Importance of The Rankings
A professional golfer's ranking is of considerable significance to his career. For example, a ranking in the World Top 50 explicitly grants automatic entry to three of the four majors and three of the four current World Golf Championships; see table below. Also, ranking points are the sole criterion for selection for the International Team in the Presidents Cup and one of the qualification criteria for the European Ryder Cup team. The rankings are also used to help select the field for various other tournaments.
| Tournament | Automatic entries |
|---|---|
| The Masters | Top 50 |
| U.S. Open | Top 60 |
| The Open Championship | Top 50 |
| PGA Championship | (Top 100)see note |
| WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship | Top 64 (sole criterion) |
| WGC-Cadillac Championship | Top 50 |
| WGC-Bridgestone Invitational | Top 50 |
| WGC-HSBC Champions | Top 25 |
Note: The PGA Championship does not have an official automatic entry based on the Official World Golf Ranking but has invited those in the top 100 for the last several years. It makes note of its strong field by referencing the number of top 100 ranked golfers entered in its press releases.
The rankings are well known to those who follow men's professional golf and feature prominently in media coverage of the sport. When Vijay Singh temporarily ended Tiger Woods' record run as world number 1 in 2004 it was one of the most reported golf stories of the year.
Read more about this topic: Official World Golf Ranking
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