FedEx St. Jude opens PGA Tour playoffs
TPC Southwind is known for its water hazards and has historically rewarded precise ball-striking.
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TPC Southwind is known for its water hazards and has historically rewarded precise ball-striking.
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The PGA Tour’s season-long playoffs begin this week with the FedEx St. Jude Championship, where the top 70 players in the FedExCup standings will battle at TPC Southwind in Memphis for a chance to advance to the next stage.
Set in the rolling countryside just southeast of Memphis, TPC Southwind will host a FedExCup playoff event for the fifth consecutive year after serving as a regular PGA Tour stop for more than three decades.
The course is known for its water hazards and has historically rewarded precise ball-striking. Recent champions include Hideki Matsuyama, Will Zalatoris, Justin Thomas, Brooks Koepka, Dustin Johnson, Abraham Ancer and two-time winner Daniel Berger, who withdrew earlier this week.
Defending champion Justin Rose also arrived in Memphis in strong ball-striking form last year, gaining 9.4 strokes in that category over his two starts leading into the tournament before defeating J.J. Spaun in a playoff.
TPC Southwind also tends to favor players with experience on Bermuda grass, with firm greens and penal rough expected to test the field in the heat and humidity of the American South.
There will be no cut this week, but the field will be reduced significantly after Memphis. Only the top 50 players in the FedExCup standings will advance to next week’s BMW Championship, while the top 30 after that event will qualify for the season-ending Tour Championship in Atlanta.
With a $20 million purse and 750 FedExCup points at stake for the winner, the tournament carries added significance for players hovering around the top-50 cutoff.
World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler leads the field and enters the playoffs atop the FedExCup standings following another dominant season.
Matt Fitzpatrick, Cameron Young, Wyndham Clark, Chris Gotterup, Collin Morikawa, Si Woo Kim, Sam Burns, Tommy Fleetwood and Ludvig Aberg round out the top 10 in the standings heading into Memphis.
Rory McIlroy will also return to TPC Southwind after skipping the event last season, while Rose is back to defend his title.
With the first major cut of the playoffs looming after this week, the FedEx St. Jude Championship is expected to set the tone for the final stretch of the PGA Tour seas.
