"Majors are the most important thing in golf, right?" - Jon Rahm shares his perspective on winning the FedEx Cup
Jon Rahm won the Masters in 2023, landing his second career major by four full strokes, an achievement he'll forever cherish. According to the Spaniard, even a victory at the Tour Championship would pale in comparison.
When asked to compare the importance of tournaments for him, he was relatively nondescript. The Tour Championship hasn't begun yet, so he doesn't want to get ahead of himself. Still, he didn't shy away from revealing a bit about his true feelings.
Rahm said (via Nuclr Golf):
“Well, I wouldn't want to give you a ranking while I'm here at the FedExCup finale of what's more important than others, but obviously, majors are the most important thing in golf, right? That's how it's been and that's kind of how it is.”
For the longest time in golf, majors held the most weight. Winning any major was a far more impressive feat and was remembered more so than any playoff victory, even the Tour Championship.
The Masters is also considered the best major by many. That's subjective though and winning any one of the four majors is a tremendous feat worthy of praise, but winning the Masters is special.
Tour Championship an uphill climb for Jon Rahm
The Tour Championship features a staggered scoring breakdown. The first-place player from before Scottie Scheffler begins at -10. The strokes are staggered from there.
Jon Rahm comes in at -6 thanks to a fourth placement, which means that winning the Tour Championship would be quite challenging. He'd have to really outplay Scheffler to overtake him. It's the same for Viktor Hovland and Rory McIlroy.
A year ago, Jon Rahm ripped the changed format, saying (via Golf Digest):
“I have made my position clear on that in the past. I don't think it's the best system. You don't get to the Super Bowl and the team with the better record starts with a two-touchdown advantage. I think it's absolutely ludicrous, but it's the best choice we have right now.”
Jon Rahm believes that, like all other sporting events including golf tournaments, the Tour Championship should begin with everyone even. That kind of scoring allows players from everywhere to have a chance to win.
Currently, it would be very difficult for the likes of Jordan Spieth, Rickie Fowler, Tony Finau, and Wyndham Clark to even come close to the top of the leaderboard.
That's less than ideal for Rahm, who does know that there's really nothing he can do about it. He'll have to shoot better than Scheffler, Hovland, and McIlroy to capture what he feels is still slightly inferior to a major win.
Still, there's no doubt that he wants to win. He's not interested in losing a tournament ever, so he'll want to win this time around even if it's not the biggest win of his career or even this season.
He faces an uphill climb, but expect the Ryder Cup star to come out playing well and giving it his best shot next time out.