The featured groupings for the PGA Tour’s first tournament back are LOADED

One, two and three will be teeing off back-to-back-to-back. Again.

Three close friends will all be close to each other. 

The featured groupings, released Sunday in advance of this week’s first and second rounds of the Charles Schwab Challenge, the PGA Tour’s first tournament after a three-month hiatus due to the coronavirus, feature plenty.

There’s the rankings group. No. 1 Rory McIlroy, No. 2 Jon Rahm and No. 3 Brooks Koepka are all paired together, reuniting the threesome that played together during the Tour’s last completed round, the Players Championship in mid-March. (But not a rivalry group, at least according to Koepka. “I’ve been out here for, what, five years. Rory hasn’t won a major since I’ve been on the PGA Tour. So I just don’t view it as a rivalry,” Koepka told the AFP. “I’m not looking at anybody behind me. … I’m No. 1 in the world. I’ve got open road in front of me and I’m not looking in the rearview mirror, so I don’t see it as a rivalry.”)

There’s the buddies group. Longtime pals Rickie Fowler, Jordan Spieth and Justin Thomas are all paired together. 

There’s the fitness group. Bryson DeChambeau will be bulked up since the Tour’s last round. Dustin Johnson once received a headline in Men’s Journal entitled, “How Dustin Johnson Became the Fittest Man in Golf.” Justin Rose, no slouch himself, is the third member of the grouping. 

There’s Phil. The other featured grouping will bring together five-time major champion Phil Mickelson; Kevin Na, the Charles Schwab Challenge defending champion; and Gary Woodland, the reigning U.S. Open champion.  

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Nick Piastowski

Golf.com Editor

Nick Piastowski is a Senior Editor at Golf.com and Golf Magazine. In his role, he is responsible for editing, writing and developing stories across the golf space. And when he’s not writing about ways to hit the golf ball farther and straighter, the Milwaukee native is probably playing the game, hitting the ball left, right and short, and drinking a cold beer to wash away his score. You can reach out to him about any of these topics — his stories, his game or his beers — at nick.piastowski@golf.com.

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