Who dominated in 2018? Hint: It wasn’t Justin Rose
By Bill Felber
5. Tommy Fleetwood (19), -0.90
The FedEx Cup formula hurt Fleetwood, possibly because he made so few starts this side of the Atlantic. Fleetwood played in only 17 events, the fewest of any of the 30 Tour Championship contestants save for Brooks Koepka, whose season was truncated by injuries.
That was unfortunate for Fleetwood, because when he played he was a constant factor. In his 17 events, he beat the field average 15 times, coming up short in that regard only at the Wells Fargo and the PGA. If this rating were merely about avoiding below-average performances, Tommy Fleetwood – with just 4.92 weighted bad points all season – would win.
Like Finau, Fleetwood was at his best on the big tournament stages, meaning that the weighting system favored him. He tied for seventh at the Players, chased Koepka to the finish before falling one stroke short at the U.S. Open, contended for three rounds before finishing 12th at the British Open, and landed a top 10 at the BMW.
His unremarkable stats in what might be referred to as the “regular” portion of the Tour probably had as much to do with how infrequently he played them. Fleetwood made only five appearances in non-major, non-WGC, non-Players, non-Tour Championship Series tournaments. When he showed up, Fleetwood was a factor. He finished fourth, just two strokes behind winner Justin Thomas, at the Honda and tied for sixth at the Canadian.