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Post by SUVFan on Mar 6, 2020 15:51:54 GMT -5
I came across a great article about Brooks Koepka today. I appreciate his game and, frankly, appreciate his no nonsense approach to course management. I did not realize what was going on behind the curtain, so to speak -- i.e., that Koepka considers it gamesmanship to maintain his poker face and doesn't want his opponent to gain any kind of edge from watching Koepka's demeanor. That makes sense. On the back nine of a close tournament, they guys who have a chance to win had better be keeping an eye on the others. How could you not at least try to find out if you had a lead and by how much or if you're down, how deep is the hole? That kind of stuff should inform decisions such as using a driver off the tee, going for a par 5 in two, or shooting for a pin instead of a safer target area on the green. Other factors go into the equation, too, but I'd be stunned if the other guys (whether they admit it or not) are not looking to learn whatever they can. Celebrating a little when you win a tournament -- especially a major -- if fine but when you simply hit a good shot or make a great putt, I've always thought a pro golfer should act like he's been there before. Actually, I view it that way in all sports. Koepka's disdain for the aloofness of golf and its trappings is refreshing. That he looks forward to getting away from the game at times doesn't cause me a bit of trouble. Work hard, play hard. Anyway, after reading the article, I walk away even more impressed with the guy!
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Post by SUVFan on Mar 7, 2020 19:24:58 GMT -5
It's been a brutal day at Bay Hill. By golf standards, the wind was blowing a hoolie! Guys were missing 4 footers all day. Even worse than the day 3 scoring last week down in West Palm at the Honda, nearly everyone on the leaderboard moved down on moving day. Rory McIlroy appears to be the odds on favorite tomorrow, finishing today at -4, tied for 2nd, and two strokes out of first. Hatton's -7 at yesterday's close was already the highest leading Bay Hill tourney score after two days in a long time. Hatton had an up and down day 3 but rallied to make birdie on the last to finish with a 73 for the day, -6 overall. McIlroy would have been no worse than -5 (even for the day) if he had not gotten greedy on the last. He was in the left rough, which appeared to be pretty thick stuff, but made fairly good contact with his iron. The thick grass must have pulled his clubface open before contact slightly, causing the ball to go right of target. It bounced on the bank about six inches outside of the red hazard line that rimmed a rock laden, green side pond. From there, the ball bounced off a huge rock near the pond's edge, then hit the bank again, this time just inside the hazard line, before rattling to rest in a crevice between the shoreline and another large flat faced rock that angled somewhat steeply away from the green, back toward the water. The ball was pin high at that point and it might have been playable by trying to rebound it off the rock back on the green. He'd likely have ruined a club in the process, risked a double strike penalty and easily could have injured his wrist with no idea where the ball might wind up. As luck would have it, the spot where McIlroy's ball first landed in play was just off the green, so when he measured two drivers lengths no nearer to the hole from that spot, he could drop on the green with about a 20 footer for par! So he did, but he missed that putt, tapping in for a bogey 5. Not bad! Patrick Reed, who won in Mexico two weeks ago, started the day at -4, just 3 shots off Hatton's pace. He shot a +8 80 today and, at +4 overall and 10 off the lead, he's out of it. Going into today, I thought Brooks Koepka might make a move. Did he ever, just not the direction I was anticipating. He was +9 for the day, +10 overall. He had 8 bogeys and a double bogey to a single birdie today. Arnie would have loved it! Leaderboard.
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Post by SUVFan on Mar 7, 2020 21:07:39 GMT -5
The field for next week's The Players Championship has been announced. As noted in the Tiger Woods topic, Tiger's skipping the tourney due to back issues. In addition to #11, only two others from the current World Golf Ranking top 50 are missing. Surprisingly, #28 Lee Westwood, who's been playing pretty well of late, did not enter and #38 Shugo Imahira is also not in the field. And only two players from last year's top 125 Fed Ex Cup points list are missing: Jonas Blixt and Kelly Kraft. So, as usual, it's probably about the strongest field all year. All criteria for invites
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Post by SUVFan on Mar 8, 2020 19:32:06 GMT -5
Congrats to Tyrrell Hatton on his first win on the PGA tour -- at Bay Hill, no less! Hatton has 4 European Tour wins to his credit and three other wins. His best finish in a major is 6th, which he did at last year's Open and the 2018 US Open.
