The post Scheffler, Cantlay lead 6 U.S. auto-qualifiers for 2022 Presidents Cup appeared first on Golf.

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The list of players who will head to Quail Hollow Club for the Presidents Cup next month is starting to take shape, as the automatic qualifiers on both the U.S. and International squads were locked up following the conclusion of the BMW Championship on Sunday.

Six players earned automatic bids for the Americans: Scottie Scheffler, Patrick Cantlay, Sam Burns, Xander Schauffele, Justin Thomas and Tony Finau.

Tournaments

Scheffler and Burns will be Presidents Cup rookies. Scheffler made his Ryder Cup debut last fall at Whistling Straits and went 2–0–1, capped with a dominating 4-and-3 win over Jon Rahm in singles.

The team will be rounded out with six captain’s picks made at a later date. As of now, the players Nos. 7-12 in the standings are Will Zalatoris, Jordan Spieth, Collin Morikawa, Max Homa, Billy Horschel and Cameron Young. Tom Hoge (13th), J.T. Poston (14th) and Kevin Kisner (15th) are just outside.

For the International team, Cameron Smith, Hideki Matsuyama, Sungjae Im, Joaquin Niemann, Joohyung Kim, Corey Conners, Adam Scott and Mito Pereira all secured spots. The final four captain’s picks will be named at a later date.

The U.S. is 11-1-1 all-time in the event and has won the last eight meetings.

This year’s event also comes in the wake of LIV Golf’s launch, and the PGA Tour has previously said LIV players will not be allowed to compete in the Presidents Cup. That means players like Dustin Johnson or Brooks Koepka, unless things change, won’t be options as captain’s picks.

The Presidents Cup is Sept. 23-25 in Charlotte, N.C.

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The post Wall-to-Wall Equipment: Justin Thomas’ surprise playoff gear change appeared first on Golf.

The post Wall-to-Wall Equipment: Justin Thomas’ surprise playoff gear change appeared first on Golf.

Welcome to Wall-to-Wall Equipment, the Monday morning gear wrap-up in which GOLF equipment editor Jonathan Wall takes you through the latest trends, rumors and breaking news.

Big things ahead

Putting is a game of inches — or half inches in Justin Thomas’ case.

Coming off a win at the PGA Championship with a relatively new Scotty Cameron T5 Proto, Thomas appeared primed for a big summer after finding a replacement (Scotty Cameron T5 Proto) for the Phantom X 5.5 that played a role in 13 Tour wins, including his first major title.

The big change for Thomas’ T5 was going away from a slant neck into a custom “knuckle neck” — the neck takes almost a day to weld, cut and sandblast the knuckle — that offered slightly less toe hang than his previous putter. While the neck improved Thomas’ start lines and closure rate, there was another potential alteration still being tested behind the scenes.

Earlier this year at the Genesis Invitational, Thomas tried out Scotty Cameron mallets in three different lengths (34.5, 34 and 33.5 inches) to see how they affected his setup. Thomas ultimately stuck with his usual 34.5 inches, believing it was the best length. Things seemed to be going well until Thomas started to notice his left shoulder was creeping up post-PGA, which prompted him to ask Scotty Cameron Tour rep Drew Page for a 34-inch version of his current T5 Proto — a half-inch shorter than his previous gamer — in advance of the FedEx Cup Playoffs.

On Tuesday of the BMW Championship, Thomas’ new 34-inch T5 putter (SuperStroke Traxion Pistol GT Tour grip) arrived, replete with a JT logo in the back cavity and thumbs-up stamp on the toe side. Thomas initially thought he might take the putter home, but after rolling putts with it on the green and noticing his shoulders level out, he chose to give it a shot.

“[A shorter putter was] something we looked at earlier this year and we were going to mess with this off-season, but I haven’t been putting great for how I feel like I should be, and it was just one of those things,” Thomas said. “I’m like, if this is going to be an easy adjustment that’s going to help me improve, then why wouldn’t I do it.”

As for why Thomas decided to have a new putter built instead of shortening his previous T5, Page said it came down to Thomas “not wanting to touch the gamer.” In other words, if the shorter length doesn’t stick, Thomas knows he has a 34.5-inch T5 sitting in the locker ready to go.

For the moment, however, Thomas doesn’t appear to be wavering in his decision to switch. Following Thursday’s opening round, he praised Cameron for building him a new putter that felt the same as his previous T5, but at a shorter length.

“I switched because it was the exact same feel,” Thomas said. “Scottie did an unbelievable job. It’s very difficult to make putters the exact same in terms of feel. They may be the same but none of them are ever the same in terms of clubs in general. But it feels identical, so getting adjusted and acclimated to the speed wasn’t difficult, but just being a little bit shorter was so much easier for me to get in a good setup.”

It also didn’t hurt that Thomas gained nearly two strokes on the field on the greens during the opening round. (The rest of the week was a mixed bag for Thomas, who lost nearly six strokes over the final 54 holes.)

“It felt great,” he said. “It was the best I’ve putted in an extremely long time. Every single putt I hit was exactly where I wanted, the speed I wanted it. It was nice. I hadn’t felt that in a while.”

