The Five: Burning questions post U.S. Open

The dust has settled on the third major championship of the year. Wyndham Clark won the U.S. Open, emerging as an impressive, resilient winner in difficult conditions at Shinnecock Hills. That already seems like a lifetime ago, following Tuesday’s announcement of competitive changes coming to the PGA TOUR in 2028, along with the steady drumbeat of the season pushing our focus to this week’s final Signature Events of the season, the Travelers Championship.

So as we begin to turn the page and turn our attention to the closing stretch of the season, what burning questions do we have?

Who will win Player of the Year?

Is this the most wide-open Player of the Year race in recent memory? After Clark’s victory, there are now five legitimate candidates: Clark, Matt Fitzpatrick, Cameron Young, Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy.

Clark is the current fascination. He’s played the best the last month, first winning THE CJ CUP Byron Nelson, then contending at the Memorial Tournament presented by Workday and capping it off with his best performance, a wire-to-wire U.S. Open victory.

Fitzpatrick leads the PGA TOUR with three victories, but only one was a Signature Event. Meanwhile, Young won the Cadillac Championship and THE PLAYERS Championship, two of the top events on the calendar. Then there’s McIlory, who has won just once, though it’s the biggest event of the season: the Masters. Scheffler leads the FedExCup by a landslide, but he’s been unable to convert his strong performances into victories. He won The American Express in his season debut, but is still searching for his second win.

Who you choose depends on what you prioritize. Total wins or quality of wins. Peak weeks or sustained success. What will TOUR members prioritize? Ultimately, they are the voters.

The reality is that the winner probably hasn’t made their final case yet. You’d expect one or multiple of these players to materially strengthen their cases in the closing months. Either way, it’s storyline as the calendar approaches July. That has not been the case for the last few years, during which Scheffler had all but locked up the award by summer.

Which big names could miss the postseason?

We’ve reached the point in the schedule when the FedExCup standings are more than just a barometer for how a player is performing. It’s now a career-altering metric with long-lasting implications.

The top 70 after the Wyndham Championship will make the postseason and assure their status for 2026, with the opportunity to play their way into Signature Events if they qualify for the BMW Championship and lock up spots in all majors if they get all the way to the TOUR Championship. Those stakes will define this closing stretch of the season.

But which top players are at risk of missing the postseason?

Brooks Koepka is 73rd and has had to earn his positioning through full-field events. He has yet to play a Signature Event this season. Meanwhile, Tony Finau is 75th, and Keegan Bradley is 76th. Both players have had underwhelming years. For Finau, it’s the second consecutive season that he has struggled, while Bradley’s issues stemmed from a slow start to 2026 as he shook off the post-Ryder Cup hangover. Max Homa, Andrew Novak, Corey Conners, Billy Horschel and Rasmus Højgaard are among the other notables outside the top 70.

Will Scottie Scheffler win again this year?

Is it possible the world No. 1 will finish with one victory this season? It feels far-fetched and statistically unlikely, but at this point in the season, it’s possible.

Scheffler won 13 events in the previous two seasons, or put another way, he won 33% of his starts in those two years. That’s an astronomical rate that only a few have been able to sustain longer than a couple of years. This year, he’s won one of his 13 starts, or 7%.

Scheffler could still play catch-up. He’s won this week’s Travelers Championship before. He will defend his Open Championship title next month and has already committed to play the 3M Open the week after. Then the playoffs come, and Scheffler has proven to be dangerous at East Lake, among other venues.

Can Ben James or Jackson Koivun hit the ground running?

The Rookie of the Year race has a pair of new entrants: Ben James and Jackson Koivun.

The two earned their TOUR cards via PGA TOUR University. James finished No. 1 in the 2026 rankings while Koivun earned his place via the Accelerated pathway. James made his professional debut at the RBC Canadian Open, led after 36 holes, and then made the cut at the U.S. Open. Koivun, meanwhile, remained amateur through the U.S. Open and tied for low amateur at Shinnecock Hills.

This is the second time in as many years that multiple college standouts will jump straight to the TOUR midseason. A year ago, Luke Clanton, Gordon Sargent and David Ford joined the TOUR in June.

While that trio is still finding its footing on the PGA TOUR, James and Koivun will hope to hit the ground running like another PGA TOUR University alum, Ludvig Åberg.

Åberg finished runner-up at the Sanderson Farms Championship in his rookie season and won later that fall on the DP World Tour. That earned him a spot on the European Ryder Cup team and set in motion his rapid ascent to a top-10 player.

Both Koivun and James boast similar talent to Åberg's. Koivun, specifically, has incredibly high expectations after his incredible collegiate career. In 13 collegiate starts this season, Koivun recorded 12 top-10 finishes, eight top fives and six victories. He led Auburn to its second national title in three years and became the first player in collegiate golf history to win all three player of the year awards (Haskins, Hogan, Nicklaus) more than once.

Will Wyndham win another major?

Clark now has more majors than Justin Rose, Adam Scott, and Jason Day. He has the same amount as Xander Schauffele and Collin Morikawa.

Is it crazy to think Clark could add another and cement himself as one of the top major winners of his generation? It’s hard to believe that after the struggles Clark experienced over the last year, he even won a second major, but he has proven to be resilient and battle-tested when he puts himself in contention. He outlasted Rory McIlroy, Scheffler and Rickie Fowler to win the U.S. Open at Los Angeles Country Club in 2023. He stared down Scheffler again last week, holding off the No. 1 player in the world to grab his second major.

Clark’s major record is an interesting dichotomy. He now has two victories but only one other top-10 finish, which came last year at the Open Championship. It’s a remarkably strange track record, which makes his future difficult to predict.