You likely will see Dustin Johnson in Atlanta next month.
Johnson won the Hurricane Irene-shortened Barclays Championship on Saturday and moved to No. 1 in the FedEx Cup point standings. He is all but assured a spot in the Tour Championship at East Lake Golf Club on Sept. 22-25. Johnson shot a final-round 65 to win the first leg of the PGA Tour playoffs, holding off Georgia Tech graduate Matt Kuchar. Johnson jumped 18 spots in the standings and holds a 784-point lead over second-place Kuchar.
With the playoff field trimmed by 25, the top 100 golfers move on to this week’s Deutsche Bank Championship at TPC Boston. Here’s a look at the biggest winners and losers from the Barclays, and what to watch for at the upcoming playoff event:
Biggest moves up
Camilo Villegas easily made the biggest jump of the week and lives to play another day. Villegas tied for sixth by finishing 14 under par. He jumped a remarkable 58 spots -- from 109th to 51st. Not only did he advance to the Deutsche Bank, but he may well have played his way into the third leg at the BMW Championship.
Padraig Harrington and William McGirt also moved on with big performances. Harrington (No. 124) and McGirt (No. 125) were the last two golfers in the playoff field. Harrington moved up 44 places to 80th and McGirt moved up 29 spots to 96th.
Five other players moved up the necessary spots to advance to the next round: Chris Stroud (31 spots), Ian Poulter (36), Bill Lunde, John Merrick and Ernie Els.
Scott Piercy (30), Vijay Singh (28) and Anthony Kim (26) were other big movers.
You’re out
With eight players moving into the top 100 field, eight players fell out and will watch the rest of the playoffs.
Bryce Molder, former Georgia Tech player, fell 10 spots to No. 101 after a tie for 64th finish. He finished three points behind No. 100 Ben Crane. The other seven players, all of whom missed the cut, and dropped out of the top 100 were Hunter Haas, Chris DiMarco, Paul Goydos, Nick O’Hern, Matt Bettencourt, Tim Herron and Michael Bradley. Haas was the highest-ranked player on the points list (No. 89) to fall out of the top 100.
Other notable players who were eliminated were Retief Goosen and Alpharetta’s Heath Slocum.
Biggest falls
George McNeill and Brian Gay will play this week despite dropping 15 places in the standings each. They were the biggest losers in the standings. Brandt Jobe (56th) and Robert Garrigus (67th) each fell 14 spots.
The top 5
Behind Johnson and Kuchar are Nick Watney, Webb Simpson and Luke Donald to round out the top five. Steve Stricker (seventh) and PGA Championship winner Keegan Bradley (14th) fell out of the first five places. Brandt Snedeker (sixth) shot a course-record 61 in the final round of the Barclays to move up 12 spots.
In the first four years of the FedEx Cup, the winner started no worse than seventh at the start of the playoffs. Tiger Woods was twice the leader, defending champion Jim Furyk was third and Singh seventh before winning the first two playoff events.
This week
The Deutsche Bank Championship, which will be played Friday through Monday, will trim the playoff field from 100 to 70 players. The field of 70 will move on to the BMW Championship at Cog Hill Golf and Country Club, Ill., in the final cut before the 30-player Tour Championship.
With Hurricane Irene hitting the Northeast on Sunday, tournament officials took precautions a day earlier. Small temporary structures and some signage around the course were removed. Larger structures were reinforced. How much damage Irene does to TPC Boston remains to be seen but officials are concerned with trees being felled by high winds and flooding.
A pro-am event, scheduled for Monday, was canceled.
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