PGA Tour: Four Weeks Left Before the Play-Offs: Notes from the Ballwasher

First topic message reminder :

1).That's right, just four weeks remain of the 2017/2018 season:
RBC Canadian Open
WGC-Bridgestone & Barracuda Championship (opposite field event in Reno)
PGA Championship
Wyndham Championship, in Greensboro, NC

2).The pros are in Ontario, just outside Toronto, where the Nicklaus-design Glen Abbey hosts for about the 30th time. It's a par 72 lay-out but, with the 13th, 16th and 18th being Par-5's, the leaderboard can be volatile over the final few holes.
The Canadian presence is relatively strong, 21 golfers even without Graham DeLaet who is undergoing microdiscectomy, again. He's been out since October and will apparently miss another six to twelve months.

3).Apart from the bleeding obvious, a few other things are at stake this week:
*It's the final week to qualify for the WGC-Bridgestone - the winner gets in, plus anyone in the owgr Top 50 who is not already qualified.
*And the winner also gets a trip to Bellerive, in St.Louis, for the PGA Championship.
*The Top 100 in the world rankings will also typically be invited to the PGA.
*Lastly, the top 70 in the PGA Championship "special money list" - from last year's Bridgestone thru this week. This is also the ranking from which "alternates" are chosen for the PGA.

4).The US Ryder Cup Team qualification ends at the PGA and last week saw Webb Simpson move ahead of DeChambeau to the 8th and last automatic qualifying position. DeChambeau is spinning his wheels this week in Germany, a somewhat bizarre scheduling move at the best of times but especially so for someone who withdrew from a tournament two weeks ago due to injury. Doubtless this is all scientifically calibrated though - hopefully he won't forget to pack his compass.

5).Thomas Bjorn must have had mixed feelings watching his horses come down the straight at Carnoustie: Molinari was leading the way, obviously, with Rose & Rory just a couple of lengths behind.
Not much need to worry about Fleetwood or Noren presumably, but several others had a dismal Open, continuing a largely lack-lustre summer from many leading Europeans.
Stenson's fitness seems to be a recurring issue as is Rahm's temperament. Sergio's in a funk, and even the usually consistent Casey, Poulter and Cabrera-Bello are struggling.

Kaymer seems to have played (or not) himself out of contention, Hatton hasn't caught fire and Fitzpatrick's struggles continue.

6).On the brighter side, Knox and Pepperell are in a rich vein of form, but is it too little, too late for both? In Bjorn's favour, possibly, is that Europeans have an extra three weeks to strut their stuff, compared to their American counterparts. Not sure if that's a mixed blessing though!

7).Luke Donald and Graeme McDowell have been RBC "ambassadors" for much of their distinguished careers, but Donald is out for the season with long-standing injury problems and McDowell is well off the pace necessary to keep his PGA Tour card.
It's almost two years since McDool last finished inside a Tour top ten and he's slipped to 151st in FedEx points. He has no apparent safety net available to him other than Past Champion status and any sponsor invitations - and he certainly seems popular with sponsors and tournament directors. Without a Tour cut made for almost three months, these would be desperate times for most pros, but not really clear what McDool's motivation is these days. Fingers crossed he has some good results in his final three opportunities and, failing that, has a Plan B up his sleeve.

8).Apart from McDowell, Seamus Power is the only European on the threshold of earning/retaining his Tour card, but perhaps the 400+ FedEx points that Martin Laird has accumulated may no longer be sufficient for him - he's had some good finishes at Glen Abbey so perhaps he can make absolutely sure this week.

9).Sergio has slipped ignominiously to 132nd in FedEx Points so will be in Europe or the nursery during the Play-Offs unless he can finally flash some form. Can't see that he's played a Tour event in Canada for almost twenty years. And Tommy Fleetwood has never played there - no idea why he's added this to his busy schedule, but no doubt there are some financial inducements.
Shane Lowry will also be in the house, with a new caddie, but Shane's PGA Tour career is withering. He feasted at the Bridgestone buffet three years ago, but he's not qualified to return there this year, and will only be in the PGA field on a wing and a prayer.

10).The future of the Glen Abbey complex seems perennially to be in doubt; it's permitted for housing development and the Canadian Open next year will certainly be in nearby Hamilton, on an earlier date, pre-US Open.
No Canadian-born golfer has won their home Championship for a century and Adam Hadwin must be the best bet this year.
But this is a quasi-home event for the Dustin Johnson family with father-in-law Wayne Gretzky having grown his legend not too far away. DJ has two runner-up results here and perhaps this will be the venue for his third win of the year.
Hunter Mahan left a winning position here a few years ago upon receiving the call that his wife had gone into labour - his career has floundered for a few years now but he played well for three rounds at the Barbasol hitting 51 greens in his first 54 holes. Only stumbles on back nine Par-5's held him back and perhaps this will be another week for him to confirm he's not done yet.
Otherwise, I'd expect Kuchar to build on his good record here, but my shillings each way will be invested in Finau, Laird & Snedeker.

McLaren wrote:Has Deshampoo jumped the shark?

Here is a tweet from Mcevoy 's caddie about the handshake

https://twitter.com/wayneefc1/status/1023643787652988931

IMO the term "underachiever" is way over used in assessing golfers careers.  In some cases it's just a simple disregard of the physical problems they've had like Love or Couples.

