Mid-Season break
As we approach our nineth event in ten weeks, and a VERY well-deserved break, I wanted to take a look at where we currently sit for season 2024/25 and what’s to come in the new year.
Season Order of Merit
I love the overall season race and from where I’m standing the winner now looks basically locked in. But I’m not sad that it’s over, I’m happy that it’s happened.
Elvis Smylie’s first half of the season is likely the best ever seen on the PGA of Australasia. Elvis has earned $460,461.95 in just 7 starts. He is the only player this season to have made every cut of those that have played in 5+ events, which includes top 5s in all but two, and top 10s in all but one. He has won nearly 50% of the total prize money awarded to the winner in all events he has played (Kazuma Kobori won less than 15% of potential prize money last season).
Smylie is the only player to gain more than 3.00 strokes per round on the season. To put that half-season in perspective, compare it to Kazuma Kobori’s second half of last season. Kazuma won three times in eight starts and did so averaging 2.42 SG. Smylie’s numbers become even stronger when considering he played two DPWT co-sanctioned events (Aus PGA & Aus Open) vs Kobori’s one Asian Tour co-sanctioned event (NZ Open) where the fields are stronger and it’s harder to gain strokes. Staggering numbers.
Current Order of Merit
Elvis Smylie 1,247.56
Cam Smith 735.68
Lucas Herbert 717.06
Jack Buchanan 620.11
Curtis Luck 523.44
Marc Leishman 488.00
Corey Lamb 374.14
Harrison Crowe 323.58
Anthony Quayle 322.17
Jasper Stubbs 307.03
With Cam Smith not playing again, and Lucas Herbert playing a Webex event where the winner only earns 170 points, the best chance of anyone catching Elvis is Jack Buchanan who is over 600 points behind and not playing this week. Jack, who has won twice so far this season, still wouldn’t catch Elvis if he doubled his points total in the second half of the season. And with only one “elevated” event remaining, versus the three we’ve already had, I cannot see it happening. Jack would probably need to win THREE MORE TIMES and that’s assuming Elvis doesn’t play again. Kazuma Kobori did score 741.55 points in the second half last year but that including three wins and a third behind an amateur so essentially a runner-up. It would be quite the feat to challenge for #1.
Elvis Smylie already has his DPWT card locked up for this season and next season, but the #1 spot also comes with two major starts in The Open and the PGA Championship. I believe Elvis will play the New Zealand Open, especially if the #1 spot is in danger. It’s up against a small pursed South African Open on the DPWT tour and gives him an opportunity to be at home before tackling a big schedule in Europe and chasing the top 50 on the Race to Dubai and a start in the DP World Tour Championship.
The race for 2nd and 3rd and conditional status on the DPWT is shaping up differently than years gone by. Typically the players are racing against each other down the closing stretch of the season, but thanks to Cam Smith and Lucas Herbert playing in the four events that make them eligible in the race, players will have a target in which they need to chase down. It’s looking like they will need at least 750 points at the close of season to have a chance, which shouldn’t be a problem for Jack Buchanan, but it’s looking like a tough ask for anyone further down the list like Corey Lamb, Harrison Crowe, and Anthony Quayle. Keep in mind there is only one more event with elevated points.
The #2 and #3 spots have become more valuable with the DPWT reducing their Q-School graduates down to 20 and ties, which means more starts and a potential to hit the 15 events required for the $150,000 USD floor from the Earnings Assurance Program.
Mid-season Re-Rank
We still have a bit to play for in the Gippsland Super 6 event this week, as players in category 14 - 21 will be re-ranked based on their Order of Merit standings at the close of the year. This will be very important on gaining entry into the New Zealand Open and potentially some Webex Players Series events. The NZ Open is the only remaining event of the season that will award higher Order of Merit points (4x) so the guys in the lower categories will need it if they want to have a tilt at a DPWT card or Q-School exemptions. Entries have not yet been published for the NZ Open, but last season only four players from the re-rank gained entry. The season prior, the cut-off was higher than the re-ranked categories.
The current top 10 standings for the categories up for re-ranking:
Corey Lamb 374.14
Jasper Stubbs 307.03
Brett Rankin 172.73
Jordan Doull 156.47
James Conran 123.17*** (needs 137.73 to be eligible for re-rank)
Jye Pickin 119.61
Ryan Peake 109.91
Dillon Hart 108.77
Jack Munro 104.73
Ryan Ang 88.66
With 107 points being awarded for second place in this week’s event, Corey Lamb is safe atop of the standings and he will hold the #1 position for the rest of the season unless he wins an event. Anyone winning will score 170 OOM points but will move out and up to the winners’ category. It’s jam-packed from 5th and below and adds an interesting dynamic to this week’s event.
Futures Tour
Billy Dowling is our main hope of scoring an Australasian Tour card for next season through the Future Tour Order of Merit. Amateurs can join the Future Tour and will gain full playing status the following season if they finish first and score the equivalent Order of Merit points to finish in the top 50. The last two seasons we have seen Quinnton Crocker cruise to victory and easily finish inside the top 50 equivalent, and Jeffrey Guan win comfortably but only just sneak in by a few points. Whilst we have seen promotions over the past two season, earning enough points to finish inside the top 50 is difficult when only playing a limited number of events.
Billy so far has 50.86 points and will likely require 150+ to earn status so is already well behind the eight-ball. Golf Australia will really want him to qualify otherwise players may be less inclined to pay the $2100 membership fee to join in future. So look out for Billy Dowling in the back-half of the season, he should receive plenty of invites.
Outside of Billy, the only player of interest is Rintaro Nakano who is a future golf star. Rintaro played his only event on tour this season in the Australian Open and was looking like he may score huge points after opening with -7 and sitting T2. Luckily for Bill, he faded over the final rounds and only picked up 7.56 points.
Still plenty happening as we close out the year, with Asian Tour Q-School and LIV Qualifying being played over the next week or two. And then we can have the break we all need.
See ya next year.