About That Player Of The Year Vote

A major victory isn't enough for Jon Rahm to overcome Tour politics. But at least he was in Maui just in case players voted for the Masters champion.

PGA Tour golfers voted Scottie Scheffler their 2023 player of the year just days after what’s left of the golf writers overwhelmingly awarded the same honor to Jon Rahm.

While we have no idea how many players voted, in announcing a decision that no longer comes with the endorsement of accountants at Grant Thornton or PriceWaterhouse, Scheffler received 38% of the vote over Wyndham Clark, Viktor Hovland, Rory McIlroy and Jon Rahm.

In the Golf Writers Association of America vote for 2023 player of the year, Rahm received 48.9% of the first place votes over Hovland (33%) and Scheffler (18.1%).

The 38% of players voting for Scheffler tells us a lot. Assuming Clark and McIlroy split something like 5% of the vote for their excellent but-not-quite POY-worthy years, this leaves 57% of the votes between Rahm’s four-wins, highlighted by the Masters and the almost-major Genesis at Riviera, and Hovland’s FedExCup win as part of a three-win year that included the almost-major Memorial at Muirfield Village.

I loathe even griping about award stuff because there is usually, (A) a political and popularity contest-component to any player-vote, (B) past signs of possible Global Home vote manipulation in the name of elevating the FedExCup, and, (C) complaining about the winner means belittling what was a sensational year for a player like Scheffler (even if he failed to win a major).

It’s just that Scheffler’s 2023 was not quite as sensational as Rahm’s given that he captured the trophy most players want the most. Or even when compared with Hovland’s campaign based on the supposed precedent of winning the FedExCup.

A recap of the year:

Jon Rahm

• Wins: Sentry, Amex, Genesis, Masters

• Majors: 1-T50-T10-2

• 10 top 10’s on the PGA Tour

Viktor Hovland

• Wins: Memorial, BMW, Tour Championship

• Majors: T7-T2-19-T13

• 9 top 10’s on the PGA Tour

Scottie Scheffler

• Wins: WM Phoenix, The Players

• Majors: T10-T2-3-T23

• 17 Top 10’s

Scheffler won the Royal Selangor Trophy for best overall score in the majors, a fact maybe five or six players were likely aware of and a nugget certainly not mentioned in the announcement. It would have made the outcome more credible.

In the race between players who made all four major cuts, Scheffler edged Hovland by two and Rahm by three. Tremendous years for all. But only one of the three captured a major along with a victory at Riviera, where the OWGR field rating was only 44 points lower than The Players, always the strongest in golf.

In 2021 I wrote about how U.S. Open champion Rahm lost the same Tour-managed player vote to Patrick Cantlay when six majors were in the mix due to COVID-19. Rahm went 23-7-T5-T8-1-T3 in the 2020-21 major season. He finished second at the Tour Championship by a stroke to Cantlay and had his Memorial win nullified after a positive COVID test.

Meanwhile, Cantlay went 31-17-MC-T23-T15-MC in the majors. Even more incredible was this gem from Kyle Porter:

“Cantlay and Rahm played in the same tournament 17 times this season. Rahm finished ahead of him in 13 of those, including all six majors and the Players. Cantlay finished ahead of Rahm three times (one of them was the Memorial!), and one was a MC for both.”

And the players voted for Cantlay. (The writers voted for Open Champion Collin Morikawa because the award was only for 2021 play and his season included a Race to Dubai win.)

In the grand scheme these awards do not matter. But it’s a worrying sign if players are not valuing majors, transparency or Tour status.