18 observations, thoughts and predictions for the week in golf…
- Amy Yang, at 34, had to wonder if she would ever cross the line in a major championship. First time major winners at that age are becoming even more rare. Twice Yang finished second at the U.S. Women’s Open in 2012 and 2015. Additionally, she had 11 top 5 finishes in major championships. Yang left little doubt at Sahalee that she would get the job done despite a modest amount of stress on a few of the holes on the inward nine. Her three-shot win gave her the crowning achievement of her career in her 75th major start. The large check, north of $1.5 million, plus the added bonus of earning a spot on the Korean Olympic team are a bounty beyond words for Yang.
- Nelly Korda’s second round of 81 was jolting. After a wonderful opening round the presumption was that she would build on it and play her way into contention. On the contrary, she imploded and has now missed three cuts in a row including rounds of 80 or higher in the U.S. Women’s Open and the KPMG women’s PGA. Life and golf can come at you fast and bad patches happen for everyone but the sensational nature of Nelly opening with 80 on day 1 of the U.S. Open, effectively ending her week after a few holes and the disastrous start on day 2 in Seattle were shocking. Exhale and a reset will do her some good.
- Lilia Vu missed almost three months with a back issue that required rest and recovery and prevented her from defending her title at the first major, the Chevron Championship. Now that she is healthy and having won the Meijer Classic last week and finishing second at the KPMG women’s PGA it’s reasonable to think she could have a monstrous second half of the season and with a couple majors left she will be a favorite in one or both. Her form and improving health also will ease the mind of Stacy Lewis knowing she will hopefully have the services of the second best American at the Solheim Cup in September.
- The social media posts last week of the new 176-acre practice facility at the University of Alabama is the latest and most robust example of the privately funded, overwhelmingly, race for top golf programs to keep up with the competition. The combined investment of just the eight schools that reached match play on the men’s side this year into their golf facilities over the last couple years is more than $70 million dollars and that does not include the new facility at Alabama that is being reported to have cost in the $40-million-dollar range. Knowing benefactors to several different schools the cost of a top recruit in NIL is now above $100k per player and coaches are asking for more donations to keep up and while golf is seeing a rise in television exposure it does not drive revenue, but it does drive giving. The private donors are golf centric and have pride in their schools, but the days of the tricked-out team vans have been replaced by hours on private jets. Golf.
- Gary Koch returned to NBC’s golf coverage this year including being a part of the U.S. Open broadcast last week at Pinehurst. This week he will play in the U.S. Senior Open at Newport Country Club. Gary qualified in his hometown of Tampa in an 84 for 2 qualifying site and 54 years after winning the US. junior amateur Koch returns to compete in another USGA championship. Gary is a total pro in every conceivable way, and he likely weighs now what he did when he won his last event on the PGA tour 36 years ago. Disciplined and dedicated, Gary’s calling cards.
- The U.S. Senior Open being at Newport touches a soft spot for me. First, they are part of the 5 Clubs family that was the inspiration for our name as the original construct of the USGA but the club itself is a time capsule. The clubhouse looks like it should be on a sound stage in Hollywood for a period piece set in the Roaring 20’s and the golf course holds as close to its origins as any golden age golf course does. Brown is a beautiful thing along the coast of Rhode Island and that’s celebrated and adhered to at Newport if the weather dictates it. This should be the anchor site for the senior open for women and men. Its where it all started for the U.S. Am and U.S. Open and who doesn’t want to be at one of the most charming places in New England in the summer?
- Tyrell Hatton won for the first time since moving over to LIV and it would not surprise me at all if he challenged for the most money won over the course of the season. He was already a global player; he has won under varying agronomic conditions, and he’ll never garner the attention of Brooks Koepka or Bryson DeChambeau, so his life and preparation are rarely interrupted by outside demands. He should be a second-tier favorite at the Open next month with his form and Troon was the site of his highest finish in a major when he finished T5 in 2016.
- At 25, John Pak is now a winner on the Korn Ferry tour by winning the Compliance Solutions Championship. Pak has New Jersey roots and moved to Florida as a junior before attending Florida State. He won the Haskins and Nicklaus awards as the top collegiate player and was flawless as a member of the 2019 Walker Cup team. Pak was as high an achiever as anyone of his vintage and his next stop will be the PGA Tour. One of his teammates on that Walker Cup team in 2019 was a 17-year-old Akshay Bhatia, who is now a two-time winner on tour at 22.
- Also by way of the Korn Ferry Tour, Harry Higgs is returning to the PGA Tour. In addition to two playoff wins Higgs finished in T4 this past week. Higgs will always have a job in golf, but it appears he’s found a balance between all the things associated with playing for a living. Harry Higgs being in the mix and being available to share thoughts on his play and just thoughts in general benefits the television show that is the PGA Tour.
