize, created for the 2018-19 season, is given to the tour’s top regular-season points getter, with Scheffler receiving $8 million for his performance. Scheffler won the honor in 2022 and finished second to Jon Rahm last season.

This brings Scheffler’s PGA Tour earnings to more than $36 million on the year. With the first two FedEx Cup playoff events offering purses of $20 million each, and the Tour Championship boasting $100 million this season (including $25 million to the winner), there’s still plenty of time for Scheffler to add to this total. This isn't counting the tour's Player Impact Program, which Scheffler should likely top for another $10 million. Scheffler already has the tour record for most earnings in one season, racking up $21 million last year.

Along with Scheffler, Schauffele and McIlroy, others in the top 10 heading into the week are Collin Morikawa, Wyndham Clark, Ludvig Aberg, Sahith Theegala, Hideki Matsuyama, Sungjae Im and Shane Lowry. Both Im and Lowry are in this week’s field; those who could crack the top 10 with a win include Akshay Bhatia (No. 15), Robert MacIntyre (No. 17), Brian Harman (No. 21) and Christiaan Bezuidenhout (No. 22).