As we saw at the PGA Championship, a hot putter makes Thomas extremely dangerous. If Thomas can find a way to replicate Thursday’s round on the greens, watch out.

Trusty rusty

Joaquin Niemann and Taylor Moore were among the first pros to take Ping’s Glide Forged Pro Raw wedges for spins around Wilmington Country Club. The latest iteration of Ping’s popular wedge features a non-plated finish that allows the head to patina, and eventually rust, over time.

Instead of breaking in a wedge or two, both Niemann and Moore chose to change out their entire wedge set — a good sign for Ping as it begins to seed the raw wedges on Tour.

Busy week

Ping Tour rep Dylan Goodwin spent a chunk of his time in Deleware dialing in putters for several pros who were attempting to advance to the Tour Championship, including Sebastian Munoz, Mito Pereira and Chez Reavie.

“Worked hard with Sebastian Munoz and [PGA Tour putting consultant] Stephen Sweeney,” Goodwin told GOLF.com. “Sebastian can get caught up on alignment so freeing him up to focus more on the read and where he wants to roll the ball over is key. Switching to a PLD Anser Milled with no sight lines had definitely helped and was in the bag for several months. Now he wanted something a little more stable but still visually subtle and not distracting, so we experimented with various mallets. We found the Oslo H was a great fit for him. Still has the Anser neck like his current gamer but in a more stable model of the Oslo. It’s all matte black with a small white topline.”

For Reavie, it was video work to check his contact point and lie angle with a Ping PLD Anser 2D. The session verified Reavie’s putter was good to go, and he was on his way.

Similar to Justin Thomas, Pereira only needed a minor length adjustment to get back on track. To keep Pereira’s shoulders from pointing left and affecting his stroke, Goodwin lengthened the putter from 35 to 37 inches, which allowed him to stand taller and reduce the tension in his shoulders and arms.

Quick-hitters: Viktor Hovland added a Ping Glide 2.0 58TS lob wedge (bent to 60 degrees). … Kevin Kisner was spotted with a 10.5-degree Ping G425 LST driver. … Collin Morikawa had TaylorMade’s original SIM driver in the bag.

Want to overhaul your bag for 2022? Find a fitting location near you at GOLF’s affiliate company True Spec Golf. For more on the latest gear news and information, check out our latest Fully Equipped podcast below.

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The post ‘There’s an alpha in there, and it’s not me’: Players mum on emergency Tiger Woods-led meeting appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘There’s an alpha in there, and it’s not me’: Players mum on emergency Tiger Woods-led meeting appeared first on Golf.

In a scene straight out of a movie and not something you might be accustom to seeing on the PGA Tour — although, boy, the current state of the golf world is unpredictable now — news outlets captured Tiger Woods step off his private plane and into a vehicle to drive to an emergency meeting with fellow Tour players at the BMW Championship on Tuesday.

Woods, flanked by his team and Rickie Fowler, was heading to Wilmington Country Club in Wilmington, Del., for a well-publicized meeting with players, which reportedly was supposed to be a thorough discussion — with Woods there to provide a rallying cry/act as the elder statesman — as the Tour bears down in its fight vs. LIV Golf.

The meeting reportedly lasted for three-plus hours. Asked on Wednesday if Woods took on a leadership role during the session, Rory McIlroy said, “I think it’s pretty apparent that whenever we all get in the room, there’s an alpha in there, and it’s not me.”

But no, it should not come as a surprise that players have been tight-lipped about what took place on Tuesday.

“I’m not obviously going to talk about it very much,” said Justin Thomas. “It was a productive meeting. It’s just something that the players who are involved just want the best for the Tour and want what’s in the best interest. I think it’s just one of those things where we all want what’s best for the players, and we’re working to do that.”

LIV Golf continues to take some of the Tour’s top talent. Open champ Cameron Smith is rumored to be the latest big-name signee, although Smith (who withdrew from this week’s tournament) has yet to confirm any reports.

The Tour has won the latest fight within the battle, though, as last week a judge ruled three LIV players could not compete in the FedEx Cup Playoffs.

News

Woods has played just three times this year and has made it clear he won’t ever play a full schedule again, but his presence still carries significant weight. Thomas said Woods flying in for the meeting — not just entering via Zoom or by phone — proves how passionate he is about the sport and the next generation of golfers. McIlroy called Woods’ presence “impactful.”

“I think it shows how much he cares about the Tour,” McIlroy said. “I think it shows how much he cares about the players that are coming through and are going to be the next generation. Like it or not, they can’t really sell Tiger Woods anymore. The Tour had an easy job for 20 years. They don’t have Tiger — yes, they’ve got a bunch of us and we’re all great players — but we’re not Tiger Woods. We’re moving into a different era, and we just have to think about things a little differently.”

In general, McIlroy said the Tour and players need to do a better job getting the top golfers in the same tournaments more often than what’s happening now. And while he didn’t exactly provide detailed minutes for Tuesday’s meeting, McIlroy said the one thing that came out of the session was purpose.

“All the top players on this Tour are in agreement and alignment of where we should go going forward, and that was awesome,” McIlroy said.

And where should the Tour go?

“I don’t think that’s for a public forum right now,” he said. “I think that’s between the players and between the executives at the Tour to try to sort of manage a way forward.”

