Scottie Scheffler has been named the 2023 PGA Tour Player of the Year. In doing so, the world No. 1 has claimed the Jack Nicklaus Award for the second consecutive season and becomes the fourth player in history — and first since Tiger Woods from 2005-07 — to emerge as a back-to-back winner. Scheffler was not the only player to add hardware to his mantle on Wednesday as Eric Cole received the Arnold Palmer Award as Rookie of the Year. Cole, 35, becomes the oldest player since 2004 to win the award.
Scheffler’s season was not necessarily defined by the trophies he won, but rather the numbers he put up. The 27-year-old successfully defended his crown at the WM Phoenix Open before winning the Players Championship, but those were the only two trophies we would earn during the PGA Tour season. Viktor Hovland, another candidate for the award, won three times in 2023.
From a statistical standpoint, however, Scheffler stood alone. From the World Wide Technology Championship in November 2022 to the Scottish Open in July 2023, Scheffler finished no worse than T12 throughout an 18-tournament stretch. He also claimed the Byron Nelson Award for low scoring average (68.6) and led the PGA Tour in terms of top fives (13), top 10s (17), official money earned ($21M) and strokes gained per round (2.3).
When it comes to the Jack Nicklaus Award, the elephant in the room is Jon Rahm, who departed from the PGA Tour in early December for LIV Golf. The Spaniard won four times in 2023, including the Masters, and was thought to be the favorite for an award voted on by PGA Tour members. Scheffler received 38% of the votes over Rahm, Hovland, Rory McIlroy and Wyndham Clark, all of whom were nominees.
The Rookie of the Year race was much closer as Cole faced stiff competition in the form of Ludvig Åberg. The 35-year-old was the only rookie to qualify for the 2023 BMW Championship and finished the season No. 43 in the FedEx Cup standings. Cole played 37 times throughout his rookie season, claiming a pair of runners-up, six top fives and 14 top 25s.
Cole’s total of six top-five finishes was tied for the fifth-most on the PGA Tour behind only Scheffler, Rahm, McIlroy and Patrick Cantlay. Cole also ranked 15th in terms of scoring average (69.8) and 16th in terms of strokes gained per round (1.1). He received 51% of the votes from his peers over the three other nominees: Aberg, Nico Echavarria and Vincent Norrman.
“I got a lot of comments that I played a lot, but I was just so happy to be out on Tour finally, and any chance I had to compete on Tour just felt like a huge privilege,” said Cole. “I didn’t get off to the best start missing some early cuts, but then kind of got it together a little bit and started to play really consistently and pretty well there the last half of the year and kind of capped it off with a pretty good fall, so it was awesome.”