PGA Tour: The Players: Notes from the Ballwasher

First topic message reminder :

1).Well done to Tyrrell Hatton, great win at Bay Hill which continued the run of non-American winners - Day, Leishman, McIlroy, Molinari, Hatton.
This was also an Open Championship qualifier and Keith Mitchell (for the second year running), Danny Lee and Dahmen get to battle the traffic at Royal St.George's in July.

2).For the second week running, the course set-up seemed to make scoring unnecessarily tricky given the prevailing weather conditions. A war of attrition, but not necessarily the most attractive golf for the TV viewer to enjoy.
Hopefully the set-up at TPC Sawgrass will enable the world's best to play their shots.

3).Scott Piercy made news for all the wrong reasons last week and now Tour Commish Monahan has expressed disappointment "in the lack of judgment used" and "that it has been addressed with Scott directly". Good thing Monahan didn't say "he knows better" because Piercy clearly doesn't. But his sponsors do, thankfully, tho' any Tour punishment will be kept unpublished - unless he starts missing tournaments, from which we might draw our own conclusions.
Personally, I'd like to have seen his "invitation" to Bay Hill revoked, but no such disapproval reported from the API.

4).Interesting graph from princedrac's twitter account this week showing the top ten owgr points-getters at The Players:
Four Americans: Woods, DLIII, Furyk, Couples
Three Aussies: Elk, Scott, Shark
Nick Price
Sergio & Langer
A good week, of which there haven't been many recently, will see Garcia can jump from 2nd to 1st, ahead of Tiger.

5).That's reflective of an international honours board with eight of the last twelve winners being "overseas" players.
And first-timers at TPC have a tough time too - after Jerry Pate won on the course's debut in 1982, only Hal Sutton and Craig Perks have won trophy on their first trip. Leading "rookie" last year was Eddie Pepperell who stormed home in 3rd place - but he's busy trying to figure out how you get dq'd three times in less than 2 years.

6).This week looks like the exact halfway point of the pre-Play-Off PGA Tour season, the 23rd event out of a total of 46. About 50 pros have already won enough FedEx Points to assure them a tee-time at the Northern Trust, Round 1 of the FedEx Cup Play-Offs.
Not many are Europeans: McIlroy, Hatton, Rahm, Hovland.

7).And only Fleetwood among other Europeans is comfortably placed, for now.
Those who have struggled this season so far, but are exempt at least through next year, include McDowell (79th), Casey (93rd), Lowry (140th), Molinari (168th), Donald (assuming he takes another earnings exemption - 172nd), Garcia (179th), Willett (181st), Stenson (197th), Wallace (202nd), Rose (205th),
While this lot, all not yet exempt for 2020/21 have it all to do: Straka (82nd), Norlander (84th), Knox (90th), Fitzpatrick (100th), Noren (107th), Rafa C-B (120th), Poulter (128th), Cappelen (130th), Laird (158th), Ventura (175th), Power (201st), Bjerregard (224th), Lewis (227th), plus 3 or 4 others on more tenuous status.

8).But one or two American "faces" are also struggling, with these three less than half-way to a Play-Off goal about 400 pts:
110th: Spieth
111th: D.Johnson
213th: Koepka

9).The Florida "Swing" has a musical chairs of dates next year, starting with Bay Hill, then The Players, followed by "Honda". No word yet on how Valspar fits in, but hopefully retains its fourth slot in Florida.

10).Finally, the Top 64 in the owgr's after The Players will qualify for the WGC-MatchPlay in Austin in a fortnight's time.

Any Valspar Notes will be added here next week.

super_realist wrote:

robopz wrote:

super_realist wrote:

McLaren wrote:They don't. This boards lack of fascination with Tiger is an anomaly among golf fans.

Please explain what is so fascinating Mac.

Most people regarding him as the best player that has ever lived perhaps?

Doesn't mean he's interesting to watch or fascinating though. Sampras was a top notch tennis player but wasn't good to watch.

You're right of course... only those with an appreciation of the most spectacularly well-played golf by the best player in the history of the game would be fascinated by watching him.  Otherwise, there's not much reason to bother...

Hope you have your knee pads on.

super_realist wrote: Hope you have your knee pads on.

Lol... Don't need knee pads to see the mountain right in front of you...

robopz wrote:

super_realist wrote: Hope you have your knee pads on.

