Weekend Wrap - Holiday Hangover Edition

Late to the keyboard, insufficient caffeine in my bloodstream and already on the clock.... What could go wrong?

Colonial Daze - Must have been quite the finish, but I saw exactly none of it.  Given that it's already Tuesday, I'll allow Dylan Dethier the honors from his Monday Finish column, first with the back story:

Grillo’s watery wait.

In October 2015, 23-year-old Argentine Emiliano Grillo played his first event as a PGA Tour member, the Frys.com Open.

He won.

You can only imagine what he thought at that point. Surely such a speedy first win meant more would soon follow, one after another, pouring out like Fernet con Coca at an evening barbecue.

Grillo had some close calls in the years that followed. He finished T2 at the Barclays in 2016. In 2018 he finished second at the CIMB Classic and third twice (both in Texas: the Fort Worth Invitational and the Houston Open). Last summer he got close again, finishing T2 twice in three starts in near-misses at the John Deere Classic and 3M Open.

Being a non-designated event was always going to have a surreal aspect, but I didn't have this on my bingo card:

How agonizing it must have been, then, for Grillo to carry a two-shot lead to the 18th tee on Sunday at the Charles Schwab Challenge only to extend his wait even longer. In what was one of the strangest sights we can remember seeing in a sport defined by them, Grillo blocked his tee shot out to the right only to find his ball had rolled into a cement drain, where a shallow stream of water carried it little by little in the wrong direction. He’d waited eight years to get back to the winner’s circle. Now he waited another eight minutes as the ball just refused to stop floating; there’s no doubt he was processing the implosion-in-progress in real time.

I've long said that the most exciting thing in our game is seeing what a ball does after contact with the ground, though not completely sure this qualifies....

Grillo eventually took a drop on some cement and went on to make double bogey to post a clubhouse lead of eight under par. Then came more waiting as Adam Schenk — also at eight under — played the 18th.

My defining prediction of the LIV mess was that it would cause us to hate them all.  I have a carve-out:

.@GrilloEmiliano invited two young fans to hit some shots during his playoff prep 🥰 @CSChallengeFW pic.twitter.com/3PTl4V1YoD

— Golf on CBS ⛳ (@GolfonCBS) May 28, 2023

He explains:

Grillo retreated to the practice tee. And here came what looked to the outside world like a moment of goodwill but something he called his “trick”: he invited a couple youngsters out to hit balls with him.

“I guess it was a little bit of a trick to get my head out of the situation,” he said. “José Cóceres did it with me when I was 7, 8 years old, and that was the greatest experience of all, just watching him and hitting his clubs. I kind of got to do it with them, and hopefully they’ll remember that.

I guess some would consider that a =n admission against interest, but it bothers me not at all.  The beauty in it is his "hope" that the kids will remember it, but it's that connective tissue back to Jose Cóceres that I love so much.  He still treasures that experience, and he repaid it in kind.  I'm guessing the kids will not only remember it, but also use it to pass on when they are in a position to do so.  Good stuff.

Just before we move on, Dylan typically finishes his feature with a look towards the week ahead, including this bit of new vernacular:

1. Designated Szn returns.

This week’s Memorial kicks off a run of three Dezzies in four weeks; the RBC Canadian Open comes next week before the U.S. Open and the Travelers. Rory McIlroy headlines the group expected to play all four events and most top Tour pros will play at least three. This is the heart of the jam-packed summer season. Drink it in!

Dezzies?  Just when you thought our language couldn't be further degraded....  

Your Fifteen Minutes Are Up -We knew Michael Block would crash and burn, but his descent from hero to zero has established a new land speed record.  That the Tour Confidential panel devoted two questions to him will puzzle future generations:

The world’s favorite club pro, Michael Block, was the talk of the PGA Championship, but he didn’t fare as well this past week, when he received a sponsor’s exemption into the

Charles Schwab Challenge and finished in last place (81-74). Are you surprised he struggled as much as he did? And how much blame could be put on mental fatigue after a taxing 10 or so days?

Josh Sens: Anything other than a letdown would have been surprising, given the altitude he’d been flying at. Block is obviously a fine player, but something cosmic was at work at Oak Hill last week. The beauty of it was that he recognized it as it was happening. He knew how rare it was, and that it wasn’t likely to repeat.

