Golf

Tracing Jon Rahm’s Remarkable Rise to Becoming the World’s Highest-Paid Golfer

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May 31, 2024 / 3482 Views

Evan Walker

Since switching from the PGA Tour in December on the culmination of a phenomenal 2023, Jon Rahm has had a comparatively quiet stretch on LIV Golf. But despite the lull, the Spaniard is in the headlines for breaking the money charts with the USD 550 to USD 600 million deal to join the Saudi-backed league. Read on to discover more about Jon Rahm, his storied career, and meteoric rise to becoming the world’s highest-paid golfer.

Forbes’ list of the highest-earning athletes — which was recently released in May 2024 — has Rahm at No 2 with total earnings of USD 218 million. The only golfer to feature in the top-10 list, Rahm’s on-field income stands at USD 198 million and USD 20 million is from endorsements and other channels. Various reports have pegged his net worth at around USD 100 million, but this could may well be higher in the wake of his lucrative deal with LIV Golf.

The winless run on LIV has led to talk if Rahm is trying to cope with the changed scenario — the format and lack of world ranking points.

The best way to silence critics is to notch a win when LIV comes calling at Houston from June 7 to 9 or better still, at the season’s third Major, the US Open, the week after.

Rahm’s fondness for the Majors is tabulated with wins at the 2021 US Open and 2023 Masters, and the Pinehurst Resort and Country Club — the venue for this year’s US Open — could be the ideal setting to declare the T45 at the 2024 Masters and missed cut at the PGA Championship as anomalies.

Time holds the key, and Rahm is too good a golfer to stay quiet for long. All his seven starts on LIV have been top-10, which place him No 2 on the individual standings, and his team, Legends XIII, is on a strong wicket too at No 2 in the team championship.

For one who is synonymous with triumphs in a short span, Rahm’s comeback demands a stage as storied as a Major, and as a past winner, the US Open is a prime opportunity.

We trace the 29-year-old’s early days and his grit and determination to emulate his idol, the late Seve Ballesteros. It’s a journey which made him World No 1 for 52 weeks. Along the way came 11 wins in official PGA Tour events and eight on the DP World Tour, all in a short span of seven years.

Jon Rahm: His stellar career and journey to becoming the world’s highest-paid golfer

Tough beginning, extraordinary progress

Born on November 10, 1994, in Barrika, a town in the Basque region of northern Spain, to Edorta Rahm and Angela Rodriguez, Rahm’s early brush with adversity started just 20 minutes after birth.

His right foot was significantly bent due to a congenital abnormality known as clubfoot. As a result, Rahm’s right ankle had to be shattered and realigned to be straightened, and the newborn had his leg plastered from the knee down.

The bruising start had no bearing on his family’s passion for golf. When Rahm was six, Angela took him to the Martiartu driving range. As she took a lesson, Rahm picked up a club, whacked a few balls, and was soon on the putting green.

By the time he was 11, it was serious Golf, and the parents rented a house near the Golf course to save time for practice. Rahm practised hitting the ball as hard as he could for hours. This came from the realisation that he would never be able to generate the torque required to be a power hitter due to his limited ankle movement. Thus, he made an adjustment where he focused on building power from a strong core and hand speed, shortening his backswing.

The innovation worked, and Rahm was on the team representing Spain at the 2011 European Boys’ Team Championship and 2014 European Amateur Team Championship. He won both and also the 2014 Eisenhower Trophy, the International Golf Federation’s biennial World Amateur Team Championship for men.

Buoyed by the progress, Rahm Sr encouraged his son to move to the United States for better opportunities. Rahm was offered a seat at the Arizona State University on a golf scholarship, and he enrolled in the fall of 2012.

Recruited by Phil Mickelson’s brother Tim, who was a successful collegiate golf instructor at the University of San Diego and Arizona State University, Rahm faced the challenge of new life in an unfamiliar setting.

Topping amateur charts

Rahm swiftly rose to prominence in Arizona, winning 11 collegiate championships, and topped the world amateur golf ranking (WAGR) for a record 60 weeks. He became the first player to win the Ben Hogan Award for Best College Golfer twice in 2015 and 2016.