- Our first event on the Underrated Tour in the United States this year was at Old Barnwell, south of Aiken, South Carolina. Steph Curry’s goal with each year is to continue to elevate the venues and Old Barnwell has already received a great deal of attention and the club is not even a year old. To really explore the land and be a part of the set-up team allowed me to get a thorough look at the work of Brian Schneider and Blake Conant. Inspired by the heathlands of England, they created a golf course with big scale, width and have blended the native vegetation into the presentation. The four days of hot and dry weather allowed for the golf course to play bouncy and quick and the kids thrived on the half par holes that are beautifully woven into the routing. Old Barnwell is all about access and the mission of its founder, Nick Schreiber is private but very public. Their kids course will be completed soon and it will continue to see its profile raised because it’s a great example of vision meeting great intentions. OB is fantastic.
- There was a stretch from Saturday into early Sunday that Cam Young was 15 under par in a 22-hole stretch. Travelers has always been a cupcake of a set up for tour fields as evidence by the historically low rounds and totals shot there over the years. Despite the alterations made after last year, the golf course was utterly defenseless. Players were completely liberated to leave the baked-out torcher chamber of Pinehurst to return to Cromwell, Connecticut and the softer and far less exacting conditions of TPC River Highlands. That will continue this week at Rocket Mortgage. This is essentially the Korn Ferry mindset portion of the schedule.
- Tom Kim has been trending. He hasn’t missed a cut since the Valero Texas Open to start April, he finished T30 at the Masters with a final round 66 and has back to back T26 at the PGA and U.S. Open. Additionally, his 4th at the RBC Canadian preceded his runner-up this week at the Travelers. Already a 3-time winner on tour at 22 years old he’s boys with Scottie Scheffler and Jordan Spieth which is good for any young professional to be so close to two of the most adult members of the PGA Tour. Plus, Paul Tesori is as wise a soul among the caddy ranks. Tom is weaponized with great guiding lights and despite being too slow and not long he’s equipped to win again soon and repeatedly in the years ahead. Just get faster pulling the trigger, please.
- Scottie Scheffler is going full franchise QB. If you look at the salaries that quarterbacks are garnering in the national football league anybody who is entrusted by the franchises to lead their teams over the next five years are making $45-50 million dollars. With the performance bonus likely to be earned by Scheffler at the end of the tour championship it’s very possible that Scheffler will earn in the Mahomes, Burrow, Herbert, and Rodgers’ neighborhood. In a sport with very modest ratings, even when ratings are good, relative to the NFL for a player to earn based on performance solely what quarterbacks do is kind of ludicrous.
- Xander Schauffele is having a fantastic year. Won his first major, contended until the end at the Players and finished second. He has finished in the top ten in all three majors and has a second and a fourth in two signature series events. A spectacular year of production as we head towards July. He has earned more than 300 LESS world ranking points than Scottie Scheffler. 300!!! The 582 points that Scheffler has earned this year puts him in another category of achievement that harkens only to vintage Tiger. It’s just to give context but there are more and more things beyond statistics that are putting Scheffler in the Tiger orbit including a monstrous season of wins.
- With Travelers and the signature events over for the season the month of July in the United States for field strength on the PGA Tour takes a big hit. The Scottish Open is a wonderful event leading into the Open and early broadcast windows makes it delightful for morning viewing with a full day of summer activities available after watching some golf, but the domestic product is simply diluted. Great opportunity for starts for players needing points for employment but July is a loss leader for the tour in the home country.
- Ben Cowan-Dewar is building a very impressive portfolio of properties with his Cabot brand of high-end retail golf offerings. In just the last 18 months his team has introduced Cabot Citrus Farms, Cabot St. Lucia and the re-branding of Gil Hanse’s Castle Stuart into the coupling of the existing course with a new Tom Doak golf course to give them Cabot Highlands. It appears Cowan-Dewar is finalizing a deal for another acquisition in Scotland to be announced very soon that will be ambitious like all their properties are and word is that additional European locales are part of his vision. Cabot is combining original design with a partial or complete overhaul to existing properties to give golfers an embarrassment of high-end global golf destinations.
- The PGA Tour will do their best to protect members from conduct unbecoming, like foul language. Boom and field microphones are killed consistently on tour and many shots are shown plausibly live so an expletive laced outburst can be quickly removed. On LIV, Rahm f-bombs are in full bloom and they are coming weekly. It doesn’t necessarily mean he is more irritable now than he was a year ago, but he has been annoyed by some of the loud music on LIV that was caught on camera and it also means that LIV shows LIVE golf a lot with no veneer. You get what you see and hear. My guess is, players are not being fined on LIV for temper tantrums and evidenced by me witnessing Rory McIlroy dropping an F bomb on the 6th green at the U.S. Open after a three putt, its selective.
- Longest days of the year right now and makes me think about my favorite golden hour golf courses. I would list Crystal Downs, Misquamicut, Cap Rock Ranch, National Golf Links and Fishers Island as the greatest places to play holes with fading light on summer nights.