Hatton lead at Bay Hill at -7 at the end of round 2. He played the last two days +3, finishing -4 and still managed to win by one stroke over Mark Leishman. Leishman started the day tied for 2nd at -4 and dropped one stroke to -3, a shot behind Hatton. Last week's Honda Classic winner, Sungjae IM, finished third, another stroke back at -2, with Bryson DeChambeau one more stroke back at -1 in 4th place. No one else in the field finished in red numbers.
Going in, I thought Rory would win, and he made a charge early to get to -5 after making birdie on the 4th, then good for a share of the lead, but his driver was fighting him all day and he fell out of the lead with a bogey on the 5th, then doubled the 6th and 9th. Out in 40 and back to level par, with Hatton sitting back at -6, level par so far halfway through his round (Hatton overcame bogeys on the first and the fifth with birdies on the 7th and 8th), Rory must have thought he was out of it. And he pretty much was, except Hatton managed to double no. 11, giving all sorts of folks a chance. Rory dropped to +1 on the back nine but recovered to level par for the tournament, tied with 3 others for 5th. Still, the top 5 finish enabled Rory to retain his #1 Fed Ex point standing.
I'd bet the winning score next week at the Players is at least -10 or better. That is, as long as the wind stops blowing the way it did these last two days at Bay Hill.
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Post by SUVFan on Mar 14, 2020 20:36:14 GMT -5
They completed Round One of the Players Championship on Thursday then cancelled the tournament due to the COVID 19 virus. The 2020 Masters has been postponed indefinitely. Other tournaments have been cancelled or postponed, too, at all levels such that the earliest that pro golf will resume is late April.
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Post by SUVFan on Mar 14, 2020 20:43:41 GMT -5
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Post by SUVFan on Mar 20, 2020 14:15:09 GMT -5
I'm not a Jim Nantz fan at all. I've said a number of times that I suspect he arrives for a broadcast armed with a list of cliches and a pen and he's on edge trying to find places where he can apply them to whatever he's describing, crossing them off with a smirk and some kind of flourish as he wedges them into his descriptions of what's transpired. He might even turn to Sir Nick and attempt a high five or fist bump when he thinks he's "hit a home run" with one of them. It would appear that The Banner Society's Richard Johnson is also not much of a Nantz fan. Still, in this hilarious piece entitled, " A Day Unlike Any Other", Johnson manages to show an impressive degree of compassion for what the man may be going through as he decompresses from the broadcasting schedule he's maintained for years, the apex of which have to be the bookends that the Final Four and The Masters represent to him. My favorite part is when Nantz, confronted with the imaginary vacant scene at the hallowed grounds in Augusta: I can just picture it!
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Post by SUVFan on Jun 20, 2020 12:01:26 GMT -5
The good news is that the PGA Tour is back, sort of. The bad news: So is Jim Nance. The Colonial was the first tourney to go live after the C19 shutdown. But I said, "sort of" because there were no spectators at the tourney, save a few grandstands on adjacent properties and other private parties just off the course. The play was very inconsistent, as is to be expected after such a long layoff from competitive golf. Missed 3 footers were the storyline. It ended in a playoff that could have been avoided if Daniel Berger, the ultimate winner had made a 3 foot putt on the last. Or a 3 way playoff if Xander Schauffele had made a 3 footer had been made on 17. Or extra holes if Collin Morikawa, the playoff loser, had made a 3 footer on 17, the first playoff hole. So while it was nice to see the game come back (I didn't see any of the final round), these guys weren't very good! Final Leaderboard
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Post by SUVFan on Jul 19, 2020 17:06:45 GMT -5
The Memorial Tournament is wrapping up today in Dublin. I've posted about Tiger's performance here in the Tiger topic.
