The Tour Championship
Viktor Hovland shot a course-record 61 (including a 28 on the back nine) Sunday to win the BMW Championship by two strokes at -17 over Matt Fitzpatrick and Scottie Scheffler and cashed a 17-1 ticket for this column.
The 61 was Hovland’s career low and the lowest final-round score in the history of the FedEx Cup Playoffs. He made 12 threes in what was close to a flawless round: 12 of 14 fairways (he led the field for the week at 43-for-56), 16 of 18 greens hit, first in Strokes Gained: Tee to Green, second in Strokes Gained: Putting.
Scheffler, who started Sunday tied at the top with Fitzpatrick, three ahead of Hovland and Rory McIlroy, birdied two of the first three holes, three of the first six and led for most of the day. The last five holes, however, featured a dramatic reversal. Scheffler played them in 1 over par, while Hovland, playing up ahead, blitzed them in 4 under.
Rounding out the top 10 were Rory McIlroy (-12, 4th), Brian Harman and Max Homa (-11, T-5), Sungjae Im (-10, 7th), Russell Henley and Xander Schauffele (-9, T-8), and Tom Kim, Harris English, Andrew Putnam, Corey Conners and Denny McCarthy (-7, T-10).
This week, the PGA Tour heads to East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta for the final event of the FedEx Cup Playoffs at the Tour Championship.
Despite failing to close at Olympia Fields, Scheffler (3-2 with starting strokes; 11-2 in the low 72-hole market) will begin with the lead at -10 at the Tour Championship courtesy of being the current FedEx Cup points leader. Hovland (11-2; 10-1 low 72-hole market) will start at -8 while McIlroy (7-2; 11-2 low 72-hole market), a three-time FedEx Cup winner and a three-time winner of the Tour Championship, will start at -7.
Jon Rahm (+850; 10-1 low 72-hole market) will start at -6 and Lucas Glover (55-1; 50-1 low 72-hole market), a winner two weeks ago at the FedEx St. Jude Championship in Memphis, will start at -5.
Patrick Cantlay (18-1; 11-1 low 72-hole market), the 2021 FedEx Cup winner, will start six strokes back at -4 along with Homa (35-1; 18-1 low 72-hole market), Harman (60-1; 40-1 low 72-hole market), Wyndham Clark (55-1; 35-1 72-hole market) and Fitzpatrick (55-1; 28-1 72-hole market).
Several shops will also offer a low 72-hole market along with the aforementioned market that includes the FedEx Cup starting strokes.
The Event
The Tour Championship began in November 1987 as an event for the top 30 PGA Tour leading money winners and became the final event of the FedEx Cup Playoffs in 2007. With only 30 players, there is no 36-hole cut. The FedEx Cup winner receives $18 million out of the $75 million bonus money pool plus a five-year PGA Tour exemption. Although the staggered scoring mentioned above will determine the FedEx Cup winner, the scores (actual under-par score) without the seeding adjustment will determine the OWGR points allocation.
The Tour Championship started with the staggered starting strokes format back in 2019.
The FedEx Cup points Leader starts at -10. Second begins at -8, third at -7, fourth at -6, 5th at -5. Then 6-10 in the standings begin at -4, 11-15 at -3, 16-20 at -2, 21-25 at -1, and 26-30 at even par.
Here is the staggered starting scoring for this week’s Tour Championship:
-10
Scottie Scheffler
-8
Viktor Hovland
-7
Rory McIlroy
-6
Jon Rahm
-5
Lucas Glover
-4
Max Homa, Patrick Cantlay, Brian Harman, Wyndham Clark, Matt Fitzpatrick
-3
Tommy Fleetwood, Russell Henley, Keegan Bradley, Rickie Fowler, Xander Schauffele
-2
Tom Kim, Sungjae Im, Tony Finau, Corey Conners, Si Woo Kim
-1
Taylor Moore, Nick Taylor, Adam Schenk, Collin Morikawa, Jason Day
Even
Sam Burns, Emiliano Grillo, Tyrrell Hatton, Jordan Spieth, Sepp Straka
The Course
East Lake Golf Club has been the permanent home of the Tour Championship since 2004. Located about five miles east of downtown Atlanta, East Lake, the oldest course in the city, was designed by Donald Ross in 1913 and has undergone several renovations, most recently by Rees Jones in 2008 and 2015. After the Ross rebuild, the course basically remained untouched until some changes were made before the 1963 Ryder Cup. Not long after the United States team destroyed Europe in that event, the neighborhood surrounding East Lake began to deteriorate and the course fell into disarray and was mostly forgotten. Fast forward to 1993 when the property was purchased by the East Lake Foundation and began restoring the course as a tribute to Bobby Jones.
The tree-lined parklands plays as a par-70 of 7,346 yards. Typically a par-72 layout for the members, the first and 14th holes are converted from par-5s to long par-4s, which adds to the toughness of the course. The Jones renovations reversed the nines so that the ninth (par-5) is now the closing 18th hole. In 2008, the greens were changed from Bentgrass to faster (12 stimpmeter) MiniVerde Bermuda. The narrowest (24.5-yard average) fairways on the PGA Tour are Meyer Zoysiagrass and the rough is a 2.5-inch thick Tifway Bermudagrass (which can be trickier because it wraps around the ball), but missing the fairways would not be ideal considering the fast greens, which are 5,619 square feet on average. East Lake also possesses many uneven lies and has high elevation (1,050 feet, fourth highest on tour). The front and back nines start off playing uphill at the lake. With the exception of four holes, the routing is east to west with holes typically playing either into the wind or downwind.
The course itself starts off straightforward with the first four holes being rather nondescript. Once past that early section, the course provides an interesting mix of difficult and easy holes. The par-5s are reachable in two shots and, along with the par-3s, provide plenty of risk/reward opportunities. The last six holes provide quite the challenging closing stretch. The highlights include the island par-3 15th hole. The 18th is a long par-5 that usually has the tees moved up on Sunday to entice players to be aggressive on their approach.
Players know they must position approach shots below the pin because the downhill putts are very quick. Like most of the other designs, East Lake features vintage Ross greens with back-to-front pitches and tightly mowed runoffs into collection areas. This is not a track that you can necessarily overpower with a bomb-and-gouge strategy.
East Lake has an average round of -0.94 under par since 2018. The track is made up of of 12 par-4s (9 at 440+), four par-3s (3 at 210+), and two par-5s (easiest on tour at -0.54).
The closest course correlations are Augusta National, TPC Southwind, Quail Hollow, TPC Potomac, Innisbrook and Memorial Park.
In addition, here are some other Donald Ross layouts and Rees Jones redesigns that have been featured in recent years on the PGA Tour:
Donald Ross
Aronimink: 2010/11 AT&T National + 2019 BMW Championship
Detroit Golf Club: Rocket Mortgage Classic
East Course at Oak Hill: 2013 PGA Championship
Pinehurst No. 2: 2014 US Open
Plainfield: 2011 and 2015 Barclays
Sedgefield Country Club: Wyndham Championship
Rees Jones
Aronimink GC: 2010, 2011 A&T National and 2018 BMW Championship
Baltusrol: 2016 PGA Championship
Bellerive CC: 2018 PGA Championship
Bethpage Black: 2009 U.S Open, 2019 PGA Championship and 2012, 2016 The Barclays
Blue Course, Congressional CC: 2011 U.S. Open and 2012-2014 & 2016 National
Blue Course, Royal Montreal GC: 2014 RBC Canadian Open
Dubsdread, Cog Hill GCC: 2009, 2010, 2011 BMW Championship
GC of Houston: Houston Open
Hazeltine: 2009 PGA Championship
Highlands Course, Atlanta Athletic Club: 2011 PGA Championship
Medinah No. 3: 2019 BMW Championship
Torrey Pines South Course: Farmers Insurance Open and 2008 and 2021 U.S. Open
Recent History
Tour Championship winners
2022: Rory McIlroy -21 (-17/263); 12-1
2021: Patrick Cantlay -21 (-11/269); 4-1
2020: Dustin Johnson -21 (-11/269); 2-1
2019: Rory McIlroy -18 (-13/267); 9-1
2018: Tiger Woods (-11/269); 14-1
2017: Xander Schauffele (-12/268); 100-1
2016: Rory McIlroy (-12/268); 13-2*
2015: Jordan Spieth (-9/271); 9-1
2014: Billy Horschel (-11/269); 25-1
2013: Henrik Stenson (-13/267); 16-1
2012: Brandt Snedeker (-10/270); 40-1
2011: Bill Haas (-8/272); 45-1**
2010: Jim Furyk (-8/272); 20-1
2009: Phil Mickelson (-9/271)
2008: Camilo Villegas (-7/273)**
2007: Tiger Woods (-23/257)
Playoff win over Kevin Chappell & Ryan Moore – *
Playoff win over Hunter Mahan – **
Playoff win over Sergio Garcia – ***
72-Hole Low Scorers
2022: Rory McIlroy; 8-1 (-17/263)
2021: Kevin Na; 70-1 and Jon Rahm; 7-1 (-14/266)
2020: Xander Schauffele; 12-1 (-12/268)
2019: Rory McIlroy; 8-1 (-13/267)
Trends and Angles
Since the starting strokes format began in 2019:
— The worst the leader with starting strokes of -10 has finished was T-3 (2019).
— The second-place starter at -8 has finished inside the top 5 only once in four years.
— No player from a starting position of -1 or even has ever finished inside the top 5.
— Every year, at least one player starting at -2 has ended up inside the top 5.
— The top 3 has included at least one player who started between -2 to -4 each year.
Statistical Analysis
The driver was used off the tee 83.5% last year at East Lake, so distance helps but so does accuracy on what are the narrowest fairways on tour. Total Driving takes into account Driving Distance plus Driving Accuracy.
Total Driving (2022-2023 PGA Tour season)
