Welcome to the new PGA Tour season! Wait, what? Didn’t the last one just end, like, two weeks ago? It sure did. And wasn’t the Presidents Cup last weekend? It sure was. But golf doesn’t really have an offseason (partly because it’s always 80 degrees and sunny somewhere).
To be honest, it doesn’t really feel like a new season — well, with the exception of all the new (and old) faces who have graduated from the Web.com Tour.
I definitely didn’t think I’d regret not staying up past my curfew last night to watch the Presidents Cup. I certainly didn’t think I’d miss anything but the standard U.S. routing or maybe the Internationals attempting a tepid comeback. I really didn’t think I’d be saying what I’m about to say, especially since any little interest I had in the Presidents Cup completely disappeared after the only thing I considered that could be slightly intriguing did not happen — which was obviously Jordan Spieth and Jason Day, the worlds nos. 1 and 2, respectively, facing off in what would naturally be an intense battle filled with lots of thumbs-up and fist-pumps for Sunday singles.
Well, to be honest, I doubt I would been awake to watch, anyway, since I was playing in a tourney at NGLA this weekend (yes, very important with at least a few hundred in pro shop credit on the line) and had an early-ish tee time. #sorrynotsorry
It’s virtually impossible to write about golf right now with playoff football showing on the television in front of me in the media center, but I’ll do my best to get through this write-up for the few of you who actually care.
As the conditions have been soft all week at Kapalua’s Plantation Course, low scores were there for the taking in the second round of the Hyundai Tournament of Champions. Defending champion Zach Johnson was one of the players to capitalize, posting a six-under 67 to take a four-way share of the lead with Jimmy Walker, Sang-Moon Bae and first-round leader Russell Henley.
Russell Henley found his second start at the Hyundai Tournament of Champions at Kapalua’s Plantation Course much more to his liking than his maiden voyage last year, where he failed to break 70 and finished 27th in the 30-man field. Henley opened 2015 with a bogey-free, eight-under 65 to take the early first-round lead by a shot over Sang-Moon Bae.
Sang-Moon Bae captured the PGA Tour’s 2014-15 season-opener, the Frys.com Open, by two shots over Steven Bowditch, posting a 15-under total at Silverado’s North Course. (He also leads in FedExCup points!!!)
Bae, who secured his first-career victory at the 2013 Byron Nelson Championship, started his campaign for his second win heading into the final round with a commanding four-shot lead. He extended it to as many as six strokes throughout the round, but a bogey on no. 8 led to a shaky stretch of holes — he bogeyed four of the next seven, though he balanced it out with two birdies.
Sang-Moon Bae. Photo Credit: Tom Pennington – Getty Images.
With Martin Kaymer winning The Players and J.B. Holmes winning the Wells Fargo, no one can be considered an expert at picking champions on the PGA Tour. A long shot, odds at 50/1 or worse, has a great chance to win because of the strong fields on Tour.
W for Waialae
Conditions were ideal on Thursday at Waialae Country Club to kick off the opening round of the Sony Open, the PGA Tour’s first full-field event of the year (not season anymore). The sun was out in full force and the wind was mostly calm. Most of the lower scores came from the morning wave, per usual — don’t worry, they switch on Friday, so the other half of the field will be able to get after it.
Jason Kokrak, Luke Guthrie, Charlie Wi and Sang-Moon Bae loosen up for the playoff
With darkness closing in during the last minutes of daylight at the U.S. Open sectional qualifier in Columbus, PGA Tour rookie Luke Guthrie stood over a five-footer for birdie on the third playoff hole — more important, a putt to clinch his place in his first major next week at Merion. And, in it went.
In a playoff that started with eleven other Tour pros who shot eight-under gunning for the seven remaining spots, Guthrie secured the 15th and final one on the third extra hole, the par-4 10th at The Lakes Golf & Country Club.
Brookside Country Club
Welcome to the “Golf’s Longest Day” — as it is marketed on Golf Channel — where nearly 1,000 players spread across 11 qualifying sites in the country are vying for coveted spots in next week’s U.S. Open at Merion. I’ll be bringing you updates from the 36-hole sectional qualifier in Columbus, which is held at Brookside CC and The Lakes G&CC (the “host” venue).
As longtime readers know, this is one of my favorite events to cover. I love watching PGA Tour pros biting their nails as they gather around the scoreboard at the end of the second round (which will be at The Lakes this year) and nervously watch the calligrapher handwrite the numbers. It’s a tense atmosphere, but the emotion is raw and real. It’s one of the few events left that have the old-school feeling to them, because realtime scoring is either nonexistent or delayed and big electronic leaderboards aren’t plastered around the course.
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