Matt Kuchar
Kuchar at the 2017Valero Texas Open
Personal information
Full name	Matthew Gregory Kuchar
Nickname	Kuch
Born	(1978-06-21)June 21, 1978 (age 47) Winter Park, Florida, U.S.
Height	6 ft 4 in (1.93 m)
Weight	195 lb (88 kg; 13.9 st)
Sporting nationality	United States
Residence	St. Simons, Georgia, U.S.
Spouse	Sybi Parker ​ (m. 2003)​
Children	2
Career
College	Georgia Tech
Turned professional	2000
Current tour	PGA Tour
Professional wins	18
Highestranking	4 (June 2, 2013)[1]
Number of wins by tour
PGA Tour	9
European Tour	1
Japan Golf Tour	1
Asian Tour	1
PGA Tour of Australasia	1
Korn Ferry Tour	1
Other	6
Best results in major championships
Masters Tournament	T3:2012
PGA Championship	T7:2015
U.S. Open	T6:2010
The Open Championship	2nd:2017
Achievements and awards
Haskins Award 1998 PGA Tour money list winner 2010 Byron Nelson Award 2010 Vardon Trophy 2010
Medal record Men'sGolf Representing United States Olympic Games 2016 Rio de Janeiro Individual

Matthew Gregory Kuchar (born June 21, 1978) is an Americanprofessional golfer who plays on thePGA Tour and formerly theNationwide Tour. He has won nine times on the PGA Tour. Kuchar briefly enjoyed success in the early 2000s before suffering a slump where he struggled to maintain his playing status on the PGA Tour. He rejuvenated himself and built a new, one-plane swing from 2008 onward leading to improved results. Kuchar was the PGA Tour's leading money winner in 2010.

Kuchar wonThe Players Championship in2012, the flagship event of the PGA Tour, his biggest tournament victory to date.^[2] As a result, he moved to a career high number five in theworld rankings and has spent over 40 weeks ranked inside its top-10. In February2013, Kuchar won his firstWorld Golf Championship event, defeatingHunter Mahan in the final of theWGC-Accenture Match Play Championship.^[3]

At the2016 Summer Olympics inRio de Janeiro, Kuchar won the first Olympic bronze medal awarded forgolf since the1904 Summer Olympics. Kuchar ended the 2022-23 season as the highest-earning PGA Tour player without a major championship win, with career earnings of over $58 million. The closest he has come was his second-place finish in the2017 Open Championship atRoyal Birkdale Golf Club.^[4]

Kuchar was born inWinter Park, Florida, to Peter, a life insurance salesman and college tennis pro, and Meg Kuchar, with one sibling, Rebecca.^[5][6][7] He went on to graduate fromSeminole High School inSanford in 1996.

Kuchar attendedGeorgia Tech inAtlanta, where he was a two-time first-teamAll-American on theYellow Jackets'golf team. After narrowly losing in the semi-finals of the 1996U.S. Amateur championship toTiger Woods, Kuchar won the title in 1997. He received theHaskins Award in 1998 as the nation's top collegiate golfer. One of Kuchar's teammates at Georgia Tech was future PGA Tour professionalBryce Molder.^[8] He earned his bachelor's degree in management.

In addition, he had some success at major championships in 1998. He was the low amateur at bothThe Masters andU.S. Open.

Kuchar turned professional in November 2000, after working briefly for a financial services firm.^[9] He missed the sign-up deadline for the 2000 qualifying school. In 2001 he was given sponsors' exemptions to some PGA Tour tournaments, and earned enough money to be fully exempt for the 2002 season.

Kuchar's first win on thePGA Tour came at theHonda Classic in2002. A tough year in2005 saw him win under $403,000, 159th on the money list, which caused a loss of his tour card. He failed to regain it atqualifying school and played on theNationwide Tour in2006. Kuchar won itsHenrico County Open and finished tenth on the Nationwide Tour money list to earn back his PGA Tour card for2007. He retained his card for the next two seasons by finishing 115th on the money list in 2007 and 70th in2008.