Lol... Don't need knee pads to see the mountain right in front of you...

I'd heard Botox has inherited the Asian side of his family genetics when it comes to manhood, rather than the "mountain" in front of you, it's probably more of a mole hill.

super_realist wrote:

robopz wrote:

super_realist wrote: Hope you have your knee pads on.

Lol... Don't need knee pads to see the mountain right in front of you...

I'd heard Botox has inherited the Asian side of his family genetics when it comes to manhood, rather than the "mountain" in front of you, it's probably more of a mole hill.

Whatever it is... you got it bad man... sheesh... moving on.

Here's my latest attempt at putting together a schedule for various tours showing what's been cancelled, postponed, rescheduled... or even events added for replacements. Most of the changes from last time is an entirely new EURO schedule for July forward, with there still being a lot of question marks... Also John Deere has been cancelled on the PGA Tour side... JD saying basically it's a no-go with sponsors and it doesn't sound like they want to take the risk...

Basically on the below... BLACK, GREEN & YELLOW are events either for sure cancelled (Black) or seems fairly certain they will be. DARK PURPLE have been rescheduled... other colors on the chart as as per the legend at the bottom... good luck trying to read it... :-)

Super

Wrong. Several of the woman he had affairs confirmed he was pretty big.

Mcilroy however, is apparently on the small side.

Yikes

Any idea who'll sponsor the Sawgrass (anticipated) stop?

You'd almost think the Players could take it on - perhaps resume play four months later?

Boy this thread took a strange turn.

Interesting speculation that Columbus, Ohio, may be the replacement venue to fill the slot left empty by the John Deere cancellation. This would make a Columbus double-header with the postponed "Memorial" the following week.
For reasons that I can never fathom, Ohio seems to be a favoured State for all facets of the PGA Tour; in this case, however, it would make a lot of logistical / synergistic sense.
Venues at Sawgrass, in Kentucky and, yup, Akron, Ohio, also in the running according to golfchannel.com

This will never happen (like the Open Championship at Royal Melbourne) but I would have loved the Tour to have Bandon Dunes in Oregon as the replacement venue for the JDC.

IIRC, part of the problem with Bandon Dunes to host a big time golf event is it remoteness. It is not near any large population centers and fans can't get there.

Perfect for this summer. No fans

I have heard great things about Bandon Dunes and would love to see it host a tournament (I saw some of the Curtis Cup that was there a few years back).

USGA ignores flyover states for its flagship event, so it makes sense that PGATour tries to exploit golf crazy Ohio

I guess UPS shirts don't come in XXXL sizes

https://twitter.com/ANTIFAldo/status/1265367780884447234

Interesting that the Tour is starting in Texas who have the fastest-growing number of new COVID cases in the country, followed by SC which is not so bad but still spawning more contamination that shows no sign of reducing.
And Ohio looks pretty grisly too!

VJ no longer playing the Korn Ferry event.

https://twitter.com/Mau5Kade/status/1266550409214205953

kwinigolfer wrote:Interesting that the Tour is starting in Texas who have the fastest-growing number of new COVID cases in the country, followed by SC which is not so bad but still spawning more contamination that shows no sign of reducing.
And Ohio looks pretty grisly too!

I think its all "relative" Kwini.  I expect an uptick in cases here with the way things are opening up quite a bit more. But we're at such a low cases per million comparatively, it's got to go quite a ways to even get up to the national averages.  

I think the bottom line on this... Fanless tournaments can probably be conducted relatively safely, but I just can't see them opening up to fans by the 5th week after the restart.  And I wouldn't be surprised to see some more John Deere like cancellations either.

 But testing is very available in this state.

GPB wrote:I guess UPS shirts don't come in XXXL sizes

https://twitter.com/ANTIFAldo/status/1265367780884447234

Looks like something super would be into.

robopz wrote:

kwinigolfer wrote:Interesting that the Tour is starting in Texas who have the fastest-growing number of new COVID cases in the country, followed by SC which is not so bad but still spawning more contamination that shows no sign of reducing.
And Ohio looks pretty grisly too!

I think its all "relative" Kwini.  I expect an uptick in cases here with the way things are opening up quite a bit more. But we're at such a low cases per million comparatively, it's got to go quite a ways to even get up to the national averages.  

I think the bottom line on this... Fanless tournaments can probably be conducted relatively safely, but I just can't see them opening up to fans by the 5th week after the restart.  And I wouldn't be surprised to see some more John Deere like cancellations either.

