Who will win the 2024 PGA Championship? Five players who should contend at Valhalla

The best golfers in the world have converged on Louisville, all with the same goal in mind: to walk away from Valhalla Golf Club with the Wanamaker Trophy. But not every player's chances of winning the PGA Championship are equal. There are 20 PGA club professionals in the 156-player field; no teaching pro has won the event.

Then there's the fact the top two players in the Official World Golf Ranking enter this week firing on all cylinders. That's not to say either of them, or any of the other favorites installed by oddsmakers, will end at the top of the leaderboard come Sunday evening. The PGA Championship has its share of underdog victors, from Y.E. Yang and Shaun Micheel to Rich Beem and John Daly — the ninth alternate the year he conquered Crooked Stick.

Keeping those facts in mind, here are five players expected to be in contention Sunday (and five more, for good measure):

The favorites

Scottie Scheffler

The only thing that has slowed down Scottie Scheffler recently is his own family. He didn't play in the Wells Fargo Championship last week because he was awaiting the birth of his first child. Now, he'll tee it up as a father for the first time. He and his wife, Meredith, welcomed their son, Bennett, into the world last week.

Scheffler will try to remain in splendid form after a torrid recent stretch.

He's won four of his last five events; the only one he didn't win (the Houston Open), he tied for second. In 10 events this season, Scheffler has finished outside the top 10 only once, as he tied for 17th at The American Express in January.

Reciting how many categories in which he ranks No. 1 on the PGA Tour this season would take all day.

For the sake of brevity, check out the tweet below from golf stats guru Justin Ray, which also includes Scheffler's numbers in major championships the past three years. (No surprise: They're also stellar.)

Needless to say, he's the odds-on favorite to bag his second major in as many events this year after winning the Masters by four strokes last month.

Rory McIlroy

After holding off Rickie Fowler and Phil Mickelson to win the 2014 PGA Championship, Rory McIlroy had four major titles at just 25 years old. (Jack Nicklaus, Tiger Woods and Bobby Jones are the only other golfers who can make that claim.) But since that victory at Valhalla, McIlroy hasn't added to his major tally.

Even though he's achieved everything else within reach.

Three FedEx Cups (the most all time), three Race to Dubai championships (the only player with more than one in that span) and three Tour Championships (the only player with multiple victories in the season-ending event). A Players Championship in 2019.

And he's won his last two starts, teaming with Shane Lowry to capture the Zurich Classic and then powering past Xander Schauffele in the final round of the Wells Fargo last week.

It's not as if he's struggled in major championships since his PGA triumph: His 20 top 10s since then are the most of any player.

For a variety of reasons — slow starts, costly errors and questionable course management, and at times, others simply playing better — McIlroy has been stuck on four majors.

On the course, his game is in tip-top shape; aside from his consecutive wins, he also has a top three a month ago (at the Texas Open) and hasn't missed a cut in 10 events this season.

Off the course, there have been developments in McIlroy's private life: He filed for divorce from his wife of seven years, Erica McIlroy, on May 13.

How he navigates what's going on off the course with a goal of snapping his dry spell in major championships may be the determining factor in McIlroy's result this week.

Next in line

Brooks Koepka

It's Brooks Koepka. At a major. Need we say more?

(We will. But not too much.)

Koepka is simply a colossus when it comes to major championships.

Since the beginning of 2015, he has 17 top 10s in majors, trailing only McIlroy. The biggest difference between the two: Koepka has five wins in majors, while McIlroy has none. Koepka became only the 20th in history to reach the five-major mark thanks to his victory at last year's PGA Championship at Oak Hill Country Club. He's won three of the past six PGAs, going back-to-back in 2018 (at Bellerive) and 2019 (at Bethpage Black).

A triumph this week would put him in rarefied air: Only Walter Hagen (five, all in match-play era), Nicklaus (five) and Woods (four) have at least four Wanamakers.

