FedExCup profiles: Running down Nos. 20-16 at the Tour Championship

The Tour Championship is here, and 30 players still have a shot (mathematically, anyway) at one of sports’ richest single prizes. In the run-up to the tournament, we’ll run down each of the players. For each player to win the FedExCup, multiple other players have to finish below certain levels; we didn’t run down all those possibilities, just the most notable ones. We continue with a few names that have an outside chance to win $ 10 million on Sunday.

20. Robert Garrigus: Garrigus is currently enjoying the best season of his career with over $ 2.5 million in earnings and three second-place finishes. He’ll need to win the Tour Championship and have Rory McIlroy finish 13th or worse to win the FedExCup, but considering Bill Haas was No. 25 when he won last year, Garrigus still has a shot.

19. Bo Van Pelt: For the third straight season, Van Pelt is heading back to East Lake for the Tour Championship. After recording a second-place and three third-place finishes this season, he picked up three more top-25 finishes in the first three FedExCup playoff events. To give you an idea of how consistent Van Pelt has been over the last half of the season, he’s only finished outside the top-25 on three occasions in his last 13 starts. To win the FedExCup, he’ll need McIlroy to finish 13th or worse, and have Tiger Woods finish fifth or worse.

18. Jim Furyk: When you finish the season with two second-place finishes and a spot on the Ryder Cup team, that’s usually cause for celebration. But this season has been anything but memorable for Jim Furyk. He choked away a lead with three holes to play at the U.S. Open, and then did the exact same thing on the final hole at the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational. Furyk is a past FedExCup winner, so he knows what it’s like to take home $ 10 million. Will a huge payday mask the pain of blowing two big events? Probably not. Regardless, he’ll need to win the Tour Championship and see McIlroy finish 12th or worse to take home the season-long title.

17. Carl Pettersson: Another hard-luck loser, the Swede was done in by a silly rules violation at the PGA Championship that derailed his chances early on during the final round at the Ocean Course. However, Pettersson won earlier in the year at the RBC Heritage, so 2012 wasn’t a complete failure. Throw in two second-place finishes, one third-place finish and 6 top 10s and you have a successful season for pretty much every player on tour. To make it truly memorable he’ll need to win at East Lake and see McIlroy finish 11th or worse.

16. Matt Kuchar: Mr. Consistent is back in the mix going into the Tour Championship, thanks to a win at the Players Championship. Even though he hasn’t finished higher than 35th in this year’s edition of the playoffs, you still have to like Kuchar’s chances at No. 16 — especially when you consider he just needs to win the Tour Championship and see McIlroy finish 10th or worse to take home the FedExCup title. Sounds easy, right?

Next: A couple major winners and on of the most consistent golfers on the PGA Tour.

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