For now, the PGA Tour vs. LIV Golf feud continues.

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The post Why Rory McIlroy believes he has an advantage at unfamiliar Wilmington Country Club appeared first on Golf.

The post Why Rory McIlroy believes he has an advantage at unfamiliar Wilmington Country Club appeared first on Golf.

WILMINGTON, Del. — While preference among PGA Tour host courses inevitably varies from player to player, Rory McIlroy seems to feel at home during his first visit to Wilmington Country Club.

“It’s a golf course that’s sort of is a little more up my alley compared to say last week in Memphis,” McIlroy said Wednesday after his pro-am round. “A lot more drivers off the tee, a lot of room off the tee, a lot more, I guess, scope to hit driver. Length is an advantage here, where in Memphis it’s not really.”

At, 7,534 yards, the South Course at Wilmington Country Club, host of this week’s BMW Championship, is nearly 300 yards longer than last week’s venue, TPC Southwind in Memphis. The greens average about double the size, and the Kentucky bluegrass/fescue rough is more than an inch longer. Compared to Southwind and East Lake Golf Club, host of next week’s Tour Championship, McIlroy said his length will be much more of an advantage.

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“These sort of big northeast-style golf courses, they’re great venues to play tournaments on,” he said. “They’re the sort of golf courses that I typically do well on.”

Like many in the field, this is the first time McIlroy has seen Wilmington Country Club. This week is the first tour event played in the state of Delaware, and McIlroy wasn’t the only once noticing the length.

“This is a big-boy golf course, 7,500 yards. All three of the par-5s are basically not reachable,” last week’s champion, Will Zalatoris, said Wednesday. “If I were to design a golf course, this is probably how I would design it for me. So I’m very excited.”

Xander Schauffele told reporters the length and style of the course actually makes it easier to learn, especially for so many players seeing it for the first time, compared to a more quirky course like Harbor Town, which is more than 300 yards shorter.

“There just isn’t much to it. I know that may sound bad, but it’s really long, you don’t want to hit it in the rough, and every putt you have is almost downhill,” Schauffele said. “It’s hard to make a 650-yard par-5 ‘special.’ It’s just really long. It would almost be impossible if you made a 650-yard hole with a dogleg and water and a raised green and run-offs.

“It wouldn’t be my favorite course to play blind, but you could definitely do it.”

While Schauffele saw the course’s style as an advantage in playing for the first time, Patrick Cantlay, the event’s defending champion from Caves Valley, a course which several players compared to the South Course, seemed to be growing tired of the bomber’s paradises.

“I think it’s also strange to me that we play so many golf courses that all they do is add length to the golf courses,” Cantlay said Tuesday. “It’s so surprising to me that the golf courses that none of the guys who hit it far, they don’t go to Hilton Head, they don’t go to Colonial, they don’t go to the short, small, dogleggy tree-lined golf courses.”

Cantlay stopped short of calling the course a U.S. Open setup, but went on to say the South Course doesn’t require a lot of thinking.

“It’s just how far can you hit it and grab your driver on every hole and hit it as high and hit it as far as you possibly can,” he said. “I’m so surprised that [the Tour hasn’t] figured it out, and it just seems like we’re getting more and more of the same bomb-it-as-far-as-you-can golf courses week after week.”

Cantlay beat Bryson DeChambeau at the 2021 BMW Championship after they were tied at 27 under through 72 holes. DeChambeau overpowered Caves Valley that week, averaging more than 340 yards off the tee.

While most pros were hesitant to guess a winning score this year, Justin Thomas said Wilmington would be more challenging than Caves Valley, but still could see some lower scoring. He also noted how this course is also different from the other two playoff host sites because of the different grasses around the greens.

“The rough is quite a bit different to chip out of,” Thomas said. “Last week you had to pay a lot of attention to the grain and where you were landing it, if the ball was landing into the grain it was going to pop straight up or if it was downgrain it was going to take off, versus now it’s kind of what you see is what you get with the slope.”

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The post Tour Confidential: Did we just watch the greatest PGA Tour finish ever? appeared first on Golf.

The post Tour Confidential: Did we just watch the greatest PGA Tour finish ever? appeared first on Golf.

Check in every week for the unfiltered opinions of our writers and editors as they break down the hottest topics in the sport, and join the conversation by tweeting us @golf_com. This week, we discuss the the six-hole playoff between Patrick Cantlay and Bryson DeChambeau, the Solheim Cup, the Ryder Cup and more. 

1. Patrick Cantlay edged Bryson DeChambeau on the sixth (!) hole of a sudden-death playoff at the BMW Championship to become the first player to win three times on the PGA Tour in the 2020-21 season. Lots to unpack, but we’ll start here: Given the stature of the players involved, the stakes (the top spot in the FedEx race heading into the Tour Championship) and the number of shots and putts both players needed to convert down the stretch (and did), where does this Sunday rank among PGA Tour finishes (non-major division) in the modern era?

Dylan Dethier, senior writer (@dylan_dethier): Sheesh, that is a lot to unpack. We’ve had epic fist-pumping putts from guys like Jon Rahm (this event last year) and Collin Morikawa (last year’s Memorial), but the way these guys traded blows for hours today made it the best duel in recent memory. The contrast in playing styles, the relentless runs of great shots interrupted only by occasional intriguing chinks in the armor … I’m having a hard time naming a recent showdown that was better. Tiger at the 2019 Tour championship seems like a different category, after all. This was good.