But in my opinion most the time is just a case of way over expectation. Biggest part of being a golfer is not just their physical talents and abilities but it's how they can develop control and maintain their mental capabilities throughout their career.  Until they've been out there a bunch of years (99.5% of them getting their teeth kicked in 95+%of the time), we don't know how they're going to be able to maintain that mental ability to win prolifically.  So while I might agree that if they don't develop the mental aspect of it then they're not fully utilizing their physical gifts, I tend to look at it more as the complete package a physical and mental. You can't separate one from the other. And unless they have all of it, it's not going to happen.

GPB wrote:

McLaren wrote:Has Deshampoo jumped the shark?

Here is a tweet from Mcevoy 's caddie about the handshake

https://twitter.com/wayneefc1/status/1023643787652988931

and here's one from McEvoy himself. Maybe if the actual people involved in the situation don't have a problem with it, perhaps it's time for a lot of fans and media to stop hyperventilating over it.

https://twitter.com/RichardMcEvoy79/status/1024259178414698496?s=19

Devastating news about Jarrod Lyle - perhaps he was an over-achiever beating (if only temporarily) his cancer a couple of times?


Was going to post the following about Bruce Lietzke on this week's thread, but it's great reading and suggests that there's more to a sport career than meets our eye; everyone is different:

https://www.pgatour.com/news/2018/07/28/bruce-lietzke-passes-away.html

robopz wrote:

GPB wrote:

McLaren wrote:Has Deshampoo jumped the shark?

Here is a tweet from Mcevoy 's caddie about the handshake

https://twitter.com/wayneefc1/status/1023643787652988931

and here's one from McEvoy himself. Maybe if the actual people involved in the situation don't have a problem with it,  perhaps it's time for a lot of fans and media to stop hyperventilating over it.

https://twitter.com/RichardMcEvoy79/status/1024259178414698496?s=19

BdC did apologise so he knew he wasn’t behaving particularly classy. Always easier to say “no problem” when someone apologises, than go out and complain up front.

I just watched his "lowlights" online, and Dechambeau comes across as a cross between Blubba Watson and Tiger Moobs for blaming anyone but himself.

He would make an absolutely fantastic American pick for the Ryder Cup from a European perspective, a prince among bottlers.

I was thinking more about his image as the scientist and his recent use of a compass out on course and his melt down during practice session at the open. 

I don't think jumping the shark makes him a bad guy just that he has become a parody of himself.

Jumping the shark? Have you got an American phrasebook next your Doak book Mac?

There are reports today that the R&A and USGA are jointly addressing, according to golfchannel.com, "the issue of green-reading materials beginning in 2019, 'reaffirming the player to read greens based on their own judgement, skill and ability'".

No word on compass or protractor . . . . . . . . and no word regarding the position of the respective Tours regarding the issue.

About time.

They should probably just allow the players to use lasers too if they want to speed it up, whilst a time limit on how long it takes to hit your shot should also be encouraged.

super_realist wrote:Jumping the shark? Have you got an American phrasebook next your Doak book Mac?

Can someone please explain "jump the shark" to me?

Never mine I looked it up - but I don't get the connection to this incident

Something to do with Chris Evert isn't it?


Hadn't realised that Bryson Bunsen had had a meltdown on the Carnoustie range, presumably before his Thursday round? After all his hystrionics it's amazing he made the cut.

Agree he would be great for the Europeans to have on the US RC team. Hope he does well the next few weeks and qualifies outright. Don’t think he’ll get a pick.

Kwini 

Jumping the shark refers to the point in a TV show or movie when a bizarre moment occurs before a decline in quality. In happy days the main characters literally jumped a shark while on water skies.


I don't think Brysons recent antics would be unfairly described by this term.

McLaren wrote:I was thinking more about his image as the scientist and his recent use of a compass out on course and his melt down during practice session at the open. 

I don't think jumping the shark makes him a bad guy just that he has become a parody of himself.

Exactly what did you expect the board to conclude from your post?  I am not sure you could have made the post more vague and ambiguous if you had tried.

McLaren wrote:Has Deshampoo jumped the shark?

GPB wrote:

McLaren wrote:I was thinking more about his image as the scientist and his recent use of a compass out on course and his melt down during practice session at the open. 

I don't think jumping the shark makes him a bad guy just that he has become a parody of himself.

Exactly what did you expect the board to conclude from your post?  I am not sure you could have made the post more vague and ambiguous if you had tried.

McLaren wrote:Has Deshampoo jumped the shark?

Due to his illiteracy, Mac is not very good at metaphors, similes and turns of phrase.


Even going by his description of BdC, it doesn't really meet the criteria for his description of "jumping the shark". Probably something he'd just heard, thought it sounded good, but then had to go and look up to see if he could make it retroactively fit. It didn't.

Agree about Jarrod, it literally brought a tear.

Maybe the governing bodies also found the compass use a little shark jumpy because there is to be restrictions put on green maps for 2019.

You still don’t really understand that phrase do you...?

NedB-H wrote:You still don’t really understand that phrase do you...?

Enlighten me.

Happy Days, great program, Mac might have been a bit young to have watched it.