Jessica Marksbury: Not surprised. We know that major weeks are a grind like no other for the guys in contention, and Block arguably received more attention than the winner, Brooks Koepka. He earned it, but it takes a while to adjust to that kind of constant adulation. The brain drain must be immense. I’m glad he bounced back with a more respectable second round at Colonial, and I expect we’ll see a much more refreshed — and prepared — Block at the upcoming RBC Canadian Open.

Sean Zak: The 81 was pretty stunning, but life and golf comes at you fast. Block didn’t do himself any favors playing just one practice round and doing dozens of interviews in the lead up. But I also don’t blame him. Every second since we’ve gotten to know him he has acknowledged that he knew this would be the best time of his golfing life. So why not do exactly what you want to do?

Did they not know he's a club pro?   

Block also caught some criticism for comments he said on Bob Menery’s podcast. “What I would shoot from where Rory hits it would be stupid,” he said. “I think I’d be one of the

best players in the world. Hands down. … My iron game, wedge game, around the greens and my putting is world class.” Was it fair to catch heat for this one?

Sens: Ha. Yeah. And if were 7-foot-4, I’d rule the paint. Sure, the comment came off as a bit tone-deaf, but even as he was being hailed as a man of the people last week, you could tell Block had some jock swagger to him. And that’s how jocks talk. More power to him for being confident in himself. If I were a buddy of his, I’d give him grief over beers about his cockiness. That’s what’s called for. A friendly ribbing. Not any kind of harsh rebuke.

Marksbury: It was a little off-putting, especially because the golf world initially embraced him for his charming humility and everyman-relatability. This arrogance of this comment is pretty extreme. But I’m inclined to agree with Josh, and give him a pass. He was clearly riding high off the PGA performance, and found it hard to suppress those alpha vibes.

Zak: I don’t care at all. Why? Because what golfer has ever played the best golf of their life and not gotten a little over-confident? You and me included! Unlike most people, I listened to the entire 30-minute interview, in which Menery did as many radio hosts do: he coaxed some cockiness out of Block. And it resulted in 30 seconds shared ‘round the world. The other 29:30 show Block as we always knew him: gracious, humble, etc.

It was hubristic and completely fair for him to draw heat for it.  What's more curious, though, is that the heat lingered for so long.... Though for all that heat, hasn't the lede been buried.  Of course he's crazy about his assessment of his own short-game skills, but what might this comment tell us about Rory's short-game skills?   

The NCAAs, Patriarchy Division - We have a champion, and said champion has a dilemma:

Fred Biondi hoped he would have a decision to make Monday afternoon. One that would have major implications for his future.

Would he turn professional, which had been his plan all along, or would he remain an amateur for nearly another year.

The caveat? A Masters invitation on the line that would require him to stay an amateur until the 2024 event.

Well, Biondi now has that decision to make.

The senior at Florida came from five shots behind in the final round of stroke play Monday at the 2023 NCAA Men’s Golf Championship to win the individual title. Biondi shot 3-under 67 at Grayhawk Golf Club’s Raptor Course, surpassing Georgia Tech senior Ross Steelman late after the latter bogeyed his final three holes in a closing 3-over 73.

If you watch any of the men's NCAAs, you'll hear talk of PGA Tour U, an attempt to reward the kids for staying in school:

When Florida senior Fred Biondi rolled in his final putt to secure the NCAA Division I Men’s Golf Championship on Monday, Georgia Tech’s Ross Steelman stood in the shade of a video board and sportingly clapped for the winner. Inside, Steelman must have been feeling a heavy churn of emotions. Yes, he’d lost the individual title to a golfer who trailed him by five shots at the beginning of the round at Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Ariz. But in many ways, Steelman had truly climbed to a higher peak.

With his tie for second, the Missouri native jumped from No. 6 to No. 4 in the PGA Tour University rankings, and that could have an enormous impact in the early stages of his professional career.

Texas Tech’s Ludvig Aberg already had the PGA Tour U title wrapped up before the NCAAs began, and he officially finished atop the final rankings on Monday night. With the accomplishment, the Swede becomes the first PGA Tour U No. 1 to earn fully exempt status on the PGA Tour, beginning this year and extending through the 2024 season. The Nos. 2 through 5 finishers get some very nice perks themselves. They earned fully exempt Korn Ferry Tour membership for 2023, as well as an exemption to Final Stage of 2023 PGA Tour Q School. They also can accept unlimited PGA Tour sponsor exemptions for the remainder of 2023 all of 2024.