Josh Sens, senior writer (@joshsens): That was ridiculously fun entertainment, especially with the fire-and-ice contrast and the tensions that were surely there after Bryson barked at Cantlay for walking while he was in pre-shot prep. It wasn’t Reed vs. McIlroy at the Ryder Cup. Not even close. Does any fan really really care who goes to East Lake with more points? But it sure made for great Sunday TV. 

Sean Zak, senior editor (@sean_zak): I think it was the best sudden-death playoff the Tour has ever seen. Two players getting in trouble, hitting it tight, dropping putts in on top of each other. The only thing that could have made it better is if they were allowed to play other holes (though the finishing two were at least interesting). The best part was that it really wasn’t sudden death. They had been competing mostly against only each other the entire weekend. 

Michael Bamberger, senior writer: It was outstanding. So was the 1968 playoff between Lee Elder, a 34-year-old Tour rookie in his, and Jack Nicklaus, a rising god in the game. Jack won on the fifth hole. Jack was a child of privilege, and Elder learned the game as a caddie and playing on baked-out courses. But this was good on Sunday at Caves. This was way up there.

2. If there were any lingering questions about Cantlay’s Ryder Cup credentials, he put them to rest at Caves Valley, where he gained a stunning 16.431 strokes on the field in putting for the week, including a torrid stretch late on Sunday (in regulation and the playoff) where he drained five consecutive do-or-dies. What did you observe or learn about Cantlay this week that he hadn’t seen or known before?

Dethier: This week served as a reminder that Cantlay loves being under the gun. He gets plenty of grief for his inscrutable flatline persona in big spots, but it’s clear he loves having that “Patty Ice” identity. In other words: The dude loves the moment.

Sens: Exactly. That putt on 18 to get himself into the playoff conveyed everything you need to know. 

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Zak: Definitely loves the moment. We will soon forget his three very (or even below) average approach shots — two in regulation and the first in the playoff — that made things appear like he had no chance to win. Great players rebound from bad shots with better shots. It was damn impressive.

Bamberger: I never realized how near-perfect his putting mechanics are. It gives me hope, to think that putting can be improved. I’ve seldom seen anybody make more straight putts. Other great putters — Seve, Jordan Spieth, Crenshaw — look like they’re doing some magical thing. Tiger, the best of them all, looks both like an engineer and an artist. But Cantlay on those soft Caves Valley greens looked like Vladimir Horowitz on a Steinway: every position, technical perfection.

3. We’ve seen (and discussed!) plenty of DeChambeau this year, but not so much in a match-play environment, which is, in effect, what the BMW became on Sunday with playing partners DeChambeau and Cantlay taking a commanding lead on the field. What jumped out at you about how DeChambeau managed his game in the decisive moments against his soon-to-be Ryder Cup teammate?

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Dethier: (First, it’s easy to fall into the “match play” line of thinking and/or commentating, but it was truly still stroke play until the playoff, which can be an important difference.) DeChambeau obviously played spectacularly well all week, but his chipping — which had been middling — and his putting — which had been excellent — each faltered once the lights shone brightest. The good news is he’s clearly driving the ball very well. The intrigue will come when his short game is under pressure in front of the watchful eyes of rabid fans at Whistling Straits. …

Bamberger: I agree through 72 and then some. Cantlay had to maintain a stroke-play mindset because at match play it wasn’t a fair fight. So Cantlay had to keep doing his thing, knowing that his thing was good enough to stand right in there and maybe win. Meanwhile. Bryson showed, as Azinger said and said well, that he can bully the course. Especially when he has the honor. It takes a very strong mind not to be put off by that. Few have it.

Sens: Bryson’s power was a spectacle, per usual. But it was hard not to notice how wildly off he was on some of his distances. That 6-iron approach on 16 in regulation came up amateur-distance short. That’s obviously nitpicking the performance of a guy who shot 27-under for the week. But it will be something worth watching at Whistling Straits. 

Zak: The driving was so good, it makes you wonder if Steve Stricker can get Kerry Haigh to set up the Ryder Cup to play to DeChambeau’s strength, literally, which seemingly cannot be matched by anyone in the world. Caves Valley in the rainy heat is not windy Whistling Straits in September in Wisconsin, but it sure makes you think about the thin margins that lead to matches won. 

4. In the second round of the BMW, DeChambeau shot a 12-under 60 — but missed a chance at a magical 59 when he missed a 6-footer left of the hole on 18. On the third-round broadcast, analyst Justin Leonard described how he had never felt more nerves than he did while once putting for that score. To most players, how do you suppose the pressure of a 59 putt stacks up against other big-pressure moments?

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Dethier: Uniquely difficult because you’re thinking about your score — like, the actual number — rather than merely trying to beat the rest of the field and post a low number. So I can see how you’d get out of sequence there. My approach is to stay far, far away from putts for 59 to avoid the potential embarrassment of missing them.

Sens: If it’s anything like the pressure I’ve felt putting for a 79, then it must be paralyzing. 

