The Reshuffle List: Non-Member Update

With the year's first major next week, it's a good time to check in on the Non-Member FedEx Cup Points List. Remember, anyone who earns the equivalent of the points the 150th-ranked player earned on last season's FedEx Cup points list gets special temporary membership and unlimited sponsor's exemptions. Anyone who makes equal to or better than the amount 125th-ranked player on THIS season's FedEx Cup points list earns will get a PGA Tour card for the 2015-2016 season.

This week is significant because the main opportunity for international players on the list to play in PGA Tour events is via the majors and World Golf Championship events.

NOTE: For the 2013-2014 season, the 125th player on the FedEx Cup points list earned 438 points, while the 150th place player earned 323 points.

1. Shane Lowry - 228 points
2. Hiroshi Iwata - 152
3. Joost Luiten - 126
4. Marc Warren - 119
5. Cameron Smith - 105
6. Emiliano Grillo - 104

Lowry has done the first step every non-member needs in their limited amount of opportunities to earn status: make the cut as often as possible. He's done that in all of his six starts except one, garnering one top-10 and two other top-25 finishes along the way. His best finish was a T7 at the Farmers Insurance Open, and with 228 points is less than 100 points away from earning that coveted special temporary membership. Helping his cause? He's 28th in sand-save percentage, and 16th in total driving. Lowry is in the field this week.

Iwata is second on the list because he nearly won the World Golf Championships-HSBC Champions, where he tied for third to eventual winner Bubba Watson. That's carrying the entire weight for him, however, as he's only made one other start on the PGA Tour this season, a missed cut at the Sony Open. He is not in the field at the Masters.

Luiten is a long-time player on the European Tour who is third on this list due to his finishes of T28 in Shanghai, T11 at the Honda Classic and T46 at Doral. Luiten, 39th in the world and in the field at the Masters, is hitting 69 percent of his greens, above the PGA Tour average of nearly 65 percent.

Warren, another European Tour stalwart, has made all three of his cuts on the PGA Tour this season, going T35 in Shanghai, T17 at Doral and T35 in last week's Valero Texas Open. He's not in the field at Augusta but will be a player to watch, as his European Tour season features a second and a ninth. The 52nd-ranked player in the world -- he just missed the top 50 cut-off to get into the Masters -- is seemingly getting better by the day.

Smith, an Australian, is arguably the most unknown of any player on the list but nearly won the CIMB Classic, tying for fifth there before missing the cut in his next four PGA Tour starts. At 177th in the world, he does not appear to have any more PGA Tour starts on his immediate radar and has been playing mostly in Australia, New Zealand and Asia.

Fans may recognize Grillo's name as he was a part of that wild Sunday at the Puerto Rico Open, which he nearly won in regulation before ending up in that massive five-man playoff that featured Arnold Palmer's grandson Sam Saunders. He lost to Alex Cejka, but his finish got him into the Valspar Championship where he missed the cut. Grillo, who is from Argentina, showed his talent in a big spot on the PGA Tour and is a name to watch.

The most noteworthy name on this list, however, is not anyone within the top six. It's the guy in 22nd, Anirban Lahiri. He only has 59 FedEx Cup points but is the 34th-ranked player in the world and has already won twice on the European Tour in 2015, first in Malaysia and then in his home country of India. Every year at the Masters some international player unknown to most American golf fans unexpectedly rises out of nowhere and pops onto the leaderboard. Don't be surprised if that guy is Lahiri. He hits a lot of fairways (63 percent), hits a lot of greens (75 percent) and averages 1.71 putts per GIR, which has him ranked 23rd on the European Tour. He can play.

Checking In With a Past Reshuffle List Member

Tiger Woods' struggles to chip have gotten the attention of seemingly every golfer, professional and amateur alike. Kyle Thompson was one of those, chiming in on Jan. 30 with these sentiments:

I battled the putting yips in 2012 on the PGA Tour and understand what Tiger is facing. It's not something I'd wish upon my worst enemy...

— Kyle Thompson (@KyleThompsonPGA) January 30, 2015

In short, it put Thompson back on our radar. I've been writing Reshuffle List columns for RotoWire since 2012, meaning I've covered parts of three completed PGA Tour seasons. There's been almost no one who has struggled in that time as much as Thompson, missing 18 cuts, only making money in three events (he made $0 for the season until the week of the Open Championship) and earning a grand total of $45,460. And now we know why it was so brutal. The yips, whether they happen to professionals or amateurs, are an absolute beast. Thompson has only played in one PGA Tour event since the 2012 season, missing the cut at the Farmers Insurance Open earlier this year.