The Web.com Tour closes out its regular season this week in Portland at the Bob Cupp- designed Pumpkin Ridge GC, with the top 25 players on the money list at the end of the tournament earning PGA Tour cards for the 2018-19 season.
In addition, players ranked between 26 and 75 will remain exempt on the tour for next year, and will compete in the Web.com Finals, a series of four tournaments beginning next week that will also offer 25 cards to the top finishers from a field that will also consist of PGA Tour members who finish outside the top 125 in the FedExCup standings.
Players who finish between 76 and 100 on the Web.com Tour will have non-exempt status for 2019 and will have the chance to earn exempt status in the tour’s qualifying tournament this fall.
Going into this week’s tournament, two Georgia residents, one each from Georgia Tech and UGA, have locked up their PGA Tour cards, along with two other players who have lived on St. Simons Island in recent years.
Among the players on the bubble is the most prominent Georgian on the Web.com Tour, with several other players with ties to the state within range of a PGA Tour card with strong showings this week.
Here’s a look at how the Georgia contingent on the Web.com Tour stand coming into the event in Portland, with their ranking on the money list in parentheses.
Anders Albertson (8): A victory in Illinois two months ago clinched a spot in the top 25 for the former Georgia Tech golfer, who is in his third season on the tour. Albertson, who played in high school at Etowah in Woodstock, has enjoyed an excellent season, ranking second in both putting and birdies and fifth in scoring. While he has just one other top-10 finish, he has made 16 of 18 cuts with 11 top-25s. He placed 56 and 62 on the money list in his first two seasons after qualifying for the tour in his first attempt.
Joey Garber (15): Garber played against Albertson during his career at Georgia, and has settled on St. Simons Island, a popular spot for young tour players. Garber started a run of four Georgia resident winners on the tour since early June, claiming victory in an event in Raleigh. That win accounted for $117,000 of his $182,000-plus in earnings, as he has had something of an up-and-down showing in his first full season on the tour, missing 10 of 21 cuts with just two other top 10s.
Finishing just one shot behind Garber in Raleigh was former St. Simons resident Scott Langley, who won the third tournament on the 2018 schedule in Panama and ranks third on the money list. Langley is a former PGA Tour player, as is Josh Teater, a recent St. Simons resident who moved from 38 to 13 on the money list with a runner-up finish last week in northern California.
Roberto Castro (23): After six seasons on the PGA Tour from 2012-17, Castro returned to the Web.com this year after a tough 2017. He qualified for the Tour Championship twice, but finished outside the top 125 three times. He regained his PGA Tour status with a strong showing in the Web.com Finals in 2015, and needs a solid showing this week to remain in the top 25 and avoid a fourth visit to the Finals, where he has fallen just short of the top 25 twice.
Castro has had a consistently successful Web.com season, with five top 10s, four in a row this spring including a close runner-up finish in Savannah. In his only missed cut, he shot 4-under for 36 holes, and has finished under par in every event he’s entered. He is seventh on the tour in fairways hit, 10th in greens in regulation, 13th in putting, eighth in scoring and first in the all-around category. But he has played a light schedule, competing in 13 of the first 22 events, and fell from 17th on the money list to 23rd after taking off last week. He is almost $10,000 ahead of the player in 26th place, and barring some unfortunate circumstances, should be able to hold onto his spot in the top 25.
Henrik Norlander (28): After teaming with Patrick Reed to lead Augusta State to back-to-back national championships, Norlander has settled in Augusta and has played on both the PGA and Web.com Tour in recent seasons. He is just over $7,000 out of the top 25 after a season highlighted by a runner-up finish in Springfield, Mo. He won a Web.com Finals event in 2015 and almost won the 2016 PGA Tour event at Sea island GC, losing in a playoff.
Sepp Straka (30): A teammate of Garber in Athens, Straka scored a surprise win in Kansas City two weeks ago, vaulting more than 100 spots on the money list after what had been a disappointing season. Straka, who moved from his native Austria to Valdosta during his freshman year in high school, was 71st on the money list last year as a rookie, but has not had a top 25 finish this season other than his victory. He began this week $13,500 outside the top 125.
Will Wilcox (34): The former Clayton State golfer competed on the PGA Tour from 2014-17, but has played this year on the Web.com, where he won in Valdosta in 2013. He has four top 10s this season, including finishes of second, third and fourth, and will need a comparable showing to move into the top 25 and return to the PGA Tour.
David Skinns (39): Like Straka, Skinns has enjoyed just one profitable week this season, a victory in Omaha last month. He had a similar year in 2017, tying for second in the season finale in Portland to retain his exempt status, and will likely need at least $40,000 this week to avoid a trip to the Web.com Finals. Skinns, a native of England who played collegiately at Tennessee before settling in Suwanee during his career as a mostly mini-tour player, was contending in a Finals event last year after 36 holes, but had to withdraw when his wife went into labor.
Billy Kennerly (56): After placing 45th as a rookie last year, Kennerly has enjoyed a solid sophomore season with nine top 25s among his 11 made cuts. However he has just one top 10, a T6 in Kansas City. Kennerly, who attended high school in Alpharetta and played in college at Clemson, is taking this week off to rest up for the four-week Finals series of tournaments.
Seth Reeves (65): The Gwinnett County native secured his top 75 status with a tie for fourth last week, moving up 23 spots on the money list. A teammate of Albertson and Ollie Schniederjans at Georgia Tech, Reeves placed 60th and 65th in his first two season on the Web.com Tour and has had another respectable season with eight top 25s.
Michael Hebert (70): After making 14 of his first 17 cuts, Hebert has missed his last four in a row, and dropped six spots on the money list last week. His lead over the player in 76th is down to about $4,700, and he will likely clinch a spot in the top 75 if he makes the cut in Portland. Hebert played in college at both Florida State and Auburn, and is living in Atlanta, playing out of Settindown Creek along with Castro. He placed between 84 and 100 on the money list the last three seasons on the tour.
Lee McCoy (78): The recent UGA standout tied for third in Springfield, Mo., three weeks ago, but after a missed cut and a poor final round last week, is a little over $2,800 behind the player in 75th. McCoy has had an inconsistent rookie season, missing 13 of 22 cuts, with a tie for 20th his best finish since the season opener before his strong recent effort in Missouri.
Samuel Del Val (94): The 2010 Georgia Open champion moved up 23 spots with a tie for 10th last week, but could have improved his situation considerably more had it not been for some late struggles in both his third and fourth rounds. After playing well in the first two events of the season in the Bahamas, Del Val missed 16 of his next 19 cuts before his T10 finish last week. Del Val, a native of Spain, played his college golf at Berry in Rome and is living in Atlanta. He was 76th on the money list year after winning an event on the LatinoAmerica Tour in 2016 and finishing fifth in earnings.
Also in the field for this week’s event in Portland are veteran tour player and former Georgia Bulldog Erik Compton (107); St. Simons resident Rick Lamb (112), who has split his time this season between the PGA and Web.com Tours); Peachtree City’s Wade Binfield (142), a former Clayton State golfer, who has two top 15s in just six starts after several wins at the mini-tour level earlier this year; and ex-Georgia Tech golfer J.T. Griffin (144), who has made the cut five of eight starts in his rookie season.
The Web.com Finals series begins Aug. 23 in Columbus, Ohio, and will play the following week in Cleveland before taking a week off. The series resumes in Boise on Sept. 13 before concluding the following week in Jacksonville, the same week as the Tour Championship at East Lake.