Zak: It has to be pretty darn high. You probably don’t think about 59 until about 3-4 hours into your round. And you tell yourself not to think about it until you reach the 18th hole. And then probably not until you’re on the green … and suddenly that moment hits you. It has to. No other putt, for most pros, has ever felt uniquely like a putt for 59. So I get it … I think?

Bamberger: It’s not just the putt, it’s the two or three shots leading to the putt. I caddied some for Al Geiberger, years after he became the first player to break 60 on Tour. First of all, what a gent and what a swing. As he described the round, typically to pro-am playing partners, all 59 shots came out of a dream. Like he was on auto-pilot. Like the ball was 12 feet from the hole, hook putt, easy read, before he got over the approach shot. I never had the feeling, listening to Al, that he felt pressure, per se. He was going low and whatever it would be it would be. I’d like to ask him that exact question sometime.

5. This week, the Solheim Cup kicks off at Inverness in Ohio. The U.S. side will feature eight of the top 30 players in the world, headlined by No. 1 Nelly Korda, and are the betting favorites (-200, according to BetMGM). But if we’ve learned anything from Solheim and Ryder Cups past, the odds don’t mean much. Two questions: Who ya got, and who is primed to be the breakout star of the event?

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Dethier: Team USA is going to roll. On paper, they’re a top-heavy squad, but I like young stars like Yealimi Noh to introduce herself to the team golf world. And watch out for Leona Maguire on Team Europe — she’s coming in with a hot hand.

Sens: Maguire is a great call for a break-out star. But yeah — on paper, the U.S. is rightly the big favorite. 

Zak: Team USA is NOT going to roll. Don’t be silly, Dylan. Team Europe has shown better form of late, so they’ll keep it close. I think Madelene Sagstrom is the breakout star. She’s been really, really good of late. Ultimately, the Americans win from one of the final three singles matches.

Bamberger: Completely agree, Sean. Don’t see either team winning by much over a point. As for Sagstrom, she looks to be a star on the rise. She looks strong and athletic and confident through the bag. 

6. We haven’t seen much of Tiger Woods since his car accident six months ago, but this week — which marks the 25th anniversary of Woods turning pro at the Greater Milwaukee Open — will bring reminders of where his professional greatness began. From that quarter-century stretch of mind-bending golf from Woods, which single shot/putt most sticks with you?

Putters

Dethier: The putt to force the playoff at Torrey Pines in the ‘08 U.S. Open. It nearly missed. It was so close to missing. And yet there was never any chance that it would. Tiger became a myth. And then he kept becoming one again, over and over.

Sens: It’s a bit like trying to pick a favorite Beatles tune. Torrey, of course. That hang-on-the-lip chip-in on 16 Augusta. His point at the putt as it dropped for birdie against Bob May at Valhalla. Or maybe that iron from the fairway bunker at the Canadian Open. And on. And on. 

Zak: I think it’s the chip on 16 at Augusta. I struggle to imagine a more famous golf shot. TV viewing at its zenith. And cable TV at that. The most famous athlete on the planet getting himself into trouble and creating a freaking commercial out of one shot. The millions of dollars of supposed ad revenue on a Masters broadcast. A 50-foot chip that lasts 16 seconds? It’s Hollywood fiction type stuff!

Bamberger: I’m not holding myself to this forever because I have a 100 in mind, but for sheer talent and audacity, try out this. Mexico, 2019.

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The post This sneaky putting tactic helped fuel Patrick Cantlay’s historically good week at BMW appeared first on Golf.

The post This sneaky putting tactic helped fuel Patrick Cantlay’s historically good week at BMW appeared first on Golf.

How good was BMW Championship winner Patrick Cantlay’s week on the Caves Valley greens?

Historic.

In the 17 years that the PGA Tour has employed its ShotLink technology to monitor every shot by every player in (almost) every tournament, no Tour pro — statistically speaking — has had a more dominant putting week. Cantlay picked up a mind-bending 14.577 strokes on the greens on his competitors, which, according to stats whiz Justin Ray, topped the Strokes Gained era record previously held by Kevin Na (2019 Shriners).  

A few other Cantlay numbers to wrap your (putter) head around:

— Total feet of putts holed for the week: 537’5” (not including the six playoff holes!), or an average of about 134 feet per round

— Number of 20-plus-footers he needed to make to keep his hopes alive in the last five holes: 2

— Number of new putters in his bag: 1 (a Scotty Cameron Phantom X 5 he added to his arsenal at the Northern Trust last week)

— Number of nicknames earned at Caves Valley for his steeliness on the greens: 1 (“Patty Ice”)

— Number of three-putts: nadda!    

Cantlay’s secret? “I think staying below the hole is very important,” he said after dispatching Bryson DeChambeau in a riveting bonus session. “I think the greens have lots of pitch, usually back to front, and the greens are very fast, so as many uphill putts as you can get, then you really have some chances of making some.”

But that wasn’t all.

Cantlay also revealed a new alignment tactic that he employed this week, one that you’re just as likely see in your Saturday-morning fourball as you are in the nervy moments of a FedEx Cup Playoff event: Cantlay, for the first time, used a line on his ball — but only in very specific situations.  

