World Golf Rankings - Who's The No.1 Ranked Player In The World

The World Golf Rankings bring in excitement, and also adds PGA Tour relevance to players from around the world, which you will find out all about here on this page. Ranking players across the world is a complex process, spanning back over a period of years and across many tournaments. The more a player wins or plays well, the more World Golf Rankings points they will earn with the chance to ascend to the coveted No.1 ranking in the world.

Not many players in history have achieved the top ranking though, mostly because Tiger Woods held it for so long, but with more parity in the game than ever before, the World Golf Rankings are changing more often than even longtime fans are used to seeing. So just who is the No. 1 ranked player in the world? The current leader is American Dustin Johnson, one of the favorites to win the 2018 Masters, but Justin Thomas, another American, is virtually nipping at his heels. Spaniard Jon Rahm is in third as of early 2018, but there’s almost no breathing room between him and 24-year-old wunderkind Jordan Spieth, who to everyone’s shock won the 2015 Masters in his debut at the biggest tournament on the annual PGA Tour schedule.

2014 World Golf Rankings: Top-30 Players
#1 Dustin Johnson 10.5 #11 Sergio Garcia 5.55 #21 Rafael Cabrera Bello 4.12
#2 Justin Thomas9.44 #12 Rory McIlroy 5.52 #22 Brian Harman 3.92
#3 Jon Rahm 8.6 #13 Tyrrell Hatton5.01 #23 Xander Schauffele3.52
#4 Jordan Spieth 8.23 #14 Henrik Stenson4.97 #24 Francesco Molinari 3.47
#5 Justin Rose 7.2 #15 Alex Noren 4.9 #25 Charley Hoffman 3.46
#6 Hideki Matsuyama 7.1 #16 Marc Leishman4.9 #26 Gary Woodland3.28
#7 Rickie Fowler 6.35 #17 Paul Casey 4.47 #27 Patrick Reed 3.24
#8 Brooks Koepka 5.86 #18 Phil Mickelson 4.46 #28 Branden Grace3.2
#9 Jason Day5.75 #19 Pat Perez 4.4 #29 Ross Fisher 3.182
#10 Tommy Fleetwood5.57 #20 Matt Kuchar 4.29 #30 Louis Oosthuizen 3.181

*standings as of 03/07/2018

More Info About The World Golf Rankings

There are a multitude of important statistics and rankings in professional golf, but one of the most important are the World Golf Rankings. Sure, players want to be ranked high up on the leaderboards for the sake of personal pride, but it also signifies a lot more than their individual fortunes throughout the course of the Tour. The better a player performs in PGA Tour events, the higher they will move up in the standings. This is critical for a number of factors. First and foremost, World Golf Rankings are one of the top ways in which players can get into big events automatically, such as Majors and World Golf Championship events.

Where Did The Idea Of World Golf Rankings Come From?

Obviously golf rankings have not been around since the beginning of the game hundreds (if not thousands) of years ago. But actually, it was at the home of golf where the idea was initially conceived. The members of Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews – that would be the organization that hosts the British Open - were the first to bring up the notion of an international rankings system for players. It’s fitting, as the St. Andrews course is the hallowed home of golf for players all over the world.

The rankings centered on the problem that the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St Andrews was having when issuing the invitations to the British Open. They were finding that the system in place was excluding some of the game's top players from competing. The invitations were made on the position of each Tour, but many players were playing several Tours during the year, not accumulating enough standing in one specific.

The initial World Golf Rankings were released just before the playing of the 1986 Masters tournament. The very first No.1 ranked player in the world was Bernhard Langer. Following Langer on the rankings were Seve Ballesteros, Sandy Lyle, Tom Watson, Mark O'Meara and Greg Norman. Originally the points for the World Golf Rankings were based on a three-year period, but as you will read below in how the rankings are determined today, it has been cut down to a two-year period, with an added emphasis on the current season. This was changed to its current system starting in 1996.

Beginning in 1990 the PGA Tour officially began recognizing the World Golf Rankings, and began using it to determine a variety of factors. Today, the ranking of a player will determine a number of things, from their inclusion in Major Championships like The Masters, World Golf Championships events, and more. That’s the entire reason the World Golf Rankings came into being: so Major invitational tournaments can have consensus picks for which players to actually invite, ensuring that the best of the best in the “Gentleman’s Game” are really going up against each other on the world stage.

How Are World Golf Rankings Formulated?

Next to each player and their ranking in the Official World Golf Rankings, you will see a points total. This is the point total in which the order of the ranking is decided. But it is certainly not just a random number. There are a number of factors that go into the formula for the World Golf Rankings, which are gathered over a span a two-year period before being formulated.

This two-year period is a rolling period - however, there is a special emphasis placed on a 13-week period to give added importance on the recent performance of each player. Players in six professional golf tours are rated based on their performance and accordingly assigned a World Golf Ranking position. The six pro tours are the USAPGA, European PGA, Japan Golf Tour, Australasia Golf Tour, Sunshine Golf Tour, and Asia Pro Golf Tour.

Former No.1 Ranked Players In The World

Betting On The World Golf Rankings

When it comes to finding a betting line for World Golf Rankings, that option will usually be found on a futures wagering section at one of the legal offshore sportsbooks we recommend for our dutiful readers. Betting on the World Golf Rankings would, by default, be a bet placed on a player to achieve a certain ranking by a certain time in the PGA Tour schedule or after the completion of the season. For example, a bet could be placed on whether or not a given player will end the PGA Tour season as the No.1 player in the world. Something like that would generally be among the most common wagers a bettor would find on the betting boards at our most trusted sportsbook sites. Now, that is not to say that other bets on golf rankings will not be formed, as they can come out at any time during the season.

Where To Bet On The World Golf Rankings

Betting lines for World Golf Rankings can appear at different times during the season, especially when the race for No.1 is exciting and changing throughout like we saw in 2012 and again during the tumultuous 2015 and 2016 PGA Tour seasons. We have a few sportsbooks below which really focus on pro golf betting odds including the PGA and several other worldwide tours. These bookmakers would be the first places to check if one were looking to put money down on a World Golf Rankings related wager.

Bovada - Futures Up Months In Advance

Bovada Sportsbook has one of the most in-depth golf betting sections of any sportsbook found anywhere in the world, though in this case it is based in Latvia – well outside any of the US federal legal prohibitions against sports betting, meaning American golf fans can place their wagers with confidence. This is because the bookies at Bovada cover more than just betting on the PGA Tour. The betting options extends across into other professional tours, most notably the European Tour and some of the Asia Tours when they host big events (or, as is the case with the Japan Golf Tour, when its events overlap with the PGA Tour’s Majors). Bovada Sportsbook will be the first to have World Golf Rankings betting lines as well.

For those interested, Bovada accepts USA players from every state except Delaware, New Jersey, New York, Maryland and, of course, Nevada. And Bovada also make betting on the PGA Tour simple, safe, and easy to sign up for a new account. Those who do deposit can receive up to a $250 bonus to place a wager or up to $5,000 in free wagers if you bankroll your account using Bitcoin.