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Jim Knous finished outside the top 50 at the Bermuda Championship last week, yet he had to feel like he won the event. Knous shot 1 under on the week and lost to eventual champion Lucas Herbert by 14, but he gained something very valuable in the process. Knous was playing on a major medical exemption and, according to Golfweek, needed 3.52 FedEx Cup points to retain his PGA Tour card as well as his Korn Ferry Tour card. He (barely) got by with 5.20 and will have status on both tours for the rest of the 2021-22 season.

Knous' story is far closer to the median than what you normally hear, see and read when you follow this sport at the highest level; Bryson DeChambeau's Instagram account … skews reality a bit. And while players are compensated quite well for their performances on the Tour, even being in the league is not guaranteed year over year as superstar amateur Patrick Rodgers recently found out.

Knous is 31. He played golf at the Colorado School of Mines. He's earned $916K in his career on the PGA Tour in 26 starts and another $236K in 68 starts on the Korn Ferry Tour. So, less than what Rory McIlroy earned in his last start. He was once possibly the best Division II golfer in the country and won five times his senior year at Colorado School of Mines. So compared to me and you, he's unbelievable at golf. Compared to McIlroy and Dustin Johnson, though, is a different story.

Back to Bermuda. Knous had to make the cut, which he did on the number on Friday with a 66 (on an eagle-par finish!) to back up his 76.

"Yeah, the pressure's immense," said Knous. "I've just dealt with it for two years now. It's just been weighing on me. It's tough for my family. An injury, it was hard. I'm just proud to be fighting on and have my family's support. It means a lot to me."

Then he had to finish inside the top 67 on Sunday to get what he needed to retain his card. After going out in 39, things looked grim as he slid down the leaderboard, but he closed with four birdies in his last eight holes to shoot 33 on his back nine (the front nine on the course) and lock up quality status going forward.

He called it "the greatest top 60 of all time."

"The emotions were going crazy today," said Knous. "I was running through all the scenarios in my head, which is exactly what you don't want to do, but it's hard to block those out. Once that first tee ball was in the air, it was game time. Everything kind of pushed to the back in my mind, so I was just able to focus on golf."

"Four over through whatever I was, eight holes, just dug myself into a deep hole [today]," said Knous. "Your mind kind of goes all the wrong places, but I just said, you know, I just told myself, 'We're going to do this.' I just kept fighting and just proud to have done it, you know. Proud to fight back on that second nine, make some birdies in tough conditions and leave Bermuda with some sort of status on the PGA Tour."

With a higher finish, Knous could have secured full-time status, but he said he was delighted just to be in this position. This is the story of so many golfers on the PGA Tour, Korn Ferry Tour and many other tours that rarely receive coverage or headlines. It's one worth telling and, Knous hopes, one worth re-telling as he takes a T11 at the Fortinet Championship at the end of September as well as this result into the rest of 2021 and the start of a new year in 2022.