Few things cure a New Year’s hangover quite like a $3.6 million paycheck, or so I’m told, so even if he overdid the sake after welcoming Toshigami (the Japanese New Year’s god – thanks Wikipedia), Hideki Matsuyama has plenty of reasons for optimism with 51 weeks remaining in 2025.
The Japanese superstar averaged just north of $14,000 per stroke in his record-setting victory, and even allowing for the absence of other big names such as Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy, he’s laid down a marker for the year ahead.
When Hideki wins, he tends to win big with a Green Jacket, two WGCs, a pressure-packed win on home soil at the Zozo, the Sony Open – particularly important for Japanese players – and victories at the Memorial and the Waste Management Phoenix Open all coming prior to last season. And three victories in the past 12 months have come at Riviera, TPC Southwind and Kapalua, all PGA Tour Signature Events, which carried $4 million, $4 million and $3.6 million respectively.
So it’s safe to say that the prizemoney in Hawaii isn’t going to change his life massively considering he’s now on the verge of crossing the $60 million mark in PGA Tour career earnings alone, nor would it have for runner-up Collin Morikawa who is now a two-time bridesmaid at Kapalua but can console himself with over $2 million for his first week of ‘work’ in 2025.
But everyone is a winner at The Sentry, and Brian Harman, who finished last at a -3 72-hole tally, still walks away with just shy of $50,000 for taking the trouble to bring his family on a trip to paradise.
Everyone except Davis Riley, that is. The 28-year-old American played the first three rounds but decided not to tee it up for the fourth and final round and one can only assume that he was suffering from something quite serious as he could’ve strolled the course with only a pitching wedge in hand and been paid close to 50k for the trouble.
While Riley’s misfortunes were likely no fault of his own, both Will Zalatoris and Cameron Davis take home considerably less than they could’ve due to sloppy errors that were no reflection of their golfing abilities.
Playing together in the final round, they each played the other’s ball from the fairway on the par-5 15th and only discovered the mishap once they’d reached the green. As a result, they were forced to return to the fairway and play from the correct position after accruing two-stroke penalties each.
The resulting double bogeys cost Davis a top-10 place and almost $300,000 in earnings, while Zalatoris would’ve earned just over $120k more without the penalty.
Position Player Score Earnings
1 Hideki Matsuyama -35 $3,600,000
2 Collin Morikawa -32 $2,160,000
3 Sungjae Im -$29 $1,360,000
4 Jhonattan Vegas -25 $975,000
T5 Ludvig Aberg -24 $744,166
T5 Corey Conners -24 $744,166
T5 Thomas Detry -24 $744,166
T8 Sam Burns -23 $550,000
T8 Cameron Young -23 $550,000
T8 Maverick McNealy -23 $550,000
T8 Tom Hoge -23 $550,000
T8 Harry Hall -23 $550,000
T13 Taylor Pendrith -22 $410,000
T13 Cam Davis -22 $410,000
T15 Aaron Rai -21 $292,000
T15 Robert MacIntyre -21 $292,000
T15 Austin Eckroat -21 $292,000
T15 Patrick Cantlay -21 $292,000
T15 Keegan Bradley -21 $292,000
T15 Tony Finau -21 $292,000
T15 Wyndham Clark -21 $292,000
T15 Adam Scott -21 $292,000
T15 Sepp Straka -21 $292,000
T24 Matt Fitzpatrick -20 $196,000
T24 Max Greyserman -20 $196,000
T26 Justin Thomas -19 $163,333
T26 Max Homa -19 $163,333
T26 Will Zalatoris -19 $163,333
29 Adam Hadwin -18 $148,000
T30 Xander Schauffele -17 $137,500
T30 Russell Henley -17 $137,500
T32 Akshay Bhatia -16 $118,000
T32 Si Woo Kim -16 $118,000
T32 Byeong Hun An -16 $118,000
T32 Nico Echavarria -16 $118,000
T36 Sahith Theegala -15 $97,750
T36 Davis Thompson -15 $97,750
T36 Stephan Jaeger -15 $97,750
T36 Viktor Hovland -15 $97,750
T40 J.T. Poston -14 $81,000
T40 Jason Day -14 $81,000
T40 Christiaan Bezuidenhout -14 $81,000
T40 Patton Kizzire -14 $81,000
T44 Kevin Yu -13 $69,000
T44 Chris Kirk -13 $69,000
T46 Chris Gotterup -12 $62,000
T46 Denny McCarthy -12 $62,000
T48 Matthieu Pavon -11 $57,000
T48 Nick Taylor -11 $57,000
T48 Brice Garnett -11 $57,000
51 Billy Horschel -10 $54,000
52 Eric Cole -9 $53,000
T53 Matt McCarty -8 $51,500
T53 Peter Malnati -8 $51,500
55 Nick Dunlap -7 $50,000
56 Jake Knapp -6 $49,500
57 Rafael Campos -4 $49,000
58 Brian Harman -3 $48,500
– Davis Riley WD $0
Leave a comment