The 2024 PGA Championship leaderboard is expected to be littered with the top names in golf, but Tiger Woods probably will not be part of the weekend race for the lead.
Woods struggled just to make the cut at The Masters last month and finished in last place.
Scottie Scheffler, Rory McIlroy and the other current top male golfers are far more likely to be in a position to win come at Sunday at Valhalla Golf Club in Louisville.
Scheffler, McIlroy and Brooks Koepka all come into Valhalla with wins in their last tournaments. That will make all three players favorite picks to capture the Wanamaker Trophy.
Expert Predictions
Any power ranking of the golfers in the PGA Championship field has Scheffler, McIlroy and Koepka at the top.
CBS Sports’ Kyle Porter rated Scheffler, Koepka and McIlroy in that order. PGA Tour’s power rankings had McIlroy ahead of Scheffler and Koepka.
Scheffler produced back-to-back victories at the Masters and RBC Heritage, McIlroy won the Wells Fargo Championship on Sunday and Koepka captured the last LIV Golf Tour event in Singapore.
McIlroy has the longest major drought among the trio, but he did win his last major at Valhalla in 2014.
Few of the golfers who placed in the top 10 at Valhalla a decade ago will even be in the field this week, so previous course history will not be a factor in picking a winner.
A lot of talk entering the tournament will be on Scheffler, McIlroy and Koepka, but Jon Rahm should be considered in the mix as well.
Rahm finished in a tie for 45th at the Masters, but he does have seven top-10 major finishes since the start of 2021. BetMGM’s Jason Sobel called Rahm the conservative pick to win the Wanamaker Trophy.
As for Woods, the odds are not in his favor to have a successful weekend at Valhalla.
DraftKings Sportsbook lists him at +30000 (bet $100 to win $30,000) to win the tournament and +2000 to finish inside the top 10. He is +900 to have a bogey-free round, which feels like the biggest indicator of where his game is at right now.
Woods could push to make the cut, but it will likely be a struggle to get there and it would not be surprising to see him need the final few holes on Friday to achieve that feat.