As pro golfers head to Florida and the calendar flips to March, we are coming up on the PGA Tour’s premiere tournament, The Players Championship.
The event has been contested annually since 1974 and routinely has one of the strongest fields in golf. Winning at TPC Sawgrass can redefine a player’s career, and it’s certainly a crown jewel on some resumes.
Last year, the event was canceled after one round due to the coronavirus pandemic. With no official winner in 2020, Rory McIlroy remains the defending champion heading into the 2021 edition.
The Players is sometimes referred to as the “fifth major” because of its strong field and elevated status compared to other Tour events. Whether or not the tourney actually is the “fifth major” moniker is a hot topic of debate, but there is no debating the quality of the field that tees it up in Ponte Vedra each spring.
There are a number of ways to qualify for the Players, with all criteria crafted in a way to guarantee the strongest possible field. Below is a list of ways a professional golfer can qualify for the Players.
— Top 125 in the special FedEx Cup points list, starting in the 2019-20 season
— Top 50 in the Official World Golf Ranking
— Major winners in the past five years
— Winners of PGA Tour events through the final week before The Players
— If necessary to complete the field of 144, golfers outside the Top 10 in FedExCup points in 2020-21 only on March 1 will gain entry in order of position
