There are twenty-six active players among the all-time Top 100 golfers, with Tiger leading the list as he continues his pursuit of Jack Nicklaus for #1.
Tiger will be 49 years old when the 2025 season gets under way, and it appears that injuries suffered in the 2021 auto accident combined with ongoing back issues will ultimately keep him from overtaking Nicklaus.
Don’t try telling that to Tiger though–he just underwent another surgery to alleviate persistent back spasms that slowed him in 2024 with every intention of playing more tour events in ’25 and getting competitive again in the majors.
Tiger holds a pretty good lead over Jack in tour wins, and he is very close to Nicklaus in cut and top 10 percentage, but Jack’s 3 additional major wins along with his tremendous number of major top 10’s make it seemingly impossible for Tiger to run him down at this point.
Even should Tiger coax another major championship from his battered body, he would still come up just a bit shy—unless he could also add another tour win and a major top 10 or two.
It’s a long shot, but then again betting against Tiger Woods has never been a wise thing to do.
Scottie
With 7 wins including a Masters Championship, no missed cuts and 16 top-10’s in 19 starts, Scheffler’s 2024 season was among the greatest of all-time.
And Scottie’s ’23 season was pretty fantastic as well, with 2 wins and 17 top-10’s (including 3 major top-10’s).
Scheffler ended the 2022 season at #112 among the greatest players of all-time, jumping to #97 in 2023 and he now stands at #60—while Scottie won’t turn 30 years old until 2026. If he continues at this pace, Jack and Tiger will start to see him in the rearview coming on fast in the not-too distant future.
Xander
Xander Schauffele is no slouch either, with 2 major championship victories in 2024 and 26 top-10’s in the last 2 seasons (including 4 major top 10’s in addition to the wins).
Schauffele ended the ’22 season at #94, moved to #85 in 2023 and jumped all the way to #68 with his 2 majors and a boat load of additional T-10’s.
At 30 years old, Xander has plenty of time to build his record—and all-time top 10 is by no means out of reach.
Rory
Everyone talks about the fact that McIlroy has not won a major in almost ten years, but he is still just 35 years old, looks as fit as he did when he was twenty (perhaps even more so), and still drives it better than anybody.
After the 2022 season Rory stood at #21 and moved past Cary Middlecoff and Lee Trevino to #19 in 2023. While 2024 was a disappointment, particularly the painful loss at the U.S. Open, Rory still made 18 of 19 cuts and recorded 7 top-10’s, including a pair of Tour wins—propelling him past Lloyd Mangrum into a tie with Peter Thompson at #17.
Jack won his last major at 46 and Phil captured The PGA Championship at 51, so Rory still has plenty of opportunities in front of him. While it’s unlikely that Rory can get close to Sam Snead, Tiger and Jack, he definitely has a shot at the top 5—and there are a ton of golf fans pulling for him.
LIV
Participating in LIV events does not elevate standing among the greats of the game, so DJ (#29), Sergio (#32), Jon Rahm (#49), Brooks Koepka (#57) and Bryson DeChambeau (#91) are relying on major championship performance alone to move up in the rankings.
While the clock is winding down on DJ and Sergio, now north of 40, Koepka, Rahm and DeChambeau have plenty of time–but they need to play lights out whenever they tee it up in a major.
Jon Rahm is currently the only player in the all-time top 50 who is under 30 years old, and his PGA Tour cut and top-10 percentages are the highest of any modern-day player other than Jack and Tiger.
Koepka always focused on the majors anyway, even when he played on the PGA Tour, but it’s tough to be at the top of your game when it counts without regular big-time competition. Still, it’s a pretty good bet that Brooks will bag at least one more major and move into the all-time top-50.
Hopefully there will be a resolution between LIV and the PGA Tour in the near future, because it would sure be great to see Koepka, Rahm and DeChambeau tee it up against Scheffler, Schauffele and McIlroy more than just 4 times a year.
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