Although Justin Thomas finished two games behind Sepp Straka at The American Express, the two-time PGA Championship winner made PGA Tour history.
Cha ching! With the $959,200 payday, Thomas becomes only the 11th player to receive that amount More than $60 million During his career, per Brentley Romine of the Golf Channel. Thomas now sits 10th on the all-time career money list, passing Matt Kuchar thanks to his second-place finish in Palm Springs.
- Tiger Woods $120,999,166
- Rory McIlroy, $90,989,348
- Scotty Scheffler, $71,793,586
- Jim Furyk, $71,507,269
- Vijay Singh, $71,281,216
- Adam Scott, $68,248,165
- Justin Rose, $64,878,042
- Jordan Spieth, $62,741,970
- Jason Day, $61,731,563
- Justin Thomas, $60,827,898
- Matt Kuchar, $60,335,682
Given how huge the purses are on the PGA Tour, this list includes players who flourished at some point during the 21st century. Not surprisingly, Tiger Woods is at the top of the club, while Rory McIlroy is nearly $30 million behind the 15-time Grand Prix winner. Scottie Scheffler then sits in third place, but his career earnings have received a huge boost as a result of Signature Events – the $20 million events the PGA Tour has created in recent years to ensure the best players compete alongside the threat of LIV Golf.
Thomas could climb this list even higher if he plays well in these marquee events this season. It’s heading in that direction as well. His second singles goal of the week marked his best result since May 2022, when he defeated Will Zalatoris in a playoff at Southern Hills. He also finished second to Schaeffler in the Hero World Challenge last month, but that 20-man exhibition in the Bahamas is not considered an official PGA Tour event. Before that, Thomas tied for second place in Japan at the ZOZO Championship.
However, after shooting a bogey-free 66 on Sunday, Thomas said he didn’t have his “best shot” this week. Despite this suspension, Thomas ranked among the top 22 players in all of the strokes gained metrics and had 7,640 strikeouts overall, which was tied for fifth among the field.
“I had the opportunity. Obviously it wasn’t a great performance on the back nine, but I was proud of myself. I did what I had to do on the front nine today and at least made some noise and kind of moved up the leaderboard,” Thomas said. “…
“Obviously it was unfortunate that we had to stop there after 11, I really played a great game of golf today, hit some really good shots, made some great putts and also hit some great shots that didn’t go in… I feel like I’ve managed It’s all really good and I handled it well, just a couple of bogeys all week, but, yeah, in a place like this you have to be very sharp everywhere, and I’ll keep building.
When Thomas reached the 12th hole — a short, 346-yard par 4 — he had just made his sixth birdie of the day on 11 and was hungry for more. But a 15-foot birdie slid across the hole and Thomas went on to make six more putts after that, stopping as he implied.
“Just keep doing what I’m doing; I don’t need to change or do anything different; just keep building, keep working, tighten some things up,” Thomas said about what he needs to do to get over the hump and win.
“I feel like my wedge game was nowhere near where I like it to be. So, yeah, just keep working on it and working because we have a big period coming up that I’m excited about.
Thomas is not in the field at the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines but will start the following week at Pebble Beach for the second feature event of the season. If he wins there, not only will he get a healthy dose of confidence, but he will also move to the top of the career earnings list with a $4 million payday.
Jack Melko is a golf staff writer for SB Nation’s Play Through. Follow him on X @jack_milko.
