The Korn Ferry Tour Finals is a series of three
golf
Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible.
Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping wi ...
tournaments that serve as a means of earning
PGA Tour
The PGA Tour (stylized in all capital letters as PGA TOUR by its officials) is the organizer of professional golf tours in the United States and North America. It organizes most of the events on the flagship annual series of tournaments also k ...
membership for the following season ("Tour cards"). The series, which until 2019 consisted of four tournaments, replaced the
PGA Tour Qualifying Tournament
The annual PGA Tour Qualifying Tournament, also known as Qualifying School or Q-School, was historically the main method by which golfers earned PGA Tour playing privileges, commonly known as a Tour card. Beginning in 2013, Q-School grants privileg ...
in 2013.
The Finals take place after the
Korn Ferry Tour
The Korn Ferry Tour is the developmental tour for the U.S.-based PGA Tour, and features professional golfers who have either not yet reached the PGA Tour, or who have done so but then failed to win enough FedEx Cup points to stay at that level. Th ...
regular season. In total, fifty players earn cards: the top 25 players on the regular-season standings (known as "The 25") and the top 25 players on the Finals standings (known as the "Finals 25"). From 2013 to 2018, the standings were based on money earned. Since 2019, the standings are based on a points system similar to the
FedEx Cup
The FedEx Cup is a championship trophy for the PGA Tour. Its introduction marked the first time that men's professional golf had a playoff system. Announced in November 2005, it was first awarded in 2007. Rory McIlroy is the 2022 champion. Th ...
on the PGA Tour.
The initial PGA Tour priority ranking of the 50 graduates is determined by alternating members of The 25 (ordered by their total points, including the Finals) with members of the Finals 25 (ordered by their earnings in the Finals); however, they are re-ordered, or reshuffled, based on their position in the FedEx Cup several times throughout the PGA Tour season. The member of The 25 with the most combined points and the player with the most points in the Finals (even if he is a regular-season graduate) are both exempt from reshuffles and remain at the top of the graduate priority rankings; this is also true of any players who won three times in the Korn Ferry Tour season.
Tournaments
From 2013 to 2015 the Finals consisted of the following four tournaments:
*
Hotel Fitness Championship
The Hotel Fitness Championship was a golf tournament on the Web.com Tour. It was played for the first time in August/September 2013 at the Sycamore Hills Golf Club in Fort Wayne, Indiana. It was the first of four tournaments making up the Web.co ...
in
Fort Wayne, Indiana
Fort Wayne is a city in and the county seat of Allen County, Indiana, United States. Located in northeastern Indiana, the city is west of the Ohio border and south of the Michigan border. The city's population was 263,886 as of the 2020 Censu ...
*
Small Business Connection Championship
The Small Business Connection Championship was a golf tournament on the Web.com Tour. It was played for the first time as the Chiquita Classic in July 2010 at TPC River's Bend in Cincinnati, Ohio.[Davidson, North Carolina
Davidson is a suburban town located in northern Mecklenburg and Iredell counties, North Carolina, United States, on the banks of Lake Norman. It is a suburb in the Charlotte metropolitan area. The population was 10,944 at the 2010 census, and in ...]
*
Nationwide Children's Hospital Championship
The Nationwide Children's Hospital Championship is a golf tournament on the Korn Ferry Tour. It was played for the first time in July 2007 at Ohio State University Golf Club, The Ohio State University Golf Club's Scarlet Course in Upper Arlington, ...
in
Columbus, Ohio
Columbus () is the state capital and the most populous city in the U.S. state of Ohio. With a 2020 census population of 905,748, it is the 14th-most populous city in the U.S., the second-most populous city in the Midwest, after Chicago, and t ...
*
Web.com Tour Championship
The Korn Ferry Tour Championship presented by United Leasing & Finance is the year-end golf tournament of the Korn Ferry Tour. It has been played at a variety of courses; starting in 2019 it will be played at Victoria National Golf Club in Newburgh ...
in
Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida
Ponte Vedra Beach is a wealthy unincorporated seaside community and suburb of Jacksonville, Florida in St. Johns County, Florida, United States. Located southeast of downtown Jacksonville and north of St. Augustine, it is part of the Jackso ...
In 2016, the
DAP Championship
The DAP Championship was a golf tournament on the Web.com Tour from 2016 to 2018. It was played at Canterbury Golf Club in the Cleveland suburb of Beachwood, Ohio. The tournament was part of the Web.com Tour Finals.