Seven years after his first PGA Tour win, Kuchar won for a second time during theFall Series in2009 at theTurning Stone Resort Championship. He prevailed in a playoff overVaughn Taylor that concluded on Monday due to darkness on Sunday evening.^[10]

Kuchar made theRyder Cup team in2010, taking the eighth and last merit position on the 12-man U.S. squad on August 15. At the time, Kuchar led the PGA Tour in top-10 finishes for the year, but had not won a tournament in2010. The winless streak ended two weeks later atThe Barclays on August 29, which was played at the Ridgewood Country Club inParamus, New Jersey; Kuchar defeatedMartin Laird on the first hole of a sudden-death playoff.^[11] Kuchar won theVardon Trophy^[12] andByron Nelson Award in 2010 for lowest scoring average and the PGA Tour'sArnold Palmer Award for leading the money list.^[13]

Kuchar started off2011 well with three consecutive top-10 finishes in the first three weeks of the season. He finished T6 at the opening PGA Tour event, theHyundai Tournament of Champions onMaui. The following week at theSony Open in Hawaii, he played his way to a T5 finish and then at theBob Hope Classic achieved a T7 finish.

In February, Kuchar reached the semi-finals of theWGC-Accenture Match Play Championship, where he suffered a 6&5 defeat by eventual championLuke Donald. In the 3rd place playoff match, he defeated fellow AmericanBubba Watson, 2&1. Previously during the week Kuchar had beatenAnders Hansen on the 22nd hole in round one,Bo Van Pelt in round two,Rickie Fowler in round three andYang Yong-eun at the quarter-final stage.

Kuchar finished tied for second at theMemorial Tournament atMuirfield Village in June 2011 behindSteve Stricker.^[14] This was his eighth top-10 finish of the season and took him to his highest ranking to date of world number six. Kuchar finished second atThe Barclays, two strokes behind the winner,Dustin Johnson. The tournament was shortened to 54 holes due toHurricane Irene. This finish moved him to second in theFedEx Cup standings. Kuchar andGary Woodland combined to win theOmega Mission Hills World Cup in November.^[15]

Kuchar had his best performance in a major championship atThe Masters when he finished in a tie for third. Kuchar was tied for the lead on the back nine on Sunday, but bogeyed the par three 16th and finished two strokes out of the playoff betweenBubba Watson andLouis Oosthuizen.

Kuchar won the biggest tournament of his career in May when he wonThe Players Championship atTPC Sawgrass inPonte Vedra Beach, Florida. He shot a final round of 70 (−2) to win by two strokes over runners-up Rickie Fowler,Martin Laird,Ben Curtis, andZach Johnson. He entered the final round in the last group, one stroke behindKevin Na. After bogeying the first hole, he played a near-perfect round, except for a three-putt bogey on the 17th, to hold off the challengers. The win elevated Kuchar to a career high of number five in the world rankings.

He won theWGC-Accenture Match Play Championship in February, defeatingHunter Mahan 2&1 in the final. During the final, Kuchar built up an early lead and was 4 up at the turn. Mahan mounted a comeback on the back nine, winning four of the next seven holes to trail by just one with two to play. Mahan's wild drive on the par-4 17th put him in trouble, and after Kuchar knocked his approach close, Mahan failed to chip in for par and conceded the hole, which ended the match and gave Kuchar his first World Golf Championship title.^[16] Throughout the week, Kuchar was never more than one down in any of his matches and only trailed three times on his way to the win. He defeatedHiroyuki Fujita,Sergio García,Nicolas Colsaerts,Robert Garrigus andJason Day en route to the final. Kuchar moved back into the world's top 10 after this victory. His second win in2013 came at theMemorial Tournament in early June.

Late in the year Kuchar played in two events in Australia. He finished runner-up toAdam Scott at theAustralian Masters and finished fourth in the2013 World Cup of Golf.

