PGATour Running Commentary - Aug 2020

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PGATour Running Commentary- Aug 2020

1. Last week:  Justin Thomas overcame a 4 shot deficit to win the WGC-FEDEX St Jude by three shots over a four players of Tom Lewis, Daniel Berger, Phil Mickelson and Brooks Koepka   Richie Werenski won the Barracuda event, by one point over Troy Merritt.

2. After he won the Memorial, Jon Rahm took the #1 OWGR ranking from Rory, and now after winning the FEDEX, Justin Thomas took the #1 spot.  

3. This week is the PGA Championship, with most of the OWGR Top 100 players in the field.  The tournament venue is at Harding Park, which has hosted two WGC tournaments in the last 20 years.  Here are some finishes by players in this years field:  Woods (1), Garcia (3), Stenson (3), GMac (6), Furyk (15)Poulter (18), Mickelson (29), Scott (29), ZJohnson (43),  The Match play was played at Harding Park in 2015, won by Rory, beating Woodland in finals.  Players advancing to the Round of 16, include Willett, Furyk, Casey, Oosty, Fleetwood, Fowler, Hideki, and Leishman.

4. Only two more tournaments to qualify for the FEDEX playoffs, some notable players that are currently inside the Top 125, but probably have not clinched a spot in the Northern Trust (Tom Lewis (#117), Russell Knox (#120,  Paul Casey (#121), Charl Schwartzel (#123).  Some players just barely outside the Top 125 include Nick Watney, Zach Johnson, Matt Wallace, Shane Lowry, RCB, Sergio, and Justin Rose. Some players that need a big week to get inside the Top 125 include Willett, Dufner, Power, Walker, Stenson

Super, the spike bar at crail is pretty run down. I have admittedly not been in the main dining room.

Are you saying you won't propose me? Are you scared that I might be too much competition for you?

McLaren wrote:Super, the spike bar at crail is pretty run down.  I have admittedly not been in the main dining room.

Are you saying you won't propose me? Are you scared that I might be too much competition for you?

You clearly haven't been recently Mac. It's a very nice clubhouse.

I don't fear a player off 7 mac, but why would I ever propose someone who I don't even know?

Super

You probably know me pretty well, certainly well enough to propose me for a club. Arrange a game on TOC and you can vett me.

PS, I am cat 1.

So you claim Mac. Last time we discussed handicaps you claimed you didn't bother with competiton any more.

I suspect you might be a bit of a Walter Mitty Maverick type character.

The sort of guy every club needs.

McLaren wrote:The sort of guy every club needs.

Every club has too many of those types.

If you guys need a caddie for that twosome, let me know ... still have a trip to Scotland that I paid for so I'll work my schedule around that!

Shotrock wrote:If you guys need a caddie for that twosome, let me know ... still have a trip to Scotland that I paid for so I'll work my schedule around that!

Bring your clubs.

I'm never wrong wrote:

pedro wrote:

I'm never wrong wrote:I'm not sure about this, but I thought that Dustin won the Tour Championship (and that gave him the FedEx Cup) but any OWGR points would be based on the number of strokes played, and therefore Xander would get the most.

Dustin was given a head start at -10 and won the FEC "on aggregate". But Xander won the actual TC, 3 shots ahead of Sheffler and 4 shots ahead of DJ.
http://www.owgr.com/Events/EventResult.aspx?eventId=7891

That's what I am saying. For the purposes of the OWGR ONLY, Xander is shown as winning the event. He didn't get 1st prize money and it is not credited as a win on his resume. https://www.pgatour.com/players/player.48081.xander-schauffele.html

IMO, this is hypocritical of the OWGR as they have already set an opposing precedent. The leaderboard of the Reno Tahoe Barracuda tournament does not necessarily exactly correlate with gross scores.

Just a few weeks ago, the Barracuda had this leaderboard

Werenski +39
Merritt +38
Gomez +37
Schwab +37

The "Shadow" Gross Leaderboard was

Werenski -15
Merritt -14
Gomez -15
Schwab -15

Werenski got 24 OWGR points, Merritt got 14.4, Gomez and Schwab got 8.4 pts apiece.

============

And who really knows how Schauffele would have performed in the "alternate universe". Would he has played as well sleeping on the 54 hole lead? with DJ and JT breathing down his neck? Maybe. Maybe not. The problem in the alternate universe of "all other things being equal" is that it is hard to imagine that All other things would actually be equal.

super_realist wrote:

Shotrock wrote:If you guys need a caddie for that twosome, let me know ... still have a trip to Scotland that I paid for so I'll work my schedule around that! ;)

Bring your clubs.

Super can get a lesson in gca.

Getting back on topic, Brooks Koepka has withdrawn from the US Open.

I'm never wrong wrote:Getting back on topic, Brooks Koepka has withdrawn from the US Open.

Brooks did seem to be struggling quite badly with injuries. Probably for the best that he doesn't play until he is fully back to fitness.

USGA are going to open new office at Pinehurst, which means more Pinhurst No.2 on the Open rota.

https://www.golfchannel.com/news/usga-adding-new-facility-making-pinehurst-anchor-us-open-site


So No.2, which already had 2024, gets 2029, 2035, 2041 and 2047.

"In conjunction with the announcement, the USGA also committed to bringing some of its other championships to North Carolina "at an increased rate," including the U.S. Women's Open, U.S. Senior Open, U.S. Amateur, U.S. Women's Amateur, U.S. Junior and U.S. Girls' Junior."

With TOC like regularity will we get a Super like character whining about this from now on?

Nah, Pinehurst is a good course Mac worthy of a regular major, TOC is neither.

What course in the US do your memberships get you reciprocal arrangements with?

I do have one, but can't remember the name of it.

Just wondered if you had anything awesome like pine valley or another of the super exclusive highly rated clubs.