“I use it on shorter putts if they don’t have very much break,” Cantlay said. “I thought it just maybe got me a little more specific on the really straight short putts. I don’t use it on very many putts, but I think it’s helping a little bit on three- to five-footers.”

Indeed, from three to five feet this week, Cantlay was a perfect 41 for 41.

That Cantlay hadn’t been using an alignment aid on shorties is unusual. As Top 100 Teacher Brady Riggs wrote on GOLF.com last year: “The majority of professional and collegiate golfers use the line on short putts, especially those that are not starting outside the hole. Many of those players don’t use the line on putts with large amounts of break or outside 15-20 feet.”

Is an alignment line right for your game?

Only one way to find out: experiment, and soon enough you’ll know if it’s an effective aid. Riggs added one caveat: “If you become obsessed with the line and unable to make subtle adjustments while you are standing over the ball you will be turning off some of the athletic instincts that can make a player special.”

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The post PGA Tour players who surprisingly won — and lost — a chance at millions on Sunday appeared first on Golf.

The post PGA Tour players who surprisingly won — and lost — a chance at millions on Sunday appeared first on Golf.

Erik van Rooyen and Sergio Garcia moved in. Charley Hoffman and Max Homa moved out. 

And Alex Noren and K.H. Lee were in. And out. All on the 72nd and final hole.

Sunday’s final round of the BMW Championship was also the finish line of the second leg of the PGA Tour’s FedEx Cup playoffs. The top 30 players in a season-long standings move to next week’s Tour Championship, where the purse is $60 million, a quarter of which goes to the winner. The remaining 40 at Caves Valley could, at best, wax poetic. 

Like Noren. 

“It’s golf, you know,” he said. “That happens.”

Well said. 

Here then are the PGA Tour players who — and lost — a chance at millions on Sunday. 

And the bizarre case of Patrick Reed. 

Who’s in?

Atop the list heading to East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta is Patrick Cantlay, also the winner at the BMW. Based on the three-year-old format of the Tour Championship, he’ll begin the tournament at 10-under, and two shots ahead of the No. 2 player in the standings, Tony Finau. Bryson DeChambeau, runner-up on Sunday, will start at seven-under as the No. 3 player, and so on down the line, until the Nos. 26-30 players, who will begin the Tour Championship at even par.  

Which is where we find both Van Rooyen and Garcia. 

Ahead of the Barracuda Championship at the start of the month, Van Rooyen was sitting in the standings’ triple digits. Then he won. Then he tied for 37th the next week at the Wyndham Championship. Then he finished seventh at the Northern Trust, the first leg of the playoffs. Then he shot 67, 68, 67 and 65 at the BMW, with a birdie on 18 on Sunday. He’ll start at the No. 27 position beginning Thursday. 

“A player knowing what he’s capable of but struggling to find his feet and searching for a little bit of confidence. Now it’s almost completely flipped,” said Van Rooyen, when asked to compare the player before the Barracuda to the player on Sunday. “I’m absolutely cruising, and I’m playing some of the best golf I’ve ever played consistently. It’s a great place to be.”

At No. 28 heading to East Lake is Garcia. Entering the week, he was 44th. Entering the 5th, he was 17th, then he proceeded to hit the lip on two straight bunker shots. Entering the 10th, he was 27th, then he shanked his second shot. But on 18, after an approach to the left greenside bunker, he hit to within 4 inches on his third shot and secured his spot. 

“To come back after what happened on 5 and not give up and keep at it and play as hard as I did those last three holes, the two up-and-downs I made on 16 and 18, they were very nice,” Garcia said. 

The top 30: 1, Cantlay, 10-under; 2, Finau, 8-under; 3, DeChambeau, 7-under; 4, Jon Rahm, 6-under; 5, Cameron Smith, 5-under; 6-10, Justin Thomas, Harris English, Abraham Ancer, Jordan Spieth, Sam Burns, 4-under; 11-15, Collin Morikawa, Sungjae Im, Viktor Hovland, Louis Oosthuizen, Dustin Johnson, 3-under; 16-20, Rory McIlroy, Xander Schauffele, Jason Kokrak, Kevin Na, Brooks Koepka, 2-under; 21-25, Corey Conners, Hideki Matsuyama, Stewart Cink, Joaquin Niemann, Scottie Scheffler, 1-under; 26-30, Daniel Berger, van Rooyen, Garcia, Billy Horschel, Reed, even.  

Who’s out?

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Atop the list of those heading home, according to the standings, are Lee (No. 31), Hoffman (No. 32), Noren (No. 33), Si Woo Kim (No. 34) and Homa (No. 35). Further down the list of those missing out are Kevin Kisner (No. 38), Webb Simpson (No. 40), Shane Lowry (No. 45), Lee Westwood (No. 50) and Phil Mickelson (No. 70), though only Hoffman and Homa were among the top 30 to start the week.

For Lee and Noren, they were in. And then, as Noren himself said above, golf happened. 

Lee entered the 18th 29th in the standings, hit his tee shot down the left side of the fairway — then rocketed his second shot right of the green, where it bounced and narrowly avoided water. He dropped, nearly hit into the water again and finished the hole with a bogey. 

