Just short of golf’s new elite, Fowler is next knocking on the door

This year in golf has been one of breakthroughs.

Jordan Spieth won two majors and took the mantle of the No. 1 player in the game from Rory McIlroy, who is already well on the way of his Hall of Fame path.

After becoming a mainstay on the top 10 of major leaderboards, Jason Day finally had his, winning the Wanamaker at the PGA in record fashion and preventing Spieth from becoming just the third man in history to win three majors in a calendar year.

It’s also been a breakthrough year for Rickie Fowler. However, his achievements have been shrouded by the major moves of Spieth and Day. Fowler played the final six holes of The Players in an absurd 6 under par, landing in a three-hole playoff with Kevin Kisner and Sergio Garcia. Moving to sudden death after three holes weren’t enough to settle it, Fowler birdied the 17th hole for the third time in a row on the day to win golf’s biggest event outisde of the majors.

Fowler got little credit for winning the Scottish Open as a precursor to the British Open, but he beat a world-class field to do it.

His year has been overlooked in part because of his peers but also because his performance in this year’s major lineup didn’t match his effort from a year ago. In 2014, Fowler became, at the time, just the third player in golf history to finish in the top five in all four majors in a year. He’s the only man to have done that and not walked away with a major title. This year, Fowler finished T-12 at the Masters, missed the cut at the U.S. Open and had a pair of T-30 finishes in the final two majors. Nothing special, particularly compared to Spieth finishing the year four shots away from the single-season Grand Slam or Day’s T-9 and T-4 performances in the Opens before the PGA win.

Fowler was left out of the premature formation of golf’s new Big Three, adding in McIlroy with Spieth and Day. That exclusion motivated Fowler.

“I want to sneak in and be the fourth,” Fowler said Sunday. “And there’s a few other guys you can probably add to it. The three of them have distanced themselves a bit. But there’s a lot of good players right now.”

Well, Fowler is back in that conversation. He stared down Henrik Stenson at the Deutsche Bank Championship on Monday, didn’t blink and won for the third time in his PGA Tour career. With The Players title, Fowler, like Spieth and Day, has his first multi-win season. It’s not quite on the level of his peers, but it’s a big deal and a reminder that the sport is so quick to look for the next Jack, Arnie, Gary, Tiger, Hogan or Phil that maybe it’s worth taking a few months or years for these things to evolve.

No, Rickie Fowler isn’t in the same company as the three guys battling for No. 1 in the world. Truthfully, only a major is going to get him into that conversation and into that equation for the sport’s top ranking. However, Fowler is making it clear that he shouldn’t be ignored — and no longer just with his threads but with his game.

Ryan Ballengee is a Yahoo Sports contributor. Find him on Facebook and Twitter.

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