Elite field ready to tee off in Tournament of Champions

ASSOCIATED PRESS
Justin Thomas played a shot from a bunker on the ninth hole during the Tournament of Champions pro-am golf event at Kapalua on Wednesday.

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ASSOCIATED PRESS

Justin Thomas played a shot from a bunker on the ninth hole during the Tournament of Champions pro-am golf event at Kapalua on Wednesday.

ASSOCIATED PRESS
With blue skies all around, Jon Rahm of Spain tracked his blast off the fourth tee during the Tournament of Champions pro-am event at the Kapalua Plantation Course.

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Scottie Scheffler signed autographs after his round on Wednesday.

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Hideki Matsuyama and his caddie studied an approach shot from the 17th fairway.

ASSOCIATED PRESS
Jordan Spieth hits his approach from the rough along the 18th green during the Tournament of Champions pro-am golf event at Kapalua Plantation Course in Kapalua, Hawaii.

KAPALUA, maui >> Justin Thomas doesn’t have to worry about his introduction on the first tee today at the Sentry Tournament of Champions.

The defending PGA champion earned his way into the field as one of 29 winners last year who will have their accomplishments read aloud before starting the new year on the Plantation Course.

For the other 10 golfers who qualified by advancing to the 2022 Tour Championship, their introduction might be a little different.

“They clearly need to change the name of the tournament because it’s not the Tournament of Champions anymore,” Thomas joked Wednesday. “I guess it’s the Sentry Tournament of Champions and Tour Championship qualifiers. What are they going to say for the people that qualified (without winning) on the first tee?” I didn’t think about that.”

A calendar year unlike any other on the PGA Tour begins with a modified Tournament of Champions that isn’t just a winners-only event.

Players who qualified for the Tour Championship who didn’t win — names including Collin Morikawa, Adam Scott, Viktor Hovland and Sungjae Im — are also in the field of 39.

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The end result is a tournament featuring 17 of the top 20 in the Official World Golf ranking.

“I think having so many guys that are playing well and they’re (at the) top of the world rankings is fun to have everybody here together,” said World No. 2 Scottie Scheffler, who won his first four PGA Tour titles over six starts last year and held the No. 1 world ranking. “It’s a great place to start the year. It’s kind of weird being here because I know what it was like when I was here two years ago.”

Two years ago, the COVID-19 pandemic caused a shortened season. To fill out the field, anyone who made the TOUR Championship was invited.

The same is the case this year, for a much different reason.

The formation of LIV Golf, a professional golf tour financed by Saudi Arabia, has resulted in a number of defections from the PGA Tour.

In response to golfers leaving for much bigger paydays, the PGA Tour has had to answer with cutting bigger paychecks of its own.

It starts here on Maui with the first of 13 designated events within the PGA Tour this season, not including the majors, with increased purses. Also, 23 of the top players in 2022 are part of a Player Impact Program in which they must play in all but one of the events or face a penalty.

Only World No. 1 Rory McIlroy and Shane Lowry are using their exemptions this week.

This week’s purse has jumped from $8.2 million last year to $15 million. The winner will receive $2.7 million, which is nearly double the $1.476 million defending champion Cameron Smith took home last year.

Smith, who defected to LIV Golf after a season in which he won the Open Championship, is the first defending champion not to show up the following year. Geoff Oglivy came to play in 2011 but didn’t tee it up after injuring his hand on coral while swimming in the ocean.

Dustin Johnson, the 2018 Sentry TOC champion whose 11 appearances at Kapalua are the most, also isn’t in the field after leaving for LIV Golf.

But the field that is here is still chock-full of talent. Jon Rahm, who shot 33-under par in his runner-up finish to Smith here last year, has seven top-10s in his last eight worldwide starts and is ranked No. 5 in the world.

Will Zalatoris, ranked No. 7 in the world, is making his season debut and playing for the first time since the BMW Championship in August, when he had to withdraw with a back injury after winning the FedEx St. Jude Championship a week earlier to move to No. 1 in the FedExCup standings.

Thomas, who has won the TOC twice, including in 2017 when he pulled off the Hawaii sweep winning at both Kapalua and Waialae, is in the final pairing of the day with World No. 6 Xander Schauffele. They will tee off at 12:45 p.m.

“It’s definitely more prestigious than it was a year ago,” Thomas said of the TOC. “There’s 17 of the top 20 in the world here. I mean, there’s not very many tournaments the last five years other than the majors and the Players that can say that and the tournament deserves all that respect.”