By Evin Priest
Despite winning five times worldwide in 2022 — including his first major championship — there’s one milestone Cameron Smith will miss out on. At No. 3 on the Official World Golf Rankings, the reigning Open champion will not be able to reach No. 1 given this week’s Australian Open is his last tournament of the year and is awarding minimal points.

The 29-year-old Australian catapulted to World No. 2 in July after his victory at St Andrews, which followed wins at the Sentry Tournament of Champions and Players Championship earlier in the year. But Smith’s move to LIV Golf in September saw his ranking drop to No. 3 despite registering a playoff loss and a win in five starts on the circuit since LIV’s 54-hole, no-cut events do not award OWGR points.

Smith returned to 72-hole stroke play at last week’s Australian PGA Championship in Brisbane, where he claimed 10 OWGR points for winning the event for a third time in his career. But a relatively low strength of field at the Aussie Open in means only 11 points will be given to its winner. That’s despite the event being co-sanctioned by the DP World Tour and having some notable Australians in the men’s field, including fellow PGA Tour winners including Adam Scott, Marc Leishman, Cam Davis and Lucas Herbert, as well as DP World Tour winners Rasmus and Nicolai Hojgaard, Ryan Fox and Min Woo Lee.

On the other side of the world, Tiger Woods’ Hero World Challenge in the Bahamas, also being played this week, is projected to award about 29 points to the winner. World No. 2 Scottie Scheffler is far enough ahead of Smith in points that he could overtake Rory McIlroy with a Hero win. But Smith’s ranking is unlikely to change at all, even if he leaves Australia with a second title.

Does that bother him?

“I don’t know; it’s hard to say,” Smith responded on Tuesday at Kingston Heath, co-host for the first two rounds with Victoria Golf Club as the women’s and men’s Australian Opens are played concurrently for the first time in history. “I’m right up there. I’m still third on the [OWGR], somehow. But as time goes on, I think those rankings become more and more irrelevant, especially with not getting World Ranking points in LIV events. It’s a bit of a shame, but it is what it is. I’ve kind of had to deal with that for the last four months. I feel like I’m playing some really, really solid golf.”

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