In the final round of theValero Texas Open in March, Kuchar held a share of the lead with nine holes to play but bogeyed the 10th and 11th holes and finished T-4.^[17] The next week, he had a four-stroke lead going into the final round at theShell Houston Open but lost a playoff toMatt Jones' 42-yard chip-in on the first extra hole.^[18] Kuchar was again in contention the following week at theMasters Tournament, where he was tied for the lead on Sunday before four-putting the fourth hole and finishing T-5.

A week later, Kuchar won for the seventh time on thePGA Tour with a one stroke victory at theRBC Heritage. He shot a final-round 64, which included a chip-in birdie from a greenside bunker on the 18th hole to come from four shots behind and claim victory.^[19]

At theSony Open in Hawaii in January, Kuchar opened with 65–63 to lead after two rounds. He stalled on the weekend, however, to finish tied for third. In the final round Kuchar failed to make a birdie, snapping his streak of 255 rounds on the PGA Tour with at least one birdie.^[20] The following week Kuchar tied for second, one stroke behind the winner, at theHumana Challenge.

In April, Kuchar contended at theRBC Heritage and finished in fifth place. His best performance in the season's majors came in August at thePGA Championship at Whistling Straits in Wisconsin where he finished tied for seventh. Kuchar played in only two official events outside of the PGA Tour in 2015 but did very well in both. He finished one stroke back to fellow AmericanRickie Fowler at theScottish Open and won theFiji International, an official event on thePGA Tour of Australasia. Kuchar had seven top-tens for the season but did not win aPGA Tour tournament for the first time in four years. He finished well down the money list after finishing in the top 10 in earnings in four of the preceding five seasons.

Kuchar had 9 top-10s heading into the 2016 Summer Olympics, and continued his good run with a bronze medal after a final round 63.

In the 2017 season, Kuchar competed in 26 events on the PGA Tour, making the cut in 22, including nine top-10 finishes. He finished tied for fourth at theMasters, his fourth top-10 finish in that event. At theOpen Championship, Kuchar shared the first-round lead withBrooks Koepka andJordan Spieth and finished rounds two and three in solo second behind Spieth. After Spieth's near meltdown on the 13th hole of the final round, Kuchar held a one-stroke lead with five holes to play. However, Spieth played the last five holes in five-under-par to claim the championship by three strokes over Kuchar, who finished three strokes ahead of third-place finisherLi Haotong. Kuchar finished the year 14th in the FedEx Cup standings and represented the United States in the President's Cup, posting a 2–1 record in the United States' win.

In the2017–18 PGA Tour season, Kuchar had another winless campaign. He played in 24 events. He had four top-10 finishes and made 20 cuts. He won $1,720,097 for the year and finished 76th in the season longFedEx Cup.

U.S. Ryder Cup captainJim Furyk named Kuchar as a non-playing vice-captain for the U.S. team in the2018 Ryder Cup. The U.S. team lost to the European team 17 1/2 to 10 1/2 atLe Golf National outside of Paris, France.

On November 11, 2018, Kuchar won theMayakoba Golf Classic in Cancun, Mexico. This event was part of the2018–19 PGA Tour season.^[21] Kuchar took home a winner's check of $1.296 million and paid his caddie, David Giral Ortiz, the amount they agreed to for a top ten finish ($4,000) and an additional $1,000 on top of that to equal $5,000, which is a 0.38 percent tip of the $1.296 million, causing a social media controversy. Kuchar offered an additional $15,000 payment to Ortiz, which would have amounted to a total of $20,000 or 1.54 percent of the winner's check. This amount is below the average payout (10 percent) for a full-time caddie whose player wins. Because Kuchar's regular caddie was not available, Ortiz was hired and agreed to the terms presented. Ortiz has stated to Golf.com that he never expected the full 10 percent payout and that "Matt is a good person and a great player.^[22] He treated me very well. I am only disappointed by how it all finished." When asked about giving his caddie such a low tip, Kuchar defended his decision by stating, "For a guy who makes 200 a day, a 5000 dollar week is a really big week".^[23] On February 15, 2019, Kuchar apologized and agreed to pay Ortiz the requested $50,000 and also donate an unspecified amount to local Cancun charities.^[24]