John Rahm has turned it into quite a yawner. He's on 11, having just made his first bogey of the day at -13. He's taken a penalty stroke on 11 and now lies 4 on the green but probably 40 feet away for par. A decent lag will still leave him with a 6 shot lead with 6 to play. I don't know if even Greg Norman could blow that.
Ryan Palmer is in 2nd at -6. Jason Day made birdie at 11 to get back to -5, and 2 or 3 guys are at -4, including Matthew Fitzpatrick, the current leader in the clubhouse. That won't be good enough to win but the 2nd place check is larger than most winning checks less than 10 years ago.
Most of the bad weather has passed. The strong storm system that's been approaching all afternoon started dissipating as it approached Dublin and has been just a wind and rain event so far. An earlier, seemingly weaker, system stopped play for less than an hour earlier. It looks like they'll get the rest of the round in without delay.
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Post by SUVFan on Jul 19, 2020 19:02:01 GMT -5
Controversy developed on the 16th at The Memorial. Rahm's tee shot on the par 3 ended up off the green in some thick rough, but Rahm chipped in for an apparent birdie. After Rahm teed off on 17 (he hit the fairway), replay showed that as Rahm was addressing the ball in the rough, the ball moved slightly and stayed in the altered position. It's almost certain Rahm didn't see the ball move but at real speed, the change in the lie is apparent. It likely conferred no advantage in the shot but it's likely a 2 shot penalty will be applied. The scores before the penalty have Rahm at -11 and Ryan Palmer at -6, so it remains a 3 shot win. That said, if the penalty had been addressed immediately, it might have impacted both players approach. Rahm would end up in the green side rough on both 17 and 18 and get up and down both times for par. Believing he was down 4 strokes, Palmer played very aggressively on 17, making bogey. If he knew he was down only 2, he might have played it differently and, who knows? For whatever reason, the PGA decided not to approach Rahm about the issue until he finished the round. It's still not known how that's going to shake out. At least the issue was noticed quickly, before Rahm signed his scorecard and then faced a DQ for signing an incorrect scorecard. That happened to Craig "The Walrus" Stadler years back in 1987 for something that happened in the 3rd round of the Andy Williams Open. Stads had ended up in some tall wet grass under a tree or branches of some sort. He took his golf towel and put it on the ground to protect his knees from grass stain and dampness. That unlikely moment of vanity cost him dearly, as his use of the towel was ruled to be considered building a stance and he incurred a 2 stroke penalty. The trouble was, he signed his scorecard unaware of that rule and his 4th place finish was nullified by the DQ -- he lost $37,000 in prize money which back then was a good payday. A TV viewer had noticed the transgression from a TV replay at the start of 4th round coverage and called in to bring it to rules officials' attention.
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Post by SUVFan on Jul 19, 2020 19:08:25 GMT -5
Officially, the 2 shot penalty was imposed, so John Rahm is the 2020 champion of The Memorial with a 3 stroke win at -9, 3 shots better than Ryan Palmer at -6.
With the win, Rahm becomes the reigning World #1, only the 2nd Spaniard to hold that position. The other one was Seve Ballesteros. Ironically, the chip in on 16 is what I'd call a Seve shot! Ballesteros was an unbelievable scrambler, seemingly pulling a rabbit out of the hat routinely to hole shots or get close from places mere mortals would have considered jail.
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Post by SUVFan on Jul 22, 2020 8:21:26 GMT -5
Following up on my comment about 2020 Majors, here's the current revised schedule: 1. PGA, August 6-9, TPC Harding Park, San Francisco 2. U.S. Open, Sept. 17-20, Winged Foot Golf Club, Mamaroneck, New York 3. The Masters, Nov. 12-15, Augusta National Golf Club, Augusta, Georgia The 2020 Open Championship was canceled.