“That’ll sting, and I know what that feels like,” said Van Rooyen, who played with Lee on Sunday. “But he’s a phenomenal player. He’ll be OK.”

Noren also entered 18 at No. 29 and also hit his tee shot down the left side of the fairway. From there, he hit into a left greenside bunker, blasted out to 7 feet — then missed the par putt just to the left of the hole. 

“I mean, I holed a few long ones in the middle of the round, and I’ve played golf long enough to understand that happens,” said Noren, who admirably answered questions considering the situation. “It’s not an easy putt to make under the circumstances.”

Patrick Reed?

Reed, who has missed the past two weeks after being hospitalized with bilateral pneumonia, also advanced. 

It’s unknown if he’ll be ready by Thursday. 

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The post ‘Patrick, can you stop walking?’ Did a bizarre sequence doom Bryson DeChambeau? appeared first on Golf.

The post ‘Patrick, can you stop walking?’ Did a bizarre sequence doom Bryson DeChambeau? appeared first on Golf.

Bryson DeChambeau, on the par-4 14th at Caves Valley, stood over his second shot for 10 seconds when he turned slightly to his left and backed away. Leading playing partner Patrick Cantlay by a stroke during Sunday’s final round of the BMW Championship, DeChambeau had outdriven him by some 50 yards, and Cantlay was beginning his walk to the green after his approach shot. 

“Patrick, can you stop walking?” DeChambeau shouted. 

Cantlay would. 

Only then he ran.

DeChambeau hit his approach to 37 feet. Then Cantlay cleared hurdle after hurdle. Cantlay made his putt on 14, from 21 feet, to tie DeChambeau atop the leaderboard. Two holes later, after DeChambeau birdied, Cantlay rolled in an 8-footer for par to fall just one shot back. On the 17th, after hitting in the water on his tee shot, Cantlay rolled in another 8-footer to remain tied. On the 18th, he jarred a 21-footer for birdie to tie DeChambeau again and move the event to sudden death. There, Cantlay kept himself alive with putts on the first and second playoff holes, then won it on the whopping sixth with a 17-foot birdie. 

Cantlay, after DeChambeau’s stop sign, made 95.5 feet worth of putts over 11 holes. And on the other side, DeChambeau missed important putts on 17, 18 and the first, second, third and sixth holes of the playoff. Coincidence? Sure. Cantlay admitted as much afterward. (DeChambeau, meanwhile, declined to speak to reporters.) “He just wanted me to stop walking,” he said. “We had just been told by the rules officials to kind of speed up, and I’m not always the fastest walker, so I was trying to get ahead and do my part. No big deal.”

Or was it? As good as Cantlay’s game is, his poker face might be better. And during the broadcast, two NBC analysts broke down the incident on 14. 

“You know, I’m surprised he called Patrick out like that,” said Paul Azinger, a former major champion. “I mean that could break your own concentration when you call a guy out.” 

“I completely agree with that take, Paul,” said Jim “Bones” Mackay, Phil Mickelson’s longtime caddie. 

“I think he could have just backed off,” Azinger said. 

Announcer Dan Hicks asked how often that happens. 

“Almost never,” Azinger said. “I think it might have broken Bryson’s concentration. Probably put a little chip on Cantlay’s shoulder.”

Adding to the theory, DeChambeau, on the next hole, thumped his drive 30 yards longer than Cantlay, grabbed his tee and took one longer-than-normal stride forward. 

“See how fired up Bryson was when he left that tee?” Hicks said.  

“These two guys, a grudge match,” Azinger said. “I love it. They’ll deny it when it’s over. But for Bryson to just call Patrick out like that it’s what makes this so compelling.” 

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It doesn’t happen often, but occasionally two of the 10 best players in the world turn an event into a two-horse race, where no one else in the field can keep pace. Add in a little passive-aggressive movement between a long drive and an even-longer driver and you’ve got an entertaining stage set. That’s exactly what we saw this week at the BMW Championship. An actual duel. 

“It’s a little reminiscent of the duel at the Open Championship at Royal Troon between Henrik Stenson and Phil Mickelson when they separated themselves,” NBC’s Dan Hicks said late in broadcast Sunday, as Patrick Cantlay and Bryson DeChambeau both elevated themselves to 27 under on the leaderboard, five clear of the field.

DeChambeau and Cantlay actually separated themselves earlier in the week, during the second round when DeChambeau’s near-59 pushed him into a tie with Cantlay. Like the boss level of any video game, DeChambeau continued to mash and bash his way around Caves Valley Golf Club often 30 yards ahead of his opponent, but somehow Cantlay stuck with him every step of the way. That clash of playing styles eventually turned into one of the best playoffs in PGA Tour history.

But pause for a second as DeChambeau stood over his ball in the 14th fairway.

DeChambeau spent most of the weekend ahead of Cantlay, on the holes they were playing, at least, and during the final round Cantlay apparently snuck up into the corner of his vision while he was standing over his shot. “Patrick, can you stop walking,” DeChambeau said. Whether that comment stirred something in the group or was an example of how testy things had become for the final pairing, it was the perfect side story to two players taking it ultra deep.