At the end of the 2018–19 PGA Tour regular season, Rory McIlroy jokingly roasted Matt Kuchar over the caddie pay controversy. At the initial award ceremony of the Wyndham Rewards Top 10, which awarded a $10 million bonus pool to the top 10 players in the final regular season FedEx Cup standings, after Kuchar playfully joked about McIlroy's narrow 2-point margin for an extra $300,000, McIlroy highlighted that "And we all know what money means to him."^[25]

On January 13, 2019, Kuchar won theSony Open in Hawaii, his second win in three starts.^[26] On March 31, 2019, Kuchar reached the championship round of theWGC-Dell Technologies Match Play for the second time in his career, having previously done so in 2013 when he went on to win the title. He lost toKevin Kisner, 3 & 2, in the final.^[27] In December 2019, Kuchar played on the U.S. team at the2019 Presidents Cup atRoyal Melbourne Golf Club in Australia. The U.S. team won 16–14. Kuchar went 0–1–3, but battled back from 3 down againstLouis Oosthuizen to halve the match in Sunday singles. Kuchar made the Cup-clinching putt on 17.^[28]

On January 19, 2020, Kuchar won theSingapore Open on theJapan Golf Tour. The tournament was co-sanctioned by theAsian Tour.^[29]

Kuchar is married to Sybi Parker, who was a tennis player at Georgia Tech, and they live onSt. Simons Island in Georgia. Their two sons are Cameron Cole and Carson Wright. Kuchar is aChristian.^[30]

• 1997Terra Cotta Invitational,U.S. Amateur

No.	Date	Tournament	Winning score	To par	Margin of victory	Runner(s)-up
1	Mar 10,2002	The Honda Classic	68-69-66-66=269	−19	2 strokes	Brad Faxon,Joey Sindelar
2	Oct 5,2009	Turning Stone Resort Championship	67-68-67-69=271	−17	Playoff	Vaughn Taylor
3	Aug 29,2010	The Barclays	68-69-69-66=272	−12	Playoff	Martin Laird
4	May 13,2012	The Players Championship	68-68-69-70=275	−13	2 strokes	Ben Curtis,Rickie Fowler, Zach Johnson,Martin Laird
5	Feb 24,2013	WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship	2 and 1			Hunter Mahan
6	Jun 2, 2013	Memorial Tournament	68-70-70-68=276	−12	2 strokes	Kevin Chappell
7	Apr 20,2014	RBC Heritage	66-73-70-64=273	−11	1 stroke	Luke Donald
8	Nov 11,2018	Mayakoba Golf Classic	64-64-65-69=262	−22	1 stroke	Danny Lee
9	Jan 13,2019	Sony Open in Hawaii	63-63-66-66=258	−22	4 strokes	Andrew Putnam

PGA Tour playoff record (2–1)

No.	Year	Tournament	Opponent	Result
1	2009	Turning Stone Resort Championship	Vaughn Taylor	Won with par on sixth extra hole
2	2010	The Barclays	Martin Laird	Won with birdie on first extra hole
3	2014	Shell Houston Open	Matt Jones	Lost to birdie on first extra hole

No.	Date	Tournament	Winning score	To par	Margin of victory	Runner-up
1	Jan 19,2020	SMBC Singapore Open1	66-68-62-70=266	−18	3 strokes	Justin Rose

¹Co-sanctioned by theAsian Tour

No.	Date	Tournament	Winning score	To par	Margin of victory	Runner-up
1	Oct 18,2015	Fiji International1	74-72-69-69=284	−4	4 strokes	Aron Price

¹Co-sanctioned by theOneAsia Tour

No.	Date	Tournament	Winning score	To par	Margin of victory	Runner-up
1	May 21,2006	Henrico County Open	71-67-69-72=279	−9	Playoff	Paul Claxton

Nationwide Tour playoff record (1–0)

