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Scottie Scheffler leaves East Lake this week with the FedEx Cup title and a $25 million cool bonusbut it will be Collin Morikawa, who officially lost to Scheffler by four shots, who gets the most Official World Golf Ranking points from this week.
That’s because Morikawa actually beat Scottie Scheffler by two strokes this week. In fact, he wasn’t the only one as Sahith Theegala also beat the FedEx Cup winner this week.
This was the sixth edition of the Tourist Championship played under a unique stacked stroke format which saw Scheffler, the FedEx Cup leader for the better part of the last six months, start the week at 10 under par with a two-shot lead.
Morikawa and Theegala, meanwhile, started the week at four and three under, respectively, after strong but winless seasons. The format was developed to help eliminate confusion with chasing points during the final event and to remove the possibility of one player winning the tournament championship and another winning the FedEx Cup title.
One could have made the argument Scheffler, after a historic regular season in which he won the Masters, the Champions League and four other titles, might have deserved a better head start. Ironically, Scheffler himself made an argument against the format just a few weeks ago at the first playoff event in Memphis.
“I’ve been talking about it the last few years, I think it’s stupid,” he said before the FedEx St. Louis Championship. Jew. “You can’t call it a season competition and it comes down to a tournament.
“Hypothetically, we get to East Lake and my neck flares up and doesn’t heal the way it did at The Players. I finish 30th in the FedEx Cup because I had to withdraw from the last tournament? Is this really a season long race? No, it is what it is.”
However, he ended up winning by four from Morikawa.
But take away the initial shots and the final leaderboard looks a lot different.
The top three players in the final standings, Scheffler, Morikawa and Theegala, were still separated from the rest of the field with Scheffler still three better than anyone else, but the order changes. Morikawa takes the “gross” title if you will and Theegala comes in second.
Of course, if Scheffler had seen the leaderboard without a shot, he might have played a few shots, including his conservative par on the par-5 18th, otherwise. But it’s interesting to pick out who played well this week.
For example, Justin Thomas had the 7th best week of anyone at East Lake, going 14 under, but he started the week at even par and ended the week at 14 under, which was even for him. 14-in.
Continue reading below for the tournament’s final standings without kick-off.
No Shots Tournament Championship Leaderboard
(Official Level Results)
1. Collin Morikawa, -22 (-26)
2. Sahith Theegala, -21 (-24)
3. Scottie Scheffler, -20 (-30)
4. Russell Henley, -17 (-19)
5. Adam Scott, -16 (-19)
6. My Sungjae, -15 (-18)
7. Justin Thomas, -14 (-14)
T8. Wyndham Clark, -13 (-17)
Shane Lowry (-16)
Viktor Hovland (-15)
Taylor Pendrith (-14)
12. Rory McIlroy, -12 (-16)
T13. Xander Schauffele, -11 (-19)
Sam Burns (-15)
15. Matthew Pavon, -10 (-11)
T16 Hideki Matsuyama, -9 (-16)
Robert MacIntyre (-11)
Tommy Fleetwood (-10)
T19. Ludwig Aberg, -7 (-12)
Patrick Cantlay (-11)
T21. Byeong Hun An, -6 (-8)
Aaron Ray (-6)
23. Billy Horschel, -5 (-6)
T24. Tony Finau, -3 (-6)
Akshay Bhatia (-5)
Chris Kirk (-3)
T27. Keegan Bradley, -2 (-8)
Sepp Straka (-3)
T29. Christiaan Bezuidenhout, +3 (+3)
Tom Hoge (+3)