The Tour Championship is in the rearview mirror and with that, the PGA Tour has closed the book on its statistics for the 2022-23 season. If you’ve been to the Tour’s stats page, you know it’s a rabbit hole where golf nerds can spend hours exploring the numbers.
There are plenty of eye-popping numbers, including the massive increase in earnings, but many will use these stats to determine the PGA Tour’s Player of the Year.
For example, Jon Rahm had the most wins (4), with Viktor Hovland winning the final two stops of the year to finish second with three victories. There were seven others, including Scottie Scheffler, another POY candidate, with two wins.
But it was Scheffler who dominated many of the Tour’s stats this season. He finished first in the Official World Golf Ranking, FedEx Cup regular-season standings, Ryder Cup standings as well as all of these categories:
- Shots gained: Off the tee
- Shots gained: Approach the green
- Shots gained: Tee-to-green
- Shots gained: Total
- Greens in regulation percentage
- Scoring average
- Bogey avoidance
Let’s take a look at some of the more interesting statistical leaders on the PGA Tour for the 2022-23 season. Many of these will seem obvious, but there’s probably a few here that are surprising.
Driving distance
Rory McIlroy won his third driving title this season (he also won in 2017, 2018), as he averaged 326.3 yards per drive. That’s more than 5.1 yards per drive longer than the next guy on the list, Brandon Matthews (321.2). It’s also the longest since the Tour started keeping the stat in 1980. Bryson DeChambeau’s 323.7 yards per drive in 2021 was the previous mark and McIlroy topped that by nearly three yards. Cameron Young (316.9), Cameron Champ (316.1) and Matti Schmid (315.8) round out the top five.
The PGA Tour average for driving distance is 299.9. There were 92 golfers who averaged more than 300 yards per drive.
Source: pgatour.com
Driving accuracy
While Rory McIlroy was tops in driving distance, he was 157th in driving accuracy.
Russell Henley led the stats in the accuracy category, as he hit 71.74 percent of fairways during the season. Out of 1,118 possible fairways, Henley hit 802 of them. He was the only one over 70 percent for the year.
Collin Morikawa was next at 69.55 percent. Nos. 3 through 5 on this list are Ryan Moore, Aaron Rai, Ryan Armour.
Source: pgatour.com.
Greens in regulation
Scheffler led the Tour in GIR at 74.47 percent after hitting 1,126 greens out of 1,512 holes played. Nos. 2 through 5 on this list: Kevin Yu (72.96), Doug Ghim (70.56), Jon Rahm (70.48) and Collin Morikawa (70.47).
Source: pgatour.com.
Putting average
Taylor Montgomery had the top putting average with 1.659 with Sam Ryder, Eric Cole, Max Homa and Sahith Theegala right behind. The Tour average was 1.765. Montgomery also led putts per round with 27.13. Maverick McNealy was first in SG: Putting at 1.058.
Source: pgatour.com.
Most eagles
Kevin Tway led the way with 18 eagles. The Tour average was two.
The top 5:
- Kevin Tway, 18
- Taylor Montgomery, 16
- Lee Hodges, 15
- Jon Rahm, 15
- Ryan Brehm, 14
- Hayden Buckley, 14
- Wyndham Clark, 14
- Vincent Norrman, 14
- Brandon Wu, 14
Source: pgatour.com.
Most birdies
The Tour average was 90. Eric Cole was way above that average in the most birdies category as he collected 438 of them. Stephan Jaeger (434) Wyndham Clark (419), Ben An (418) and Sungjae Im (413) round out the top five.
Source: pgatour.com.
Scoring average
Scottie Scheffler was anything but average as he posted 68.629 for the season. Rory McIlroy (68.777) was not far behind. Those were the only two to go sub-69 for the season. Jon Rahm (69.037) was third with Xander Schauffele (69.083) fourth and Viktor Hovland (69.123) fifth.
Notable is that Scheffler played 88 Tour rounds this season, 24 more than McIlroy and 17 more than Rahm.
The Tour average was 71.091.
Source: pgatour.com.
Scrambling
Brian Harman, Champion Golfer of the Year after winning his first major at the 2023 Open Championship, led this category at 67.74 percent.
The Tour average was 58.45.
Jonathan Byrd (66.35) was second to Harman, while Matt Kuchar (65.76) was third. J.J. Spaun (65.74) and Tommy Fleetwood (65.47) are fourth and fifth, respectively.
Source: pgatour.com.
Wins
Rahm won four times, which was twice as many as the next guys on this list unless Viktor Hovland won this third in the season-ending Tour Championship. Rahm won two signature events and a major, his second career major, at the Masters. There were seven golfers with two wins each.
Source: pgatour.com.
Non-member earnings
On a list mostly filled with LIV golfers who earned official money at the 2023 majors, PGA Championship winner Brooks Koepka is No. 1 with $5,057,192.
Source: pgatour.com.
Money
Scheffler set the mark for most money earned in a single season during the 2021-22 campaign with more than $14 million.
This season, thanks to two victories, in particular the Players Championship, and his 15 top 10s, Scheffler went over the $20 million mark, the first-ever to do so. To be exact, he made $21,014,342.
Add up just his last two seasons and Scheffler has banked more than $35 million dollars. His career total is $40 million.
Source: pgatour.com.
