Scottie Scheffler has joined Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy in the exclusive $100m earnings club on the PGA Tour after starting his 2026 season with a dominant victory at The American Express in California. The world No.1 closed with a six-under-par 66 to finish on 27-under-par, four shots clear of the field, for his 20th win on the tour.
The 29-year-old's prize money of $1.656m took his career on-course earnings to $101,109,136, making him only the third player after Woods and McIlroy to bank more than $100m on the PGA Tour. The win, all of which have come in the past four years, also earned him lifetime membership, and he joined Woods and Jack Nicklaus as the only players with 20 Tour titles and four major wins before turning 30.
Scheffler's victory was all the more remarkable given his disrupted start to last season, when he injured his hand preparing ravioli with a wine glass at Christmas and was sidelined for several weeks. He returned to win The Open later in the year, and has now triumphed in seven of his last 13 stroke-play events, finishing no lower than tied eighth since last March.
Former world No.1 Jason Day, who finished joint runner-up, compared Scheffler to Woods, saying: "It's not like we're looking at Tiger, but he's putting up Tiger-ish numbers. Every time he tees it up he's right around the lead. That is one of the most difficult things to do, to always stay hungry."
Scheffler, who will defend his Masters title in April, warned that he can still improve. "You look at last year, it is different just because I had made what I felt was so much progress in the offseason and then to have that basically taken away by four to six weeks of inactivity from golf, that has an effect," he said.
Teenager Blades Brown, who played alongside Scheffler in the final round, said: "To play with Scottie Scheffler and see him win it, that was insane. I had to pinch myself a couple of times just to make sure this was real."