No.	Year	Tournament	Opponent	Result
1	2006	Henrico County Open	Paul Claxton	Won with birdie on third extra hole

No.	Date	Tournament	Winning score	To par	Margin of victory	Runners-up
1	Jun 21, 2011	CVS Caremark Charity Classic (withZach Johnson)	58-60=118	−24	2 strokes	Davis Love III andMorgan Pressel
2	Nov 27, 2011	Omega Mission Hills World Cup (withGary Woodland)	64-70-63-67=264	−24	2 strokes	England −Ian Poulter andJustin Rose,  Germany −Alex Čejka andMartin Kaymer
3	Dec 15, 2013	Franklin Templeton Shootout (withHarris English)	64-60-58=182	−34	7 strokes	Retief Goosen andFreddie Jacobson
4	Oct 25, 2015	Bridgestone America's Golf Cup (withJustin Hueber)	67-60-63-60=250	−34	4 strokes	Rafael Campos andEdward Figueroa
5	Dec 10, 2016	Franklin Templeton Shootout (2) (withHarris English)	57-66-65=188	−28	1 stroke	Jerry Kelly andSteve Stricker
6	Dec 13, 2020	QBE Shootout (3) (withHarris English)	58-61-60=179	−37	9 strokes	Rory Sabbatini andKevin Tway

Results not in chronological order in 2020.

LA = low amateur
CUT = missed the half-way cut
"T" = tied
NT = no tournament due toCOVID-19 pandemic

• Most consecutive cuts made – 14 (2013 Masters – 2016 Open Championship)
• Longest streak of top-10s – 2 (2017 Open Championship – 2017 PGA)

Year	Championship	54 holes	Winning score	Margin	Runners-up
2012	The Players Championship	1 shot deficit	−13 (68-68-69-70=275)	2 strokes	Ben Curtis,Rickie Fowler, Zach Johnson,Martin Laird

CUT = missed the halfway cut
WD = withdrew
"T" indicates a tie for a place
C = Canceled after the first round due to theCOVID-19 pandemic

Year	Championship	54 holes	Winning score	Margin	Runner-up
2013	WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship	n/a	2 and 1		Hunter Mahan

Results not in chronological order before 2015.

¹Cancelled due toCOVID-19 pandemic

QF, R16, R32, R64 = Round in which player lost in match play
NT = No tournament
"T" = Tied
Note that the HSBC Champions did not become a WGC event until 2009.
Note that the Championship and Invitational were discontinued from 2022. The Champions was discontinued from 2023.

* As of April 17, 2022

Amateur

• Eisenhower Trophy:1998
• Palmer Cup:1998 (tie),1999 (winners)
• Walker Cup:1999

Professional

• Ryder Cup:2010,2012,2014,2016 (winners)
• Presidents Cup:2011 (winners),2013 (winners),2015 (winners),2017 (winners),2019 (winners)
• World Cup:2011 (winners),2013,2018

• 2006 Nationwide Tour graduates

• Matt Kuchar at thePGA Tour official site
• Matt Kuchar at theOfficial World Golf Ranking official site
• Matt Kuchar atUSA Golf
• Matt Kuchar atTeam USA (archive June 6, 2023)
• Matt Kuchar atOlympedia
• Matt Kuchar atOlympics.com

• American male golfers
• Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets men's golfers
• PGA Tour golfers
• Ryder Cup competitors for the United States
• Presidents Cup competitors for the United States
• Golfers at the 2016 Summer Olympics
• Medalists at the 2016 Summer Olympics
• Olympic bronze medalists for the United States in golf
• Korn Ferry Tour graduates
• Golfers from Orange County, Florida
• Golfers from Georgia (U.S. state)
• American people of Ukrainian descent
• Sportspeople from Winter Park, Florida
• People from Glynn County, Georgia
• 1978 births
• Living people
• 21st-century American sportsmen

• Articles with short description
• Short description is different from Wikidata
• Use mdy dates from May 2019
• Team USA template using new ID