Jake Knapp withdrew from the 2026 Memorial Tournament at Muirfield Village on Tuesday afternoon with a wrist injury, opening a place in Jack Nicklaus’ signature event for 24-year-old Sudarshan Yellamaraju. The PGA Tour communications team confirmed the move in the middle of the week, and Yellamaraju, who earned his way onto the tour through the developmental Korn Ferry Tour, stepped into the 72-player field.
The withdrawal matters because the Memorial is one of the season’s back-to-back signature events and carries a $20 million purse. Scottie Scheffler, the world number one, headlines the field in Ohio, while Viktor Hovland has also pulled out and Collin Morikawa is skipping the tournament as he recovers from a back injury. Knapp’s exit removes another notable name from a field that was already thinning before the first tee shot.
The 25-year-old, who won his lone PGA Tour title at the 2024 Mexican Open, had built real momentum earlier in the season. He shot 59 in the first round of the Cognizant Classic last February, the 15th sub-60 round in PGA Tour history, and he opened this year with four top-10 finishes in his first five starts. He also tied for 11th at the Masters at Augusta National, a result that underscored how quickly he had moved into the conversation at big events.
But the wrist problem has been hanging over his schedule for weeks. It first flared up at the end of April and forced him out of the Truist Championship, the Cadillac Championship and the PGA Championship in Pennsylvania, and he had not played since the RBC Heritage in late April. That history makes Tuesday’s withdrawal more than a one-off scheduling change; it is the latest sign that the injury is still affecting one of the tour’s more dangerous scorers.
What comes next is the part left unresolved. Knapp’s status for his next scheduled start has not been set, and there is still no clear return date. For now, Yellamaraju gets another chance on one of the PGA Tour’s biggest regular-season stages, while Knapp’s week becomes another pause in a season that started with promise and now hinges on whether his wrist is ready to let him finish it.
