The year gone by saw a lot of action on the Golfing terrain in terms of the rise and fall of several players.

 

One way to look at which players took a step forward and which ones took a step back is by looking at the Official World Golf Ranking.

 

 

 

                             Dustin Johnson has moved to number 1 in the Official World Golf Rankings 

 

 

Here's a look at the top 10 in the world comparing the final rankings of 2016 and 2017:

 

2016	2017
1. Jason Day	1. Dustin Johnson
2. Rory McIlroy	2. Jordan Spieth
3. Dustin Johnson	3. Justin Thomas
4. Henrik Stenson	4. Jon Rahm
5. Jordan Spieth	5. Hideki Matsuyama
6. Hideki Matsuyama	6. Justin Rose
7. Adam Scott	7. Rickie Fowler
8. Patrick Reed	8. Brooks Koepka
9. Alex Noren	9. Henrik Stenson
10. Bubba Watson	10. Sergio Garcia

 

At the top of the ranking, the strong 2017 performances of Dustin Johnson, Jordan Spieth and Justin Thomas led to the first U.S. trio to top the rankings since Tiger Woods, David Duval and Mark O'Meara in August 1998.

 

Meanwhile, the previous world No. 1s Jason Day and Rory McIlroy slid outside the Top 10 in 2017 with McIlroy finishing at No. 11 and Day at No. 13.

 

 

                                                      Rory slid in Official World Golf Rankings

 

 

But who had the biggest gains in the rankings in 2017? You might think it was Jon Rahm, who rocketed up the rankings after his first career win at Torrey Pines. He finished 2016 ranked No. 137 and climbed a very impressive 133 spots to No. 4.

 

However, the title of the biggest mover in the Official World Golf Ranking belongs to former amateur World No. 1 Patrick Cantlay. He finished 2016 ranked 1,866.

 

Following an impressive run of top 10 performances that allowed him to qualify for the Tour Championship and then his first career PGA Tour win at the Shriners Hospitals for Children Open in November, he moved up an astonishing 1,822 spots to No. 38 in the world.

(*Sourced from PGA.com)