Courses in the US that I highly doubt would have a reciprocal arrangement with any course: Pine Valley, Cypress Point, Augusta National.

Pine valley might be a bit unlikely but maybe a winged foot or a merion might if you play at TOC.

FedEx Points. Just looking through the schedule for the 2020-21 PGA season, it appears that there will be 600 points available for the 6 Majors and Players, 550 for the 3 WGC's, Genesis Invitational, Arnold Palmer and Memorial. 500 for the rest (apart from opposite field events) and 2 biggies (2000 points) for the play offs.

Fun fact: Tiger never played Pine Valley.

TOC membership gets you reciprocals at Merion? I would be mighty surprised, but who knows.

St Andrews has reciprocal arrangements with a course. https://www.espn.co.uk/golf/story/_/id/13173734/st-andrews-kooky-deal-opal-fields-golf-club

But its not the old course.

stewart cink! FFS. What an underwhelming winner.

That's a win in 4 decades. Not too bad.

McLaren wrote:stewart cink! FFS. What an underwhelming winner.

Fair play to the guy. I'm sure he'll be justifiably concerned about your impressions of his victory....

pedro wrote:That's a win in 4 decades. Not too bad.

Nope, Missed the 2010's

Spoiler:

He probably won a club medal in the 80's.

navyblueshorts wrote:

McLaren wrote:stewart cink! FFS. What an underwhelming winner.

Fair play to the guy. I'm sure he'll be justifiably concerned about your impressions of his victory....

Navy, it was a joke. Golf digest took some flack over the weekend for publishing a list of "underwhelming" major winners.

McLaren wrote:

navyblueshorts wrote:

McLaren wrote:stewart cink! FFS. What an underwhelming winner.

Fair play to the guy. I'm sure he'll be justifiably concerned about your impressions of his victory....

Navy, it was a joke. Golf digest took some flack over the weekend for publishing a list of "underwhelming" major winners.

Yeah, I saw that by chance actually. Not everyone read Golf Digest over the weekend though I suspect; you could give readers a clue .

It was all over golf twitter.

A surprising winner for sure ... but just goes to show how unpredictable this game is. Still, he's not my pick for Winged Foot!

Shotrock wrote:A surprising winner for sure ... but just goes to show how unpredictable this game is. Still, he's not my pick for Winged Foot!

For sure, Cink is not playing this week,

Ha! Shows you how little I know.

Looking forward to seeing Winged Foot on TV and if the blue coats make it playable (and not overly penal) with green speeds and pin positions. I'm hoping they do.

GPB wrote:

pedro wrote:That's a win in 4 decades. Not too bad.

Nope, Missed the 2010's

Spoiler:

Oops. Thanks GPB. Is it that long ago..

Shotrock wrote:Ha! Shows you how little I know.

Looking forward to seeing Winged Foot on TV and if the blue coats make it playable (and not overly penal) with green speeds and pin positions. I'm hoping they do.

I would not be optimistic about that. This is the USGA.

Sam Horsfield out of US Open. Tested COVID19 +

Thats unfortunate.

But that means the 2020 US Open will have the first Slovak as a participant. Rory Sabbatini gets in as the next available alternate.

Horsfield barely been in America before he gets the virus. Scheffler out aswell with it. Though surprised to see Grace in as alternate, he really has slipped down tge rankings.

beninho wrote:Horsfield barely been in America before he gets the virus.  Scheffler out aswell with it. Though surprised to see Grace in as alternate, he really has slipped down tge rankings.

He could have got in because the field was "set" some time ago, so his ranking could have been higher when the field was drawn up.

I'm never wrong wrote:

beninho wrote:Horsfield barely been in America before he gets the virus.  Scheffler out aswell with it. Though surprised to see Grace in as alternate, he really has slipped down tge rankings.

He could have got in because the field was "set" some time ago, so his ranking could have been higher when the field was drawn up.

I read he is in as a replacement of scheffker or horse field. I just thought he would be in anyway.

Grace replaced Scheffler

Slovak Sabbo replaced Horsfield

McLaren wrote:It was all over golf twitter.

I'm not on ****ing Tw@tter. Neither are gazillions of others.

If you are not on twitter how do you find out what is happening in the world?

McLaren wrote:If you are not on twitter how do you find out what is happening in the world?

Using Twitter as a news source is like sticking your head in a bee hive to find honey.

Nothing wrong with twitter, if you use it properly.

I consider twitter a dashboard. I ignore most of it, but at times something appears that interests me so I start a deeper dive.

GPB wrote:Nothing wrong with twitter, if you use it properly.

I consider twitter a dashboard. I ignore most of it, but at times something appears that interests me so I start a deeper dive.

That's how I try and use it. If you carefully curate who you follow it is a useful tool for getting articles on topics you are interested in.

McLaren wrote:If you are not on twitter how do you find out what is happening in the world?

Was that a joke?

pedro wrote:

McLaren wrote:If you are not on twitter how do you find out what is happening in the world?

Was that a joke?

Is this a joke?

McLaren wrote:

pedro wrote:

McLaren wrote:If you are not on twitter how do you find out what is happening in the world?

Was that a joke?

Is this a joke?

Are you joking?

I am quite excite about a US open at winged foot, but the lack of chat on here this week suggests I might be alone in thinking that.

Not true! Also looking forward to it Mac. I'm just hoping they don't make it silly hard and I'll never understand the USGA's preoccupation with par. As I may have mentioned before, I have played Winged Foot and it's a wonderfully designed course. Lots of variety and the tees I played from didn't make it unbearably long. Nor was the rough as crazy as it is this week.

I suppose it's hard to not like Rory, DJ, JT ... but Webb Simpson could cause damage if he putts well. Webb generally keeps it in play.