A common refrain used when praising elite golf courses is that they “reward great shots and punish the bad ones.” TPC Sawgrass lives out that adage every year.
Hence, the following statistics about the 2024 Players Championship:
• The field made 212 double bogeys or worse, more than any tournament on the schedule besides the U.S. Open and The Open Championship.
• The field’s birdie average (3.97 per round) was higher than that of the Mexico Open (3.95).
One of the most unpredictable weeks in championship golf is here. Here are the top numbers and notes to know entering the 2025 Players.
1. For more than 40 years, the brilliance of this Pete and Alice Dye design was apparent through its diverse array of champions. Until Scheffler did it last year, no player — not even prime Tiger Woods — was able to win this championship in back-to-back fashion. Power and youth could rule one week (2004, Adam Scott, 23, fifth in driving distance) and the complete opposite (2005, Fred Funk, 48, last in driving distance) might immediately follow.
A distinct pattern has presented itself recently at TPC Sawgrass, though. This will be the sixth playing of this championship since it moved back to its customary March spot on the schedule in 2019. Those five editions of The Players have swung heavily toward elite ball-striking, with iron play carrying an extreme premium. Players champions since 2019 have gained nearly 44 percent of their total strokes gained from approach shots. At every other PGA Tour event in that span, that figure is just 34 percent.
Four of the last five Players champs led the field that week in strokes gained tee-to-green, including Scheffler each of the last two years. None of those four ranked better than 37th for the week in strokes gained putting. Those who have finished in the top five at TPC Sawgrass since 2019 have hit more than 70 percent of their greens in regulation that week, a significant uptick from the field average.
So, are we due for an unconventional champion this week, someone from the Craig Perks or Si Woo Kim mold? Or will the proven-ball-striker theme persist again at the top of the leaderboard in 2025?
2. Scheffler caused significant edits to the Players Championship record books with his performance last year. His finishing total of 20-under-par was the lowest by anyone since 1994 and the best by a defending champion by 10 strokes. He finished the week with 31 consecutive holes without a dropped shot, the longest such run to finish a Players victory.
Scottie is a combined 37-under-par the last two years at TPC Sawgrass, 12 shots better than any other player. He leads all players in that stretch in strokes gained off the tee, greens in regulation and bogey avoidance. The world No. 1 is trying to become the first player to win any PGA Tour event back-to-back-to-back since Steve Stricker three-peated at the John Deere Classic from 2009 to 2011.
Scheffler has played fine golf so far in 2025 — a tie for third at the Genesis Invitational being the high point to date — but he’s yet to reach the impossible standard he set in 2024. When Scheffler arrived at Sawgrass a year ago, he was averaging a preposterous 1.20 strokes gained approach per round for the season. This year, that number is 0.70 per round.
Even with that in mind, Scheffler has habitually achieved unprecedented results on the golf course in the last few seasons. It’s difficult to expect anything less than being in contention this coming Sunday.
3. When Rory McIlroy won The Players in 2019, he carved up TPC Sawgrass with his irons, hitting more than 80 percent of his greens in regulation. While his play around the greens wasn’t perfect (57.1 percent scrambling, 40th in the field), he still tied for fewest bogeys or worse in the field for the week (six).
Since his victory, he’s not finished in the top 15 and missed the cut twice. McIlroy’s approach play has been very good in those 12 rounds, picking up nearly 10 full strokes. His primary foil has come after the occasional misfire into greens: He’s saved par from greenside bunkers just 26 percent of the time and got up-and-down at just a 50 percent clip overall.
At Bay Hill last week, McIlroy putted well, gaining more than a stroke per round on the greens. His iron play has diminishing returns each day, though, culminating in just nine greens in regulation in the final round. Rory will need to rediscover those 2019 approach shots to be a factor this weekend.
4. Collin Morikawa led a charmed existence early in his professional career. In just eight major championship starts, he picked up a pair of victories, the fewest for a two-time men’s major winner since the great Bobby Jones. Now 28, Morikawa is in the midst of a more familiar run for a pro golfer: maddeningly close, but no trophies. Last week at Bay Hill was Morikawa’s ninth top-five finish on the PGA Tour over the last two seasons — three more than any other player without a win in that span.
Promise should reign over pessimism, though, in the Morikawa camp. His underlying numbers are sensational, leading the PGA Tour this season in strokes gained tee-to-green and strokes gained total. Last season, he ranked 113th on Tour in average proximity to the hole. He’s first on tour so far in 2025.
Morikawa appeared to have the red alpaca sweater sewn away Sunday in Orlando before Russell Henley chipped in for eagle at 16, pushing him to second place. The last player to win The Players Championship the week after finishing runner-up on the PGA Tour was Jack Nicklaus in 1978. This will be Morikawa’s fifth Players appearance, his best finish being a tie for 13th in 2023.
