Alex Smalley<\/a> remained very composed throughout the final round of the 108th PGA Championship.<\/p>\nAlthough Aaron Rai was the one left holding the Wanamaker trophy aloft, the 29-year-old American can be very proud of his efforts.<\/p>\n
And he can also look forward to the rest of the season, because his runner-up finish at Aronimink has opened up a few more doors – so don’t be surprised to see him finally get into the winner’s circle this year.<\/p>\n
Here’s what a successful week at the season’s second Major Championship has done for Smalley…<\/p>\n
POINTS AND PAYOUTS<\/p>\n
When it comes to prize money, there was quite a big difference between first and second.<\/p>\n
Aaron Rai banked $3,690,000, whereas Smalley’s check was roughly half, $1,804,000 to be exact (the same as joint runner-up Jon Rahm).<\/p>\n
Smalley drained a 20-footer for birdie on the 72nd hole to get into second, which was worth an extra $961,000.<\/p>\n
Decent enough, then, and there’s also the bonus of 425 FedExCup points, which puts Smalley in a very strong position.<\/p>\n
A PLACE IN THE MASTERS<\/p>\n
Talking of strong positions, his place in next year’s Masters has already been secured.<\/p>\n
The PGA Championship has a top-four-and-ties rule for Augusta, so he can look forward to teeing it up in the 2027 Masters for the very first time.<\/p>\n
“This week was special,” he said. “As far as this tournament, in terms of my career, who knows? Maybe it’s a springboard.<\/p>\n
“It gives me a lot of confidence coming away from this week to know that I can compete on the PGA Tour and even some of the Major Championships.”<\/p>\n
PGA Championship Return<\/p>\n
Next year is already shaping up nicely, and there’s more good news on the Majors front: Smalley also gets to have another crack at the Wanamaker Trophy.<\/p>\n
The top 15 players have already done enough to return to the PGA Championship next year, which will take place at PGA Frisco in Texas.<\/p>\n
A PLACE IN THE US OPEN<\/p>\n
Having moved well inside the world’s top 60, Smalley has also qualified for next month’s US Open at Shinnecock in New York.<\/p>\n
Smalley’s only previous appearance in his national Open came in 2017, when he competed as an amateur.<\/p>\n
A PLACE IN THE OPEN<\/p>\n
The first 50 players on the OWGR for Week 21, 2026, qualify automatically for this year’s Open at Royal Birkdale.<\/p>\n
Having climbed to No. 42, Smalley’s place in the field is all but assured. It will be his first appearance in golf’s oldest Major Championship.<\/p>\n
WORLD RANKING BOOST<\/p>\n
Smalley can also update his CV. Coming into PGA Championship week, he could only say he was a top 100 player in the world.<\/p>\n
Now, though, he can claim to be one of the best 50 players in the world.<\/p>\n
Smalley has leapt from No. 78 to No. 42 in the world, a career-high.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Alex…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":653359,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[71],"tags":[25855,36298,427,14192,99,274443],"class_list":["post-653358","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-golf","tag-aaron-rai","tag-alex-smalley","tag-golf","tag-pga-championship","tag-sports","tag-wanamaker-trophy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/653358","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=653358"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/653358\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/653359"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=653358"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=653358"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=653358"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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