Rory McIlroy hits $100m in PGA Tour prize money with Players win
Rory McIlroy has taken his PGA Tour prize money to $100m with a St Patrick’s Day victory at the Players’ Championship.
The Northern Irishman’s second win at the prestigious tournament earned him $4.5m and took his total prize money from events on the tour to nine figures.
McIlroy has also banked more than $50m on top of that in bonuses from the FedEx Cup, the finale to the PGA Tour which he has won three times.
The 35-year-old is now second only to Tiger Woods, whose prize money from the tour of $121m is now in sight thanks to growing purses.
He won the Players on Monday in a three-hole play-off with American JJ Spaun after thunderstorms on Sunday forced the tournament into a fifth day.
McIlroy took the upper hand with a birdie at the first extra hole and Spaun’s hopes sank definitively when he found water at the second.
It is his second win on the PGA Tour already this season after he pipped Ryder Cup teammate Shane Lowry at Pebble Beach last month.
This is the first year in which McIlroy has notched multiple wins on the US circuit ahead of the Masters, which will complete a Career Grand Slam if he wins next month.
World No1 Scottie Scheffler last season backed up wins at the Arnold Palmer Invitational and the Players by claiming the Green Jacket at Augusta.
McIlroy said: “Scottie has been on an unbelievable run and inspired all of us to try to be better. I need to be better if I want to compete with him. I’ve knuckled down – I’ve worked hard.
“It’s nice to tie him with this [a second Players title], and Tiger and the five others that have won this multiple times.
“I went home last night thinking I should have had this. I reset. I had not a great night’s sleep but made the swings I needed to today.”