WGC-Bridgestone Invitational purse: Jason Day closing in on another huge payout

One of the most lucrative months in the history of the PGA Tour starts this Sunday in Akron, where a massive $9.5 million purse will be doled out to just 61 players. The WGC-Bridgestone Invitational at Firestone has always been one of the biggest cash games in golf, and the PGA Tour has gone and bumped the purse another $250K this year. That’s just $500k shy of the major championship purses and $1M short of the richest purse in the game (another PGA Tour-hosted party), The Players Championship. The Bridgestone is the start of a July that will feature this WGC purse and two majors purses that will be at least $10 million.

The WGCs are unseemly for some who follow the Tour closely -- they tend to be a closed party that provides free money and world rankings points for the top of those rankings, and thus makes it harder for those outside to crack that exclusive club. If you’re qualified, it is stupid not to play. There’s no cut and it’s easy money, even if you play some of the worst golf of your life. We saw this at the first WGC of this year at Doral, where Steven Bowdtich finished a crazy 37-over par, a good 14 shots worse than the second-to-last finisher. The Aussie still made almost $50,000.

At least Bowditch played out the string and completed four ignominious rounds. This week, we had Daniel Berger show up on the 1st tee, make one swing and walk off the course. Berger withdrew instantly, saying he had a shoulder injury. But he was no idiot and knew the rules -- if he withdrew after starting the tournament, he’d still collect that guaranteed cash. If he pulled out during the practice rounds, then he walked away with nothing. So Berger hit a shot and got a $50,500 check for it. It was one of the all-time robberies that highlighted just how crazy some of the free money is at these WGC events.

The winner on Sunday will earn $1.62 million in prize money, which, again, is less than only the four majors and The Players. Jason Day is back on top of another Sunday leaderboard and, well, he probably doesn’t care too much about the money at this point. He’s already won one of these WGC purses this year -- the Match Play back in March. And then he won the richest prize in the game, an almost $1.9 million payday at The Players in May. It’s the first weekend in July and he’s already got $5,868,610 in season earnings with two more majors and the entire FedExCup ahead of him.

Here’s the full purse breakdown (we’ll update info with ties when results go official).

UPDATE: Day made a mess on the back nine, while Dustin Johnson closed with 4-under 66 to win by a shot. It’s DJ’s second straight massive payday. Here are your updated totals (this does not include the three WDs -- Berger, Davis Love III, and Brooks Koepka who all still took home the aforementioned $50k)