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Post by SUVFan on Jul 27, 2020 19:26:33 GMT -5
Congrats to Micheal Thompson on a 19 under, 2 shot victory at the 3M Open held at the TPC Twin Cities! He was the 3rd round leader, by 4 I believe, but went out and shot a final round 67 to claim the hardware! I tuned in for some of the coverage and was surprised that Jim Nance was not part of the team providing the coverage. A quick search turned up nothing that explained his absence. Sir Nick did a great job holding down the fort!
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Post by SUVFan on Aug 3, 2020 9:47:00 GMT -5
Congrats to Justin Thomas for his -13, 3 stroke win yesterday at the WGC event in Memphis!
After Thomas hit his tee shot on 15, I'd have bet that Brooks Koepka would get his second win in the event. But Thomas pleaded with his ball to "get lucky". Did it ever! The ball landed on a cart path and bounced under/through trees to end up about 50 yards short of the hole. Thomas hit a nifty pitch shot from there over a trap that he was able to spin and stop just a few feet from the hole. He drained the putt for a birdie 3 when mere mortals would have been happy with a 5 while the tee shot was in the air!
Thomas managed to scramble his way in while Koepka's chances ended with a splash (literally) on the last, though technically if he had holed out from the fairway after his penalty (he used the rules of golf in a way that would have made Tiger proud, first dropping in front of a scoreboard -- nearest point of relief from where his ball crossed into the hazard -- and then taking relief from the scoreboard to a point where he could safely go for the green) he could still tie Thomas. Not only did he fail to hole out, he ended up making a double bogey 6 on the hole that dropped him into a 4 way tie for 2nd, which cost him a tidy sum of cash.
Koepka's meltdown on 18 ended up bolstering another player's impressive record. Phil Michelson was part of the group tied at -10. When Koepka joined that group, he vaulted Phil into a tie for 2nd place, making Phil the first 50+ golfer to finish 2nd in a WGC event. Phil has won 6 WGC events, second only to Tiger.
CBS' put up a graphic showing that with yesterday's win, Thomas became the third youngest golfer to record 13 tour victories, edging out Rory and Phil, and joining Jack and Tiger in that club.
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Post by SUVFan on Aug 3, 2020 10:07:16 GMT -5
2020 PGA Championship odds (via William Hill) (I've included those at 100-1 or better - the whole field is handicapped at the link): Brooks Koepka 10-1 Justin Thomas 10-1 Bryson DeChambeau 11-1 Rory McIlroy 14-1 Jon Rahm 14-1 Dustin Johnson 20-1 Xander Schauffele 22-1 Tiger Woods 22-1 Patrick Cantlay 24-1 Webb Simpson 28-1 Collin Morikawa 35-1 Rickie Fowler 40-1 Hideki Matsuyama 40-1 Jason Day 40-1 Daniel Berger 40-1 Viktor Hovland 40-1 Tyrrell Hatton 45-1 Patrick Reed 45-1 Justin Rose 50-1 Jordan Spieth 50-1 Tony Finau 50-1 Tommy Fleetwood 50-1 Gary Woodland 50-1 Matthew Fitzpatrick 50-1 Adam Scott 50-1 Paul Casey 66-1 Sergio Garcia 66-1 Louis Oosthuizen 66-1 Marc Leishman 66-1 Matt Kuchar 66-1 Sung-Jae Im 66-1 Abraham Ancer 66-1 Shane Lowry 70-1 Matthew Wolff 80-1 Henrik Stenson 80-1 Brendon Todd 80-1 Phil Mickelson 80-1 Bubba Watson 100-1 Billy Horschel 100-1 Scottie Scheffler 100-1 Byeong Hun An 100-1 Joaquin Niemann 100-1 Adam Hadwin 100-1 Chez Reavie 100-1 Danny Willett 100-1
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