Web.com top-25 graduates vs. Challenge Tour top-15 graduates

I got to thinking about the Web.com and Challenge Tour graduates and what Tour's graduates are more successful the following season on the main tour. For the purpose of this blog post, I am only counting the top-25 graduates from the regular season money list on the Web.com and the top-15 graduates from the Challenge Tour. I will be using the 2014-15 season as my sample for the 2014 graduates.

2014 Web.com Tour Top-25 Graduates (2014-15 PGA Tour season money list rank)

1. Carlos Ortiz (106)

2. Andrew Putnam (178)

3. Zach Sucher (212)

4. Adam Hadwin (110)

5. Justin Thomas (37)

6. Alex Cejka (79)

7. Blayne Barber (122)

8. Tony Finau (40)

9. Jason Gore (92)

10. Steven Alker (185)

11. Andres Gonzales (111)

12. Jon Curran (95)

13. Derek Fathauer (158)

14. Cameron Percy (151)

15. Daniel Berger (25)

16. Jonathan Randolph (182)

17. Max Homa (171)

18. Mark Hubbard (176)

19. Steve Wheatcroft (105)

20. Ryan Armour (199)

21. Byron Smith (198)

22. Bill Lunde (204)

23. Fabian Gomez (59)

24. Roger Sloan (203)

25. Kyle Reifers (84)

*top-125 on PGA Tour money list retain their cards for the following season

2014 Challenge Tour Top-15 Graduates (2014-15 European Tour Race to Dubai ranking)

1. Andrew Johnston (70)

2. Benjamin Hebert (65)

3. Byeong-hun An (7)

4. Moritz Lampert (151)

5. Mark Tullo (176)

6. Sam Hutsby (190)

7. Jordi Garcia Pinto (173)

8. Jason Palmer (191)

9. Michael Lorenzo-Vera (78)

10. Oliver Farr (156)

11. Edouard Espana (94)

12. Florian Fritsch (120)

13. Jerome Lando-Casanova (172)

14. Jake Roos (143)

15. Jason Barnes (175)

*top-110 on Race to Dubai retain their cards for the following season

If I compare the number of graduates who retained their cards for the following season, the Web.com Tour had 13 (52%) and the Challenge Tour had 5 (33%). There may be a few reasons for this. First, the Web.com Tour had ten more graduates than its European counterpart. Second, the European Tour has 15 fewer players than the PGA Tour who retain their cards every season. Third, the number of PGA Tour rookies who graduated from the 2014 Web.com Tour numbered 11 (44%) versus 8 (53%) from the Challenge Tour. Lastly, Challenge Tour players are much younger than on its American equivalent. A lot of that has to do with the smaller prize funds, making it harder for players to compete on that tour for multiple years if they haven't yet made it to the European Tour. The financial situation of Challenge Tour players is more of an issue than it is for Web.com players. 

The 2014 Web.com graduate list included Justin Thomas and Daniel Berger (PGA Tour Rookie of the Year), who many project to have stellar careers. The one player from the 2014 Challenge Tour list that is in the same conversation as the two Americans is An. The 24-year-old South Korean won the BMW PGA Championship en route to winning the Sir Henry Cotton Rookie of the Year Award. An is going to be a player who steps up his game in the bigger events.

While the Challenge Tour produces younger players than the Web.com Tour, its graduates don't experience as much success when they reach the European Tour. With the announcement of the 2016 Challenge Tour schedule and an increase from 24 to 27 tournaments, let's hope that Europe's second-tier Tour can continue to produce stars of the future and have a healthy competition with the Web.com Tour.