It took until the 71st hole of the championship and the 17th hole of the final round for it to seem like one might pull ahead. Already one shot back, despite being a preposterous 27 under, Cantlay left his approach into the downhill par-3 short and in the hazard when DeChambeau was dry, but off the green. Golf Twitter called the tournament then and there, but DeChambeau must have enjoyed the two-man stalemate too much.

DeChambeau had shown some cracks of his own with his short game early in the day and those issues arose again on 17 as he shorted his soft wedge from the rough and missed the ensuing par putt. On the broadcast, Paul Azinger boldly floated the idea of him having the “chip yips.” Cantlay pitched on from the drop area and made a scrambling bogey himself. No blood. 

Fast forward 15 minutes, and 72 holes was not enough, either. Cantlay buried a 21-footer on the 18th for a birdie to reach 27 under once again. With a shorter putt on a similar line, DeChambeau’s putt to win never came close. Off to a playoff they went, the fourth straight week of extra time on the PGA Tour. 

On the first playoff hole, a two-putt par from DeChambeau and an all-world up and down from Cantlay. On the second, DeChambeau missed a 6-footer to extend it further. On the third, DeChambeau’s 17-foot putt grabbed the left edge of the cup and refused to drop. “If it were a book, it’d be hard to put down,” David Feherty said of the match. He wasn’t wrong. 

Finally, on the fourth playoff hole, DeChambeau broke. He pulled that driver that has been so good to him all week long and sent his ball careening into the creek along the right side. Drop 2, hit 3 onto the green, two-putt bogey, right? Wrong! Cantlay made a rudimentary par as DeChambeau lofted a wedge and spun it back to four feet, where he of course made par to send them to yet another playoff hole. 

“This is crazy,” Roger Maltbie said. He could have been describing any part of the playoff, to be sure. But he was describing the two approach shots on the fifth playoff hole. DeChambeau hit a wedge to six feet. Cantlay stepped up and tossed his dart inside three feet. Both players, of course, made their birdies and headed to the sixth playoff hole. 

Playing the 18th hole for the fifth time Sunday — once in regulation and four times in sudden death — the golf played out exactly like the show we’ve been watching all day long: Cantlay made a long putt while DeChambeau missed a shorter one. Cantlay’s came from 17 feet while DeChambeau’s measured half as long. The man who gained 14 strokes on the greens alone this week was the champion. It had to end sometime. Everyone knew that. It was a helluva ride until then.

“Sports,” NBC’s Steve Sands said, signing off from the broadcast. “It’s the best.”

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The post 2021 BMW Championship purse: Payout information, winner’s share in Maryland appeared first on Golf.

The post 2021 BMW Championship purse: Payout information, winner’s share in Maryland appeared first on Golf.

We’ve reached the final round of play at the 2021 BMW Championship at Caves Valley Golf Club in Maryland. Below, find everything you need to know about tournament money, including payout information and purse.

2021 BMW Championship final round preview

If there were any doubts about the BMW Championship serving as the penultimate FedEx Cup Playoff event of the 2021 PGA Tour season, they were quickly erased by a leaderboard loaded with big names, and built to the exact specifications of the modern PGA Tour.

After his Friday 60, Bryson DeChambeau sits atop the field at 21 (!!!) under par. DeChambeau hasn’t just lived under par, he’s taken up residence here; utilizing the PGA Tour’s cookie-cutter weekend setup to plow his way to a tie for the lead. Bryson sits tied with Patrick Cantlay for the top spot after Saturday’s third-round 66.

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Now in addition to the high-drama of the FedEx Cup playoffs, there’s also some Ryder Cup math at work on Sunday. A win for Cantlay would secure the final auto-bid spot on the U.S. Ryder Cup team, while a loss would leave the final spot up for grabs between Tony Finau and Xander Schauffele. In the event Cantlay doesn’t come out on top, the higher-finisher between Finau and Schauffele will snag the final spot.

Below, find everything you need to know about the BMW’s $9.5 million purse; you can catch all the action on Sunday on NBC.

BMW Championship payout information, winner’s share

1. $1,710,000

2. $1,026,000

3. $646,000

4. $456,000

5. $380,000

6. $342,000

7. $318,250

8. $294,500

9. $275,500

10. $256,500

11. $237,500

12. $218,500

13. $199,500

14. $180,500

15. $171,000

16. $161,500

17. $152,000

18. $142,500

19. $133,000

20. $123,500

21. $114,000

22. $106,400

23. $98,800

24. $91,200

25. $83,600

26. $76,000

27. $73,150

28. $70,300

29. $67,450

30. $64,600

31. $61,750

32. $58,900

33. $56,050

34. $53,675

35. $51,300

36. $48,925

37. $46,550

38. $44,650

39. $42,750

40. $40,850

41. $38,950

42. $37,050

43. $35,150

44. $33,250

45. $31,350

46. $29,450

47. $27,550

48. $26,030

49. $24,700

50. $23,940

51. $23,370

52. $22,800

53. $22,420

54. $22,040

55. $21,850

56. $21,660

57. $21,470

58. $21,280

59. $21,090

60. $20,900

61. $20,710

62. $20,520

63. $20,330

64. $20,140

65. $19,950

66. $19,760

67. $19,570

68. $19,380

69. $19,190

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