The Players Championship field: Tiger Woods headlines qualifiers at TPC Sawgrass

Golf’s richest and most competitive tour, the PGA Tour, actually has no control over the game’s four most important events. All four major championships are run by independent governing bodies -- Augusta National, the USGA, R&A, and PGA of America. So the PGA Tour spends all this time running a well-oiled golf circuit, and then has to fall back during the biggest weeks of the year. But that’s where The Players comes in -- the most prestigious non-major of the season.

The PGA Tour promotes and pushes the event as the season’s fifth major, and in many ways, it has become that. It has long held the largest purse in the game and it also boasts (arguably) the most competitive field of the entire year. There’s no portion of the field reserved for amateurs or flukey Open qualifiers and PGA of America teaching pros who have no chance of winning the major championships yet take up spots in those fields. This field always features the best of the best and is the deepest of the season.

The Tour builds the field in a way comparable to the majors, pre-setting a list of exemptions and guaranteeing that an international crop of the best players will all qualify. Only two players from the current top 50 in the Official World Golf Rankings are not here this week -- Victor Dubuisson and Tommy Fleetwood. Dubuisson, the mercurial Frenchman, backed out of the event last Friday.

Fleetwood just moved into the top 50 this week after his solid showing at the WGC Match Play last week, but that was too late for the top 50 cutoff exemption. So he needed to win that event last week in order to get in (every PGA Tour winner in the intervening 12 months between Players Championships also qualifies and all 23 are here this week). Dubuisson’s WD opened up a spot for Justin Thomas, one of the more exciting top prospects on Tour this year and one of Jordan Spieth’s closest friends on the circuit.

Aside from those two Euro players, however, the top 50 and all the big guns are in attendance, which is a welcome change from last year when both Tiger Woods and Jason Day were among the Top 50 players MIA. Woods, of course, is back this year to “defend” his title from 2013, his second win on a course that’s not always been kind to him throughout his career. It’s his first start since the Masters and just his fourth of the season.

Thomas is the first off the alternates list, which is currently nine deep. If, for some unforeseen reason, there’s a spate of WDs on Wednesday, next up (in order) would be Martin Laird, John Peterson, Tony Finau, Hudson Swafford and so on.

Here’s the group that already has a spot and is set to go for Thursday. There are 144 players from 24 countries, including 84 from the USA. The full field in alphabetical order: