Two dozen of the world’s best golfers have descended on the Marco Simone Golf and Country Club outside of Rome this week for the 44th biennial Ryder Cup. There is a lot on the line as the U.S. team attempts to win on European soil for the first time in three decades.
Not on the line: prize money.
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Golf pros are used to competing for blockbuster paydays. Last month, 30 PGA Tour pros divvied up $75 million during the Tour Championship, with Viktor Hovland pocketing $18 million; the Norwegian’s game still looks on point with a hole-in-one on a par 4 during a Wednesday practice round for the rare “albatross.”
The Ryder Cup works differently than the year-round pro tours. It is an exhibition event with no prize money or appearance fees. The teams are after “glory and pride” per the event’s homepage, which adds: “The Ryder Cup also is among the last great professional sporting events where winning, and not prize money, is the reward.”
Of course, the Ryder Cup is big business for its owners—a 50-50 split between the PGA of America and a quartet of European golf entities. There are TV contracts with NBC in the U.S. and Sky Sports in the U.K., as well as seven global sponsorship partners: Aon, BMW, Capgemini, Citi, DP World, Hilton and Rolex. Tickets and merchandise also add to the coffers.
Players will not take home any money from their play this weekend, but the PGA of America will provide members of the U.S. team with $200,000 apiece to donate to a charity of their choice, according to a PGA spokesperson; it is the same figure as two years ago. Since 1999 (when the practice started), the U.S. Team has sent more than $30 million to charitable organizations.
It has been a huge year for golfers’ bank accounts after the PGA Tour boosted prize money this season to compete with LIV Golf. The PGA Tour established 13 “elevated” events that feature increased winnings totaling $315 million, up 47% from 2022. The PGA Tour’s total purse for the year was expected to top $560 million, an increase of $140 million.
Hovland led the way with $34.5 million in prize money and bonuses, followed by Scottie Scheffler ($26.4 million), Jon Rahm ($21.3 million), Rory McIlroy ($20.3 million) and Wyndham Clark ($17.8 million). Seven Ryder Cup participants made at least $15 million, including Brooks Koepka, who is the lone LIV golfer competing this week. The American made the cut based on his PGA Championship win in May and runner-up finish at the Masters.
All 12 U.S. players are ranked among the top 25 in the world, versus just seven for the European side. Yet, the U.S. team is just a slight betting favorite, based on the squad’s history when the competition crosses the Atlantic.
The allure of the Ryder Cup for players is not always evident, even among themselves. “It’s not that important of an event for me,” McIlroy said in an interview when he was 20. “It’s an exhibition at the end of the day…obviously, I’ll try my best for the team, but I’m not going to be running around fist-pumping.”
Those words were read back recently to the now 34-year-old in a video interview McIlroy posted on social media ahead of the event. The world’s second-ranked player had a different reaction as he readied for his seventh Ryder Cup.
“I said that in my naïveté as a young, swashbuckling lad,” McIlroy said with a smile when confronted with the quote. “But it’s just a completely different environment once you get in there and seeing how much it means to everyone. It’s the purest competition in golf. For me, it doesn’t get any better than that.”
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