Perhaps even more worrisome for the field this week: He's fresh off a victory in his most recent outing, winning the LIV Golf tour's Singapore event earlier this month, beating Cameron Smith and Marc Leishman by two shots.

Jon Rahm

The 29-year-old Spaniard already is halfway to the career Grand Slam, winning the U.S. Open in 2021 and the Masters last year.

No player, on the PGA or LIV tours, has been more consistent recently than Jon Rahm when it comes to reaching the weekend at majors: He's made 18 consecutive cuts in golf's four biggest events, the longest active streak of its kind. (His last missed cut: the 2019 PGA at Bethpage). During his cuts-made streak, Rahm's scoring average is 70.40, which trails only Scheffler (69.95) and McIlroy (70.38) among players with at least 40 rounds in major championships in that span.

In seven LIV events this year, Rahm has yet to finish outside the top 15, though he's still in search of his first victory on that tour.

The PGA Championship is the only major in which Rahm doesn't have multiple top fives; he tied for fourth in 2018, five strokes behind Koepka. He has three top fives in the Masters and two apiece in the U.S. Open and Open Championship.

Another one to watch

Xander Schauffele

Aside from Koepka, no player has been more of a fixture on the first page of major championship leaderboards the past five years, as Schauffele has nine top 10s.

But putting himself in contention never has been in question.

Actually winning has been the problem.

He's still seeking his maiden major victory. And those struggles closing extend beyond the majors into the rank-and-file PGA Tour events. Schauffele led McIlroy by one stroke heading into last week's final round; the Californian went on to lose by five shots. And that final-round flameout came after Schauffele held a four-shot lead at the conclusion of 36 holes.

Since his last victory — the 2022 Scottish Open — he has 21 top 10s and 13 top fives.

Is this the week he ends his 39-tournament winless drought and finally breaks through in a major?

Five more who might contend

Ludvig Åberg: The young, immensely talented Swede would rank higher on this list if not for his health. Åberg withdrew from the Wells Fargo, citing lingering knee soreness. When his body hasn't bothered him, he's been a force. Already No. 6 in the OWGR, Åberg has a victory, three runners-up, five top fives and nine top 10s in just 26 starts on the PGA Tour. And only Scheffler bested him in his major-championship debut last month at Augusta National Golf Club. If his knee isn't an issue, he'll be a factor this week.

Patrick Cantlay: While he's started to turn around his performance in major championships — he has five top 15s in his last seven appearances after having only four in his first 21 — it's still not what is expected for a player of his caliber, who hasn't been outside the top 10 in the OWGR since June 2021. Cantlay is 11 for 11 in made cuts on the PGA Tour this season but hasn't won an event since the 2022 BMW Championship.

Collin Morikawa: The 2020 PGA champion, whose level of play dropped off after his 2021 Open Championship triumph, has bounced back in the past 10 months. Since a missed cut at the 2023 Open, he ended his winless drought (thanks to a victory at the Zozo Championship) and has seven top 25s in 11 tournaments this season. He finished third at the Masters.

Jordan Spieth: A PGA Championship win is all that separates Spieth from the career Grand Slam and golf immortality, joining a group consisting of just five players: Nicklaus, Woods, Ben Hogan, Gary Player and Gene Sarazen. But he'll have to overcome lackluster results in recent years: He hasn't finished better than 29th in the last four PGA Championships and has just two victories since his 2017 Open Championship win. Spieth also has twice as many missed cuts (seven) as top 10s (three) in 12 events in 2024.

Justin Thomas: The local favorite, and two-time PGA champion, undoubtedly will have the crowd behind him. But can he rediscover consistent form in majors? In his first 28 major championships, he missed just five cuts. Since the beginning of 2023, however, he's failed to make the weekend four times in five majors; the lone made cut was last year's PGA, where he tied for 65th.

Reach Kentucky men’s basketball and football reporter Ryan Black at rblack@gannett.com and follow him on X at @RyanABlack.

This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Who will win the 2024 PGA Championship at Valhalla Golf Club?