 But testing is very available in this state.

robo,

I looked at the stats and, bl00dy hell, you're spot on!
But still not a good sign with two or three alarming hotspots there.
We're lucky, one new case Thursday, another yesterday.
Why won't the Tour visit VT?

Kwini... All I know is, as much as I try to be informed on the topic, The right answer of how and when to try to open up around the pandemic is beyond me.  But I do know life and economy has to go on somehow, someway.   All I can hope is we move forward with decisions reasonably based on science and with our eyes open to the potential risks involved.  Not sure what else we can do.

But I do know this much for sure... I am very much looking forward to professional tournament golf coming back. With or without fans in attendance.

Agree robo, I've been following the whole thing pretty avidly, partly for professional reasons, my wife, not me.

I'm looking forward to all sport, sport my metaphor for life! Very worried about our A baseball team, just on the very local level; under threat from MLB and now the COVID . . . . . . . .

And if the country had the Federal leadership (same applies in Westminster) that we have in our State Governor's office, we'd be a lot further along.

Kwini... Seems to me fingers can be pointed in many directions, but suffice it to say with 20/20 hindsight going back to last Nov/Dec... We would be an entirely different place today. 

What matters today is where we are right now and where do we go from here... And I fully expect to look back in a couple of months to this day May 31 and see there were plenty of right and wrong decisions made after... Such seems to be the nature of what we're dealing with.

Hopefully sport around the world can show the way forward instead of dragging behind the politics - we need it!

princedrac reckons there could be 74 owgr points for the Colonial winner. Amazing!

kwinigolfer wrote:Hopefully sport around the world can show the way forward instead of dragging behind the politics - we need it!

princedrac reckons there could be 74 owgr points for the Colonial winner. Amazing!

I've been following the field strengths of Colonial, Heritage and Travelers...  I can't see the individual names, but I can see how many of top 10, 30, 50, 70, 100 & 125 OWGR & past and current FedEx ranked players there are.  There's been some fluctuation, but all three are going to be really strong.  Worst of the 3 looks like Travelers at 66-68 at this point... Colonial and Heritage are definitely looking 70+ assuming everybody who's currently entered actually shows up. 

  I ran a manual ranking on Colonial based on who they had listed on their website the other day, I came up with 72 level... but that listing appeared to have a good 8-10 top 100 players missing.  I think they have taken that player list down now.

PS... This is how I can get an estimate of field strength... Compare the fields below the red line to Riviera (70) and API (66) above.

PSS... I pulled the above like last Wednesday or Thursday when John Deere was still in... Looking again today... I think Colonial might be a little hard-pressed to get four points above Genesis (still could happen though).  And Travelers is looking a little stronger now too. All 3 could be in the 70-ish range.  But regardless even if they are not, those are still extremely strong fields for those 3 particular events

Didn't realize Burlington had a Minor League Baseball team. Who are they affiliated with?

I don't think they had one when I lived there, years and years ago. I am sure my Uncle would have taken me to some of the games, he used to take me to Expo games several times during the Summer.

GPB wrote:Didn't realize Burlington had a Minor League Baseball team.  Who are they affiliated with?  

I don't think they had one when I lived there, years and years ago.  I am sure my Uncle would have taken me to some of the games, he used to take me to Expo games several times during the Summer.

Loved going up to Expos games, (tho' have only been to Jarry Park for tennis).
Vermont Lake Monsters, A's affiliate, play at Centennial Field, grandstand built in 1922 so one of the very oldest still in use in the US. Barry Larkin & Ken Griffey, Jr, among those who played there when it was a Reds affiliate. My friends who manage the operation reckon the A's are a fantastic parent club and have certainly been hugely supportive of field improvements and other franchise investments.
Just a nice summer's walk away.

The Lake Monsters must be "Champ"ions.

When I was up there two years ago, I stopped at Charlotte to see my ex-stepbrother and his wife.  We went to lunch across the lake (taking the ferry).  No Lake Monsters stuck his/her head out, in either direction.  One of my summer jobs was a "gopher" for the O-Yanks.  I had a lot of fun that summer, went to a lot of games.

GPB wrote:The Lake Monsters must be "Champ"ions.