5. Ludvig Ǻberg wasn’t phased much by the game’s biggest stages when he made his debut on many of them in 2024. TPC Sawgrass was one of those arenas where he felt right at home: a pair of 67s on the weekend gave him an eighth-place finish. For the week, Ǻberg ranked in the top 10 in many of the key ball striking metrics but was 57th in strokes gained putting among players to make the cut.
6. Another key figure in the 2024 Players narrative was Xander Schauffele, who made his return to PGA Tour competition last week after missing about two months with a rib injury. Schauffele held a one-shot lead through 54 holes last year at TPC Sawgrass before succumbing to Scheffler’s closing 64.
In his pair of T2 finishes at this championship, he’s gained nearly a stroke and a half per round with his approach play and scrambled at a 77.5 percent clip. In his four other starts here, he’s lost strokes with his irons and got up-and-down just 50 percent of the time. Schauffele, McIlroy and Scheffler will be grouped in Rounds 1 and 2, just as they were last year at the Masters and U.S. Open.
Strokes gained tee to green ranks of @THEPLAYERS champs since the switch back to March
2019 McIlroy – 1st2021 Thomas – 1st2022 Smith – 35th (putting: 1st)2023 Scheffler – 1st
2024 Scheffler – 1st
— Justin Ray (@JustinRayGolf) March 11, 2025
7. With better timing, Hideki Matsuyama might already be a Players Champion. In 2020, Hideki opened the week with 63, hours before the COVID-19 shutdown and accompanying cancellation of the championship.
Even with that round erased from the official records, Matsuyama has a tremendous resume at TPC Sawgrass. Since 2019, no player has a better scoring average (69.5) at this event. Since 2016, Matsuyama ranks second among qualified players here in strokes gained approach and third in strokes gained tee-to-green. Matsuyama might have the most underrated short game in men’s pro golf today: Last year, he ranked second on Tour in scrambling percentage. He leads that stat this season.
Only two players have finished in the top eight each of the last two years at The Players: Matsuyama and Scheffler.
8. This spring, the PGA Tour has produced a handful of runs by 30-somethings finding a new level in their professional lives. Last week’s winner at Bay Hill, Russell Henley, is a top-10 player in the world this week for the first time after a surge of strong play that doesn’t appear to be letting up anytime soon.
Henley leads the Tour in 2025 in top 10s and official earnings. He’s making more than five birdies per round and is currently sixth in strokes gained total. The 35-year-old Henley, who made his first Presidents Cup team in 2024, is moving closer to locking up a spot on the Ryder Cup roster for Bethpage.
More surprising than Henley’s newfound gear has been the recent play of Michael Kim. In a time when rank-and-file player opportunities are evaporating, Kim is a beacon of new-age PGA Tour meritocracy.
His tie for second at TPC Scottsdale earned him a spot in the Genesis Invitational via the AON Swing 5. He kept up his strong play in Mexico and Palm Beach Gardens, getting a tee time at Bay Hill through the AON Next 10 program. Kim, who once had a streak of 25 consecutive missed cuts/WDs, has finished in the top 15 in five consecutive PGA Tour starts for the first time in his career.
Since the beginning of the WM Phoenix Open, Kim is a combined 57-under-par, better than anyone else in that span by 21 strokes.
9. There is a beautiful volatility amidst the closing stretch at this golf course that is different than almost anywhere in the world of golf. From 2021 through 2024, players made 76 eagles, 237 double bogeys and 81 triple bogeys or worse on 16, 17 and 18 at TPC Sawgrass. That sum of scores 2-under or 2-over (or worse) is 394 — or 116 more than any other closing three holes on the PGA Tour in that same time (TPC Summerlin, 278).
The always-entertaining 17th hole has yielded five aces in the last three years combined. That’s the same total that was made from 1982 through 2001. Incredibly, the player in the field with the most times playing 17 at TPC Sawgrass without making a birdie is Schauffele with 18. On the other end of the ledger, Adam Scott has made 22 birdies at 17, four shy of Bernhard Langer’s record of 26.
Arguably, the walk to the 18th tee is more nerve-wracking than walking into the arena at 17. Players who miss the fairway on the closing hole lose more than seven-tenths of a stroke to the field, which is by far the largest missed fairway penalty on the course.
10. Though Scheffler bucked the trend last year, 13 of the last 17 Players Champions have gone off in the early half of the draw Thursday and in the afternoon in Round 2.
A good start is paramount: Each of the last 22 Players winners shot under par in the opening round, and nine of the last 12 have been in the top 10 after Day 1. Since 2008, the eventual winner of The Players has a first-round scoring average of 67.4.
The opening round begins with threesomes and split tees at 7:40 a.m. (ET) on Thursday.
(Top photo of Scottie Scheffler: Jared C. Tilton / Getty Images)
