More than a fringe benefit, Séamus Power's improved status on the PGA Tour – following his breakthrough career win in the Barbasol Championship last year – has ensured his place in the limited, no cut field for this week's Sentry Tournament of Champions at Kapalua in Hawaii.
Power is the lone Irishman in the field, with Rory McIlroy, who was also eligible, opting to hold back his seasonal debut until the Abu Dhabi Championship on the DP World Tour later this month where he will compete in back-to-back events, also playing in the Dubai Desert Classic, before refocusing his play to the PGA Tour stateside.
For Power, the Tournament of Champions – with a purse of €7.25 million ($8.2m) and a field of just 39 players – which is confined to winners through last season, presents an immediate opportunity to kick-start his New Year ambitions. Currently 73rd in the world rankings, the Waterford man would move into the top-50 with a third place finish and as high as 30th with a win as he sets his sights on that top-50 ranking that would also bring with it a place in the US Masters at Augusta in April.
Time is on his side, for sure, and Power – who had six top-10s on the PGA Tour last year, including that win – has started this wraparound season well with a tied-fourth position in the RSM Classic in his last outing of 2021 moving him to 25th in the current FedEx Cup standings.
Power is not the only player with eyes darting towards the world rankings, as British Open champion Collin Morikawa has the opportunity to leapfrog Jon Rahm into the number one position if he manages to win in Kapalua.
Morikawa made a late-year move to the number two spot in the rankings on the back of a run that saw him finish runner-up at the CJ Cup, tied-7th at the Zozo Championship, first in the DP World Tour Championship and tied-5th at the Hero World Challenge.
While the Tournament of Champions marks the first event of 2022, it will actually be the 10th tournament of the wraparound 2021/’22 season on the PGA Tour which started last September with the Fortinet Championship won by Max Homa.
The Kapalua tournament starts a run that will also take in the next week’s Sony Open in Hawaii before a West Coast swing that takes in the American Express (at Quinta), the Farmers Insurance (at Torrey Pines) and the AT&T Pebble Beach pro-am (at Pebble Beach).
That Pebble Beach tournament will be deprived of a large number of leading players due to its clash with the Saudi International on the Asian Tour, which has on Monday added Patrick Reed and Tony Finau to a list that already included Dustin Johnson, Bryson DeChambeau, Louis Oosthuizen, Sergio Garcia, Xander Schauffle, Shane Lowry, Sergio Garcia and Phil Mickelson.
The PGA Tour agreed to release players to play in the event (which was dropped from the DP World Tour) on the understanding that they add Pebble Beach to future scheduling.
Full field for Sentry Tour of Champions at Kapalua: Abraham Ancer, Daniel Berger, Sam Burns, Patrick Cantlay, Cameron Champ, Stewart Cink, Joel Dahmen, Cam Davis, Bryson DeChambeau, Harris English, Tony Finau, Lucas Glover, Talor Gooch, Branden Grace, Lucas Herbert, Garrick Higgo, Max Homa, Billy Horschel, Viktor Hovland, Sugjae Im, Matt Jones, Si Woo Kim, Kevin Kisner, Brooks Koepka, Jason Kokrak, KH Lee, Marc Leishman, Hideki Matsuyama, Phil Mickelson, Collin Morikawa, Kevin Na, Séamus Power, Jon Rahm, Patrick Reed, Xander Schauffele, Cameron Smith, Jordan Spieth, Justin Thomas, Erik van Rooyen.
