The “5th Major” is upon us with the 48th edition of The Players Championship this week!

Why do they call it the 5th Major? Three reasons… 1. The Purse 2. The Course 3. The Field

The Purse

This week’s purse will be the largest of any event EVER contested on the PGA Tour. The top 65 players (and players tied with the 65th position) will share a purse of $20 million come Sunday afternoon. Rory McIlroy won The Players Championship in May of 2019 and the purse that year was $12.5 million—a whopping 60% increase in less than three years.

The prize for first place you ask?

$3.6 million aka $3,600,000! That’s a lot of zeros for four rounds of golf!

No other event winner has ever cracked $3 million before this weekend, so this is a “major” jump in payout.

To comprehend the size of this week’s purse, of the four majors from last year—The Masters, The PGA Championship, The U.S. Open, and The Open Championship—the largest purse was $12.4 million. Hideki Matsuyama’s Masters victory netted him $2.07 million for first place last year. This year’s Players Champion will make nearly 50% more than that.

It's perhaps not as much notoriety as winning any of the four majors, but the winner will certainly be able to afford a few new clubs (or houses/cars/boats, etc.) with a victory this weekend at TPC Sawgrass in Ponte Verda Beach, Florida!

The Course

While this is the 48th edition of The Players Championship, TPC Sawgrass has only been the home of this event since 1982. The course was opened in the fall of 1980 and is the home of The PGA Tour headquarters. It will play to a length of 7189 yards and a par of 72. The closing three holes, 16-17-18, have historically been the three holes that decide the championship each year and continue to be one of the hardest stretches of golf of any event on tour.

Railroad ties and heavy use of water throughout the course are what make this course so memorable. The railroad ties and lakes on 17 out of the 18 holes are a calling card of Pete Dye who designed the course. He was quoted as saying he had no physical blueprints for the design at Sawgrass and pretty much drew out the entire layout on the back of a placemat at his favorite restaurant. The famous island green on 17 even came as an idea from his wife Alice! Mr. Dye was perplexed as to how he would fit the 17th hole in between the 16th green and 18th teebox, so his wife suggested to him, “Why don’t you build a bulkhead in the middle and build an island green?” to which Pete responded, “…we’ll probably get killed for it, but let’s do it!”

Here is a great clip from The PGA Tour with Pete Dye as the narrator explaining the design, layout, and challenges of 16-17-18.

While the closing stretch is no doubt something to watch for this week, another important aspect of this week’s tournament will be the weather. Thursday, Friday, and Saturday’s forecast calls for heavy rain of up to an inch or more, coupled with strong winds and thunderstorms. This will certainly make the conditions challenging. Scores will sure be higher than in previous years! Saturday morning could be especially interesting with sustained winds in the 20-30 mph range!

The Field

This year’s field will be 140 players deep and will showcase the top ten golfers in the world. Justin Thomas will be defending his 2021 Players Championship title—he made a clutch birdie on the 16th hole on Sunday last year to hold off Lee Westwood and Bryson DeChambeau to claim his first Players title.

The PGA Tour has grouped the best in the world together for the first two rounds which will for sure deliver some fireworks!

• 7:51 am: Viktor Hovland (#3 in OGWR), Patrick Cantlay (#4 in OGWR), Jon Rahm (#1 in OGWR)
• 12:34 pm: Daniel Berger (#20 in OGWR), Dustin Johnson (#9 in OGWR), Jordan Spieth (#14 in OGWR)
• 12:45 pm: Scottie Scheffler (#5 in OGWR), Brooks Koepka (#18 in OGWR), Xander Schauffele (#7 in OGWR)
• 12:56 pm: Rory McIlroy (#6 in OGWR), Collin Morikawa (#2 in OGWR), Justin Thomas (#8 in OGWR)

The Favorites

Right now, the Vegas oddsmakers have Jon Rahm as the favorite, at +1200 to win. Defending champion Justin Thomas and World #2 Collin Morikawa aren’t far behind at +1400. Viktor Hovland led most of last week's Arnold Palmer Invitational but just couldn’t quite close the deal when things got tough down the stretch. That enabled World #5 golfer Scottie Scheffler to claim the title.

I like Viktor’s chance to emerge with a statement victory this week. This could be when he finally gets his first win in the United States. Of course, I fully expect Collin Morikawa and Patrick Cantlay to contend and finish near the top of the leaderboard as well!

My sleeper isn’t really a sleeper. Brooks Koepka has had somewhat of a quiet start to 2022, and with his new hairdo, he seems prime to break through and remind the rest of the golfing world that he is one of the best players on the planet.

Coverage

• Thursday, March 10: 12-6 p.m. ET (Golf Channel, ESPN+)
• Friday, March 11: 12-6 p.m. ET (Golf Channel, ESPN+)
• Saturday, March 12: 1-6 p.m. ET (NBC, Peacock)
• Sunday, March 13: 1-6 p.m. ET (NBC, Peacock)

A Look Ahead

Watch out for my updates after the tournament as I'll recap the exciting conclusion of the “5th Major” and look at how many balls ended up in the water on the 17th green, as well as what’s in the winner’s bag! As always if you ever need any help or have any questions about golf equipment, feel free to message me or any of our other great Golf Experts here on Curated!