When I was up there two years, I stopped at Charlotte to see my ex-stepbrother and his wife.  We went to lunch across the lake (taking the ferry).  No Lake Monsters stuck his/her head out, in either direction.  One of my summer jobs was a "gopher" for the O-Yanks.  I had a lot of fun that summer, went to a lot of games.

The Adirondack Coast is beautiful, Essex & Westport especially. "O-Yanks? Oneonta?? Hope you were there when Donnie Baseball was in town.

OWGR is set to announce a decision this week on when they are going to restart the rankings again.   It's going to be controversial either way. PGA & KFT tours starting up the week of June 14th... Korea and Japan first week in July... Challenge Tour mid July... ET the last week of July (which could be 5-6 events after the PGAT).  Sunshine, Asia and Australia are pretty much off till fall. 

If they start with Colonial, no question PGA Tour players are going to have an advantage in the rankings (when usually the opposite is true). But with the first three PGA tour events looking like they are going to be in the 70 range... It's going to be hard to let them play without ranking them.

EDIT: Edits made to text above (had Challenge and ET start dates wrong)... and here's the schedule again... so you can see the conundrum of different start dates...  See KEY at top... basically DARK backgrounds and strikethroughs are cancellations/postponements/Reschedules... White and Light backgrounds are schedules going forward as we know them.

Yes, Mattingly was a rising star in the Yankee organization the summer i was with the O-Yanks.

Robo, IMO, If the OWGR doesn't restart next week. that would be more controversial than if they don't do a restart at the same time.

I can't see any scenario where the Euro Tour events on their scheduled restart won't be heavily subsidize which will mitigate their late start.

GPB wrote:
I can't see any scenario where the Euro Tour events on their scheduled restart won't be heavily subsidize which will mitigate their late start.

You are probably right on that.  I only see two ET events through the US Open that have a chance of reaching a legitimate 24 level.  I suspect most of the ranked Euros (who aren't already here) will be coming over for the Memorial or at the latest, the WGC and PGA 2 weeks after that.  And PGA will invite top 100 and US Open will probably be close to top-100  It's really hard to make a legitimate 24 event out of what's left. (Here or there)

Mickelson National and Calgary opens today. Really nice looking course... https://www.mickelsonnational.com/course/

Kind of an odd plan... It opens up being open to the public, but the plan is as the real estate develops around it, they'll take it private. Hope they get a Canadian Open out there someday.

Canadian Open avoids the flyover country even more than the USGA does.

Last time it was held outside of Quebec and Ontatio was 2011 in Vancouver, British Columbia

Last time it was held outide of Quebec, Ontario, and British Columbia was 1962. And only 4 times total. Twice in Manitoba, once in Alberta, and once in New Brunswick.

What would the rankings look like IF they had not been paused?

Only one change in the Top 10. Xander in, Fleetwood out. DJ dropping quickly.

Projected Ranking on Jun 8th, if not paused:

Notables: Woods would be 16th, Rose 14th, Hatton 15th, JDay 60th, GMac 36th

The Top 100 players would have lost an average of about 13% of their average in the last three months (about 1% per week). GMAC and Hatton averages have actually risen, with the decrease in their tournament divisor mitigated the attrition,

Players who have lost the least of their avg (as a %):

10 of the top 100 players averages has decreased at least 20%

Spoiler:

>>> NERD ALERT <<<

Things that would help a players average (with respect to other players average)

1. Success early in 2020. GMAC and Hatton won early in 2020
2. Players that played poorly in the the Spring of 2018, and around 50 tournaments in their divisor

Things that hurt a players average (with respect to other players averages)

1. Little success in 2020
2. Players hovering around the 40 events divisor, and players with a lot of tournaments played in their 2 year resume.

Muirfield hosting a double-header next month. Two weeks in a row at Jack's place. Workday is stepping up as the sponsor of the replacement event. (no fans)

Assuming Mickelson, Fitzy, Kuch, Sneds, and other Workday Ambassadors will be playing.

GPB wrote:Muirfield hosting a double-header next month.  Two weeks in a row at Jack's place.  Workday is stepping up as the sponsor of the replacement event.  (no fans)

Assuming Mickelson, Fitzy, Kuch, Sneds, and other Workday Ambassadors will be playing.

Have to say: This is the genius, or the persuasive power, of the PGA Tour in action.

I just hope they set up the course quite differently for each tournament to offer some distinct identity. As one hopes CM will in Wales in August (or whenever it is).