There's some history here that we haven't the time to review, but prior Tour policies, most notably the elimination of Q-School, forced the kids to turn professional earlier.  I haven't seen enough to judge its effectiveness, but the intention seems to be to allow the kids to finish the school year.  Will it allow them to put off the payday long enough for the U.S. Amateur in August?  That still seems a stretch... 

Hello World!, The Sequel - Let me see if I have the plot right.  A talented youngster matriculates at Stanford, dominates the college/amateur game for two years, then decides to move up a weight class.  This movie is at least seventeen years old:

Rose Zhang has penned one of the most storied amateur golf careers of all time. Now, she’s taking her talents to the next level.

Zhang announced Friday on Instagram she will forgo her final two years of college eligibility to turn professional. She’ll make her pro debut at the Mizuho Americas Open next week at Liberty National.

The 20-year-old turns pro after one of the most successful amateur careers in the history of the game. In her two years at Stanford, Zhang won 12 tournaments — breaking the Cardinal record previously held by Tiger Woods, Maverick McNealy and Patrick Rodgers — including back-to-back NCAA individual titles. She also won the U.S. Girls Junior, the U.S. Women’s Amateur and the Augusta National Women’s Amateur.

Like Tiger, she's won both the Amateur and the Junior.  Unlike Tiger, she won them in the "wrong" order,  which your humble blogger finds delightfully amusing.  

The girl will most certainly be busy this summer:

Zhang will have a busy summer ahead as she wades her way into professional golf. In addition to her start at Liberty National, Zhang will also play in the four remaining major championships (U.S. Women’s Open, KPMG Women’s PGA, Evian, AIG Women’s Open), the Dana Open, the Canadian Open and the Queen City Championship.

I have little doubt that she'll be a top player out there, just curious as to whether there will be an adjustment period.

That TC panel had this on Rose's college career:

Stanford sophomore Rose Zhang won her second straight NCAA DI Women’s Individual Championship — becoming the first woman to win multiple DI golf titles — and picked up her 12th career win in the process, breaking the school record held by Tiger Woods, Maverick McNealy and Patrick Rodgers. (Zhang has played two seasons to their three.) Now she’s set to make her pro debut at this week’s Mizuho Americas Open. While we won’t ask you to predict her future on the LPGA, we will ask you this: Where does she rank among the best collegiate golfers ever?

Sens: Where her achievement ranks, I’m not sure. But it’s the most dominant run by a college player I can think of since Ryan Moore won pretty much everything on the amateur circuit in 2004. It will be interesting to see whether she can carry over that success to professional events. Look at the names listed in the question: collegiate dominance is clearly no guarantee.

Marksbury: Remarkable. Incredible. Unprecedented in the women’s game! I can’t name someone to top her. Zhang deserves all the accolades. No doubt she’s turning pro because she ran out of things to accomplish in college. As Josh pointed out, amateur dominance doesn’t automatically translate to professional success, but something tells me that Zhang will have some serious staying power on the LPGA circuit, and it will be fun to watch.

Zak: She’s probably top 5 best college players ever? Every decade or so we see a player win 10 or more times in college, but Zhang has a major trump card with those two NCAA titles. Her career falls short of Phil Mickelson’s at ASU — 16 wins, three NCAAs — but if she hung around for another year she probably would have matched him.

Nobody will confuse me for a Phil sycophant, but if you're pimping his collegiate career, wouldn't winning a PGA Tour event while a collegiate golfer be worth noting?  

I was initially surprised that she made the announcement while the NCAA men have the stage.  But she's in the LPGA field this week, so she may simply have not had a window to announce without stealing some of the guy's thunder.

Harshing Their Mellow - Heady days for those nice folks at LIV, basking in the reflected aura of Brooksie's win at the PGA (including, as at Augusta, a total of three in the top ten).  Which would be great, though the part was broken up by the need to haul ass to D.C. to continue to grow the game.  Are these guys selfless, or what.

So, are they putting on a good show?  Full confession?  I'm drafting this early Sunday morning due to a jammed early week schedule and making no promises that I'll circle back to edit.  But if this second round leaderboard doesn't grow the game, what will?

I'm not in the least saying that the Colonial leaderboard is any better, it's just a comparison of the worst of the PGA Tour with the same-old every week LIV.  Brooksie is T16, credible coming off last week's high, and thankfully ensuring that he'll finish as low Koepka (though that category is a pretty strong tell about the depth of the LIV field).