Winners
See also
*Rust-Oleu ...
and the
Albertsons Boise Open
The Albertsons Boise Open presented by Chevron is a professional golf tournament in Idaho on the Korn Ferry Tour
The Korn Ferry Tour is the developmental tour for the U.S.-based PGA Tour, and features professional golfers who have either not yet ...
replaced the
Hotel Fitness Championship
The Hotel Fitness Championship was a golf tournament on the Web.com Tour. It was played for the first time in August/September 2013 at the Sycamore Hills Golf Club in Fort Wayne, Indiana. It was the first of four tournaments making up the Web.co ...
and
Small Business Connection Championship
The Small Business Connection Championship was a golf tournament on the Web.com Tour. It was played for the first time as the Chiquita Classic in July 2010 at TPC River's Bend in Cincinnati, Ohio.[Official World Golf Ranking
The Official World Golf Ranking is a system for rating the performance level of professional golfers. It was started in 1986.
The rankings are based on a player's position in individual tournaments (i.e. not pairs or team events) over a "rolli ...]
(OWGR), up from 14 points for regular season Korn Ferry Tour events. The Korn Ferry Tour Championship was worth a minimum of 20 points as the Tour's flagship event, as in the past. Following changes in the OWGR calculations in 2022, there are no fixed minimum points.
Qualification
There are four ways to qualify for the Finals:
[
*Finish in the top-75 on the Korn Ferry Tour's regular season standings (money list from 2013 to 2018, points from 2019).
*Finish the PGA Tour's regular season ranked 126–200 on the ]FedEx Cup
The FedEx Cup is a championship trophy for the PGA Tour. Its introduction marked the first time that men's professional golf had a playoff system. Announced in November 2005, it was first awarded in 2007. Rory McIlroy is the 2022 champion. Th ...
points list. Not all players with this criterion will compete, as some are already exempt through other means.
*As a non-member of the PGA Tour, earn enough FedEx Cup points to place 126–200 on the points list.
*Special medical exemptions.
Tour cards
In 2013, the top-25 on the regular season Web.com Tour money list were guaranteed PGA Tour cards regardless of their performance in the Finals and the Finals determine their priority ranking. Money earned in the four Finals events determined the remaining 25 PGA Tour cards. The leading money winners on the regular season Web.com Tour money list and the Finals money list were fully exempt on the PGA Tour; the remaining 48 players were ranked for PGA Tour priority purposes based on their Finals earnings.[ In addition, the money leaders in both the regular season and the Finals received places in the following year's Players Championship.
In 2014 the determination of the priority ranking changed. The top 25 from the regular season money list carried their earnings to the Finals, competing among themselves for priority. The top 25 earners in the Finals only, not including the top 25 from the regular season, again earned PGA Tour cards. The priority rankings were then determined be a "zipper method" with the top 25 in combined regular and Finals earnings taking rankings 1, 3, 5, ... and the top 25 from the Finals taking rankings 2, 4, 6, ...
Those who win their third event of the season during the finals are also fully exempt on the PGA Tour. Players who finish in the top 50 on the Finals list and Top 75 on the regular season standings also are guaranteed full Korn Ferry Tour status for the next season. The remainder will either attempt to regain their cards through Korn Ferry Tour Qualifying School or make use of limited PGA Tour status if available.
]
Criticism
One unintended consequence of the change in Q school is that more amateurs are turning professional earlier in the year (June instead of August) in order to have a better chance at earning a PGA Tour card through high finishes via sponsors' exemptions.
Winners
Tournament winners
*''Tournament canceled due to Hurricane Matthew
Hurricane Matthew was an extremely powerful Atlantic hurricane which caused catastrophic damage and a humanitarian crisis in Haiti, as well as widespread devastation in the southeastern United States. The deadliest Atlantic hurricane sinc ...
''
Money/points leaders
Bolded golfers received full exemptions for the PGA Tour not subject to re-order. In 2013, golfers who led the regular season money list and the Finals money list received full exemptions. Since 2014, golfers who led the overall money list and the Finals money list received full exemptions. Points replaced money beginning in 2019.
References
External links
*{{official, http://www.pgatour.com/webcom/web-com-tour-finals.html
Korn Ferry Tour