Ben Kohles had one objective, and that was to lock up a PGA Tour card for 2027. He had two options and chose to follow his hunch.
Kohles, who won the BMW Charity Pro-Am the first week in June, was No. 19 on the Korn Ferry Tour points list heading into the Korn Ferry Tour Championship, where the top 20 earn PGA Tour cards for next year.
So he got on a plane to Japan.
“There was no real way of knowing what it was going to take points-wise,” Kohles said before going to the airport for the long flight home. “I was just betting on myself.”
It appears to have paid off. Kohles closed with a 3-under 68 in the Baycurrent Classic and tied for 17th, and those 48 points moved him to No. 80 in the FedExCup. He’s not a mathematical lock to finish in the top 100, but with only five events left in the FedEx Fall — he’s going to play four of them — he should be all set.
Kohles was 17th on the Korn Ferry Tour points when he chose not to play the last three events, instead going to the PGA Tour stop in Asheville, North Carolina, (tie for 15th) and Utah (tie for 13th), going from 96th to 84th in the FedExCup.
It was quite the juggling act.
“I looked it at like, I could play the last three Korn Ferry events and miss the first three in the fall and lock up my card. At the same time, I’ve been doing this long enough,” he said, pausing to chuckle. “The money is one thing — it’s a little more on the PGA Tour — but knowing how I was playing, I thought I could move up in the fall standings.”
Kohles was coming off a poor year and had only conditional status. He started with nine Korn Ferry Tour events in his first 11 starts.
He got in the John Deere Classic and had a chance to win until he hit his approach into the water on the 18th, missed a long par putt to force a playoff and then went to tap in his meaningless bogey when that missed, too. That cost him 100 points and $318,200.
“I take the positives from that,” he said. “Ever since then, my game has been in the best spot it’s ever been. Everything is where I want it to be.”