Much more optimistic talk  comingfrom Keith Pelly of the European tour... https://www.scotsman.com/sport/golf/prize-money-down-european-tour-gets-set-return-2868038

Short-term pain = long-term health is the basic plan...

kwinigolfer wrote:

GPB wrote:Muirfield hosting a double-header next month.  Two weeks in a row at Jack's place.  Workday is stepping up as the sponsor of the replacement event.  (no fans)

Assuming Mickelson, Fitzy, Kuch, Sneds, and other Workday Ambassadors will be playing.

Have to say: This is the genius, or the persuasive power, of the PGA Tour in action.

I just hope they set up the course quite differently for each tournament to offer some distinct identity. As one hopes CM will in Wales in August (or whenever it is).

Talk is they might flip 9s for the Workday event. That would probably yield a bit more of a birdie generous finish.

I would like to see them shake the course (which I love) up a bit - probably not much you can do on the front nine, although I'd like to conjure a longer tee shot on #6, plus longer tee shots into back pins on #8. Is it possible to make #3 a driveable Par-4?
But there are plenty of tee-shot options on the back nine, stretching the two Par-5's, playing around with #14 making it semi-driveable, find a different (shorter?) tee on #16 (which I reckon is a boring hole turned into a terrible hole). Not sure if there's room to stretch #17?
Whichever 9 you choose, there'll be great ampitheatre finishes. But no fans? Say it ain't so!

OWGR to restart with Colonial.

The OWGR Governing Board is announcing today that the Official World Golf Ranking will be restarted on the completion of tournaments taking place in week ending June 14, 2020 (week 24).


Full statement can be found on https://t.co/erekNM1fG5


#OWGR https://t.co/qgOW2XdoKi

It looks like a steady diet of mid 90's temps with sunny skies next week at Colonial. Hope that means the course plays firm and fast - I think they'll lost a ton of balls if that's the case. Could be slow going!

kwinigolfer wrote:It looks like a steady diet of mid 90's temps with sunny skies next week at Colonial. Hope that means the course plays firm and fast - I think they'll lost a ton of balls if that's the case. Could be slow going!

I hope for firm and fast also... But lost balls at Colonial?  I don't understand. That's usually not much of an issue there. But I suppose any event without fans there to act as forecaddies could result in more searches...

The USGA has not played a US Open in Texas in over 50 years. 1969 in Houston.

I thought it was because they didn't want to play in Texas, in the middle of June.

The PGATour is playing in Texas, in the middle of June net week.

kwinigolfer wrote:It looks like a steady diet of mid 90's temps with sunny skies next week at Colonial. Hope that means the course plays firm and fast - I think they'll lost a ton of balls if that's the case. Could be slow going!

Cristobal might have an impact on Ft Worth early next week. Better chance it hits Louisiana and goes straight up the Mississippi and impacts Chez GPB.

The relaunch of the World Ranking didn't go the way the European Tour was hoping
John Huggan
Golf DigestJune 3, 2020, 3:51 PM CDT

Apparently Keith Pelley of the European Tour was the only one of the 8 member OWGR Governing Board (see image) to vote against the restart... Can't really blame him, but it's still a decision that had to be made..
.  
https://sports.yahoo.com/relaunch-world-ranking-didnt-way-205109022.html

Maybe I am being alarmist but how will ET players, or any tour not restarting at the same time as the PGAT, ever make up the OWGR points depreciation and just not earning any?

McLaren wrote:Maybe I am being alarmist but how will ET players, or any tour not restarting at the same time as the PGAT, ever make up the OWGR points depreciation and just not earning any?  

Remember that the divisor is also reducing.
The best way is for European players to play better on the PGA Tour and then for the ET to stack its schedule from US Thanksgiving thru early January.
In other words, there's no totally fair way so might as well accept that and move on.

What about the ET players who don't play the PGAT? All they face is depreciation but with no new points.

McLaren wrote:What about the ET players who don't play the PGAT?  All they face is depreciation but with no new points.

But their shrinking divisor helps out a little.

I know some have reached number 1 sitting on the sofa but in general you need to earn points to climb or maintain in the rankings.

The way I look at it is the pool of points each player will have the potential to earn over the rest of the year. Mid ranked ET players are just not going to have a enough to play for to move up or even maintain their ranking.

Not sure that many people will be fussed about rankings right now. They'd be happy to be playing.