12 observations worth pondering for LIV Golf Chicago

BOLINGBROOK, Illinois – Big week in the Windy City. Individual Championship on the line. Guaranteed spots and relegation for 2025. Final team seeds for Dallas. Here are a dozen observations going into LIV Golf Chicago, the final regular-season tournament of the 2024 season.

NO. 1 SCENARIOS

This scenarios list published a few days ago shows the outcome of the Individual Championship based on the results of Jon Rahm and Joaquin Niemann on the Chicago leaderboard. But realistically, less than half of those scenarios matter. That’s because Rahm has not finished outside the top 10 in any of the first 12 tournaments this season except for his WD in Houston. If Rahm finishes 10th this week, Niemann will have to finish seventh or better. Of course, for now, the lone scenario either player is focused on is winning the tournament. That’s the only guarantee of success, no matter how the other one fares. As Rahm said, “I'm probably going to need to win.”

RISE OF THE 40-SOMETHINGS

No LIV Golf player age 40 or over has ever finished in the top 5 of the season-long Individual Championship. Sergio Garcia was the highest ranked in 2022 (ninth) and Charles Howell III was the highest ranked in 2023 (10th). But the 44-year-old Garcia and 41-year-old Louis Oosthuizen are in position for top-5 finishes – and possibly a podium – this year. Garcia, the Fireballs GC captain, enters Chicago ranked fourth while Oosthuizen, the Stinger GC captain, is fifth.

BEST 1-2 COMBINATION

Legion XIII’s Jon Rahm and Tyrrell Hatton enter Chicago having usurped Dustin Johnson and Patrick Reed as LIV Golf’s proverbial best 1-2 punch. Rahm is ranked first in points, with Hatton third, and no teammates have finished on the same podium in the season-long standings. The 4Aces got close in 2022 with Johnson winning the title while Reed finished fourth (albeit tied with second-most points but losing tiebreakers to Branden Grace and Peter Uihlein).  A year later, Johnson was fifth to Reed’s sixth. With last year’s champion Talor Gooch joining Brooks Koepka on Smash GC for 2024, they entered the season most likely to challenge DJ and Reed. Instead, Ryder Cup teammates Rahm and Hatton have left no doubt, as they’ve combined for two wins, seven other podiums and an amazing 20 top 10s in 23 completed tournaments.

ANOTHER BACKDOOR PODIUM FOR BROOKS?

A year ago, Koepka entered the final regular-season event in Jeddah ranked fifth in points. His victory that week moved him onto the Individual Championship podium in third place. The Smash GC captain has the same opportunity this week, thanks to his playoff win over Rahm in Greenbrier. If Koepka can make it two straight victories this week and Hatton finishes no higher than fourth, Koepka will claim third place again. There are also scenarios in which Koepka can finish second or third and still finish on the podium. Of the current top 10 in points, Koepka has been the most hit-or-miss this season; he has the fewest points finishes (8) while 63% of his points have come from his two wins. As he said after winning Greenbrier: “I've only had two chances to win and I won them, but that's not enough.”

GRACE’S CHALLENGE

Branden Grace has been a top-10 player the first two years – second in 2022, ninth last year – but the Stinger GC star is in danger of relegation. He starts the week ranked 50th in the Drop Zone. To even have a chance of moving up into the Open Zone (48 and above), he must produce his best result of the season, solo 15th or higher – and he’d still need help from the players directly above him.

THE OTHER TOP 10ERS

Grace is one of five players who have finished top 10 in points in each of LIV Golf’s first two seasons. The others are Dustin Johnson, Cameron Smith, Brooks Koepka and Patrick Reed. Smith and Koepka enter Chicago guaranteed to finish inside the top 10, Johnson needs a strong result to move up and Reed’s only chance of moving inside the top 10 is to post his first LIV Golf individual win.

LAST CALL FOR THIS TRIO

Talor Gooch, Cameron Smith and Bryson DeChambeau combined for seven individual titles in 2023. They’ve been shut out this LIV Golf season. Smith does have three runner-ups; Gooch (last year’s Individual Champion) finished T2 in Las Vegas; and DeChambeau was T3 in Nashville (oh, and you may have heard about his non-LIV victory at Pinehurst). Hard to imagine two of those three are guaranteed to go home empty-handed from a LIV Golf individual standpoint in 2024.

BUT ABOUT THEIR TEAMS …

Despite their lack of individual success, DeChambeau, Smith and Gooch have managed to pop a few champagne bottles this year. Each one has contributed to two team tournament wins this year – DeChambeau as the Crushers GC captain; Smith as the Ripper GC captain; and Gooch in his first year with Koepka’s Smash GC. The Crushers are guaranteed a top-3 seed, and Ripper and Smash are vying for the final available seed.

STROKE AVERAGE LEADER

The PGA of America awards the Vardon Trophy to the PGA Tour player who finishes with the lowest stroke average each season. Current LIV Golf stars Jon Rahm, Dustin Johnson and Sergio Garcia are past recipients. LIV Golf has no such official trophy, although may we suggest the Shark Award, given that current Commissioner and CEO Greg Norman was a three-time stroke average leader. A tight race exists among Rahm (67.4), Niemann (67.7) and Hatton (67.9) for our unofficial award going into Chicago.

SPEAKING OF STATS

One of the many benefits of LIV Golf, with all players competing in the same tournament and in the same conditions, with no draw bias thanks to the shotgun start, is professional golf’s first true reflection of statistical comparisons. That’s what makes the stroke average such an accurate reflection of this year’s three top point-getters. Meanwhile, head-scratching statistical outliers are usually avoided. One thing that we can glean from comparing the performances of all individual winners this year is that greens in regulation is the category that matters the most. Only one of the first 12 winners this season (Abraham Ancer in Hong Kong) ranked outside the top 10 in the field that week in GIR, and three times the winner led or shared the lead in that category. Compare that to putting average, in which just six of 12 winners have been inside the top 10, and none are at the top of the category. LIV Golf evidently is a second-shot league.

NO BYE FOR ACES

Dustin Johnson and his 4Aces GC earned the top seed and a first-round bye for the Team Championship in each of the first two seasons. But they enter Chicago 10th in the team standings and can finish no higher than 8th if they win this week. That means they’ll be playing in next week’s quarterfinals for the first time. Might be interesting to see if DJ shakes up his match play lineup in Dallas, especially since captains are no longer obligated to face the opposing captain. Patrick Reed, nicknamed "Captain America" through his match play prowess, is a surprising 0-2 in singles in his previous Team Championship matches. Perhaps he'd get a jumpstart by facing a captain.

HOPING TO AVOID THE SHUTOUT

Each full-time member of a LIV Golf team has finished with at least one point-producing (top 24) result this year. The only two players who have been blanked this year are Wild Card players Anthony Kim and Hudson Swafford. Kim’s best result in his first 10 starts is his 36th last month at Greenbrier. Swafford’s best is a T35 in Nashville.  Last year, two players – Martin Kaymer and Sihwan Kim – finished without points.