On its face, the Tour Championship would seem such a simple tournament to understand and follow. The PGA Tour’s season finale has a limited field of 30 players, each earning their way into the event based on their play over the course of the season. And this year, the winner will once again also be crowned the FedEx Cup champion.
With us so far?
Good, because for 2025, the event does have a few new wrinkles, including the prize money payout being handed out come Sunday at Atlanta’s East Lake Golf Club. Let’s start with the fact that all 30 players will begin the tournament at even par. Isn’t that how every PGA Tour event works? Yes, but it was a switch made mid-season and a departure from what had been done since 2019 at the Tour Championship, where the FedEx Cup points leader entering the event started at 10 under par and the rest of the field trailed by a certain number of strokes based on their place in the rankings.
That’s all gone this year, but the winner this week will still claim the two titles.
The winner, however, will be making a little less than in the past few years yet more than any tournament winner has ever made in official prize money.
Say what? (We told you there were a few wrinkles.)
So along with the decision to do away with the staggered start at the Tour Championship, the PGA Tour Policy Board also changed how the $100 million FedEx Cup bonus pool would be distributed. Rather than have it all be decided on the finish at the Tour Championship—when Scottie Scheffler claimed last year earned $25 million for being the FedEx Cup winner—$60 million has already been allocated after the Wyndham Championship and last week’s BMW Championship.
That leaves $40 million being offered as a purse this week, with the winner earning $10 million. And this will all be official prize money that counts toward players’ career money totals. That means that technically speaking this week’s event will be offering an all-time record prize money payout overall and for the winner.
So, if Scheffler wins this week, with the way the money is being allocated, he would become the third player in history to earn more than $100 million in career prize money (he’s at $95.7 million, and would pass Phil Mickelson at No. 2). And if Rory McIlroy wins, his career money number would jump to $117.5 million, which puts him in line to pass Tiger Woods (at $120.9 million) on the all-time list at some point next season.
Here’s the prize money payout for each golfer this week at East Lake. We’ll update this list shortly after the conclusion of the tournament with names and individual paydays.
Win: $10,000,000
2: $5,000,000
3: $3,705,000
4: $3,200,000
5: $2,750,000
6: $1,900,000
7: $1,400,000
8: $1,065,000
9: $900,000
10: $735,000
11: $695,000
12: $660,000
13: $625,000
14: $590,000
15: $560,000
16: $505,000
17: $490,000
18: $475,000
19: $460,000
20: $445,000
21: $430,000
22: $415,000
23: $400,000
24: $390,000
25: $380,000
26: $375,000
27: $370,000
28: $365,000
29: $360,000
30: $355,000
This article was originally published on golfdigest.com