Another milestone was finishing T5 at the 2015 Waste Management Phoenix Open for the best performance by an amateur on the PGA Tour since 2008.

jon rahm career highest-paid golfer — Jon Rahm during the fourth round of the 2015 Waste Management Phoenix Open at TPC Scottsdale on February 1, 2015 in Scottsdale, Arizona. (Image: Sam Greenwood/ Getty Images)

Rahm reached the United States Amateur Championship quarterfinals in 2015, and the same year bagged the Mark McCormack Medal for being the highest-ranked player on WAGR, thus qualifying him for the US Open and Open Championship.

The Spaniard finished his undergraduate career by winning the Pac-12 Conference championship and an NCAA regional championship before placing tied third in the national tournament.

Blazing through the PGA Tour

Rahm turned professional in 2016 following an excellent showing at the US Open, where he was T23. He didn’t take long to establish himself, and his first pro start, the Quicken Loans National, got him a spot at The Open courtesy the T3 finish.

The RBC Canadian Open was another high, and the T2 granted him Special Temporary Member status for the rest of the season. Additionally, he accrued enough points as a non-member to be eligible for the 2017 PGA Tour season.

The 2017 Farmers Insurance Open fast-tracked his career as the win propelled Jon Rahm from 137th to 46th on the OWGR, and it came with invites to the Masters, Players Championship, PGA Championship, and World Golf Championships. He played his first WGC, the Mexico Championship, and finished in a tie for third, two shots behind champion Dustin Johnson. The sole second at the WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play brought him to top 10 in the world for the first time.

Concurrently, Rahm started to make waves in Europe, and the 2017 Dubai Duty Free Irish Open was his first win on the DP World Tour. After finishing sixth on the FedEx Cup to cap off the hugely successful 2017 PGA Tour season, Rahm returned to win the DP World Tour Championship in Dubai, and was named the Rookie of the Year.

Winning the PGA Tour’s Career Builder Challenge in January 2018 propelled Rahm to World No 2, and the victory at the Open de Espana ensured Rahm played a vital part in Europe’s historic Ryder Cup win over the United States at the Le Golf National in Paris.

The Hero World Challenge at the end of 2018 isn’t an official PGA Tour event, but it was a win for Rahm nonetheless. Teaming up with Ryan Palmer, there was glory at the Zurich Classic of New Orleans in the April of 2019, and was followed by a T3 at the US Open in June.

Rahm returned to Europe, and won the Irish Open a second time to add to the trophies from the DP World Tour Championship and Open de Espana at the start of 2019 to bag the European Tour Player of the Year.

The summit of pro golf was Rahm’s in July 2020 with the win at the iconic Memorial Tournament. After his idol, Ballesteros, he became the second Spaniard to become World No 1. This acted as a trigger, as Rahm won his first Major in June 2021, the US Open at Torrey Pines.

The accolades kept pouring in — the PGA Player of the Year, Vardon Trophy and the Byron Nelson Award for the lowest scoring average for the 2020–21 PGA Tour season.

Rahm blazed on in 2022, winning the Mexico Open, and logged three consecutive solid weeks on the DP World Tour by winning the Tour Championship, Open de Espana and the T2 at the BMW PGA Championship.

Going with the nickname ‘Rahm-bo’, it was full-blooded golf from the Spaniard as he won four times on the PGA Tour in 2023, starting with the back-to-back wins at the Sentry Tournament of Champions and American Express. The Genesis Invitational was the next stop of the Rahm juggernaut, and given the form he was in, donning the Green Jacket at the Masters wasn’t surprising. Rahm was back as World No 1, and the T2 at the Open Championship meant by the time the Ryder Cup came calling in September, he was on a roll.

Europe won 16.5-11 in what was a fairytale week, and Rahm played a critical part in the verdict especially with his singles match against current World No 1 Scottie Scheffler.

Jon Rahm joins LIV Golf

Amid his claims that history and contesting against the best in the world on the PGA Tour is what drove him, Jon Rahm confirmed what was being rumoured for a while by moving to LIV Golf in December 2023.

Rahm’s reputation took a hit with critics describing his decision as choosing money over legacy, but the USD 550 to USD 600 million deal with LIV propelled him from 23rd on Forbes’ 2023 list to No 2 in latest compilation in May 2024.

It was a tectonic shift, and having Jon Rahm on board is the biggest deal in LIV Golf’s brief existence and a huge boost to the league’s image.