UPDATE: Who coulda seen Mito Pereira giving up a final round lead (I kid), but HV III won the event.  Given that he won that event in Saudi, he's become quite the Wahabi darling, which I find quite amusing because.... well, you can finish that thought as easily as I can.

I'll just add that my favorite part of the LIV leaderboards are that they give us the tee times for the final round.  

UPDATE II:  This is from Dylan's column, but how does this work?

And in the LIV event, four WDs (including from Thomas Pieters, Matthew Wolff and Jason Kokrak mid-tournament) forced the three reserve players into action and even left Smash GC competing with just three golfers in the final round.

Really?  Wouldn't you be pissed if you paid a billion dollars for Smash GC and found you only have three players? 

So, remember that great playoff that DJ won.  Yanno, the one that had us citing trees falling in the forest, because the CW had cut off the broadcast.  It turns out that LIV has an app for that:

LIV Golf is headed back to YouTube.

Less than six months after signing a media rights agreement with the CW, LIV announced Friday that it has created a new, pay-per-view broadcast option to run on YouTube. The PPV broadcast will cost $3 per tournament day, LIV said in a release announcing the decision, and will run in addition to the league’s agreement with the CW.

A LIV source indicated that the CW is aware of the decision to introduce a pay-per-view model, and that the decision does not violate any of the league’s preexisting broadcast agreements. The hope for LIV is to grow off the success first seen on YouTube in 2022, where the league attracted tournament audiences of several hundred-thousand views in the U.S. and abroad. The league already has its own direct-to-consumer subscription platform, LIV Golf Plus, which the PPV channel will run counter to. LIV broadcasts will continue to be streamed for free on the CW app.

LIV channels its inner CNN+?  What could go wrong?

CNN+ was launched with a business plan that projected that 16 million (OK, I made up that number, but it was something crazy high like that) would pay them for their product, when they couldn't get one million folks to tune in for free.

Because I've been reliably informed that everything is going swimmingly:

The announcement comes on the heels of a rocky few weeks for the Saudi-backed upstarts and their first-time sports broadcast counterparts. At LIV’s last event in Tulsa, CW affiliates in many major markets dropped the league’s broadcast minutes before a three-way playoff featuring Cam Smith and Dustin Johnson began; opting instead for Sunday evening news shows or sitcom reruns. That decision came after weeks of radio silence from the CW or LIV about the league’s broadcast ratings, which had dipped some 24 percent from the season-opening broadcast in Mayakoba to the second tournament in Tucson before the two parties stopped reporting.

Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln....

Eamon Lynch has a typically scathing piece up, one whose predictability doesn't diminish the enjoyment:

Lynch: Brooks Koepka's major victory is being hijacked by hangers-on

 Who ya gonna skewer first, Eamon:

If Koepka was uninterested in using his PGA Championship victory as a platform for point

scoring, there was no shortage of scavengers eager to do so in his stead.

His swing instructor, Claude Harmon III, was first out of the blocks, exploiting the moment to air his grievances about those in media (chiefly Brandel Chamblee, with a drive-by caress of yours truly) whose criticisms of LIV Golf are at odds with his avaricious burrowing into the Saudi trough. Harmon has been an occasional friend for 20 years, but even his pals know he’s peerless in marketing himself on the accomplishments of others, a skill honed from the cradle. His attack featured all the whataboutery you’d expect from one more apt to flatter royalty than to inquire after those they torture. (In CH3’s defense, no one should be subjected to a Chamblee reply that is ungoverned by Twitter character limits).

I might have a thing or two more to say about Calude's rant, but what else ya got, E?

Alert to any opportunity to remind his Saudi overlords that he’s a loyal supplicant, Phil Mickelson leapt on the Brooks bandwagon and sought to portray the win not as proof of Koepka’s brilliance but as evidence of the superiority of the circuit he helped engineer. “Love LIV or hate it, it’s the best way/Tour to be your best in the majors,” he tweeted. “Enough events to keep you sharp, fresh and ready, yet not be worn down from too many tournaments or obligations. 14 LIV events, 34 weeks left open to prepare for the 4 majors. Fact.”

That Mickelson cannot distinguish between statements of fact and opinion comes as no shock since he has long since blurred the line between fact and fiction too.

I know, hard to post much of a score when the degree of difficulty is so low.....

I thought Koepka himself had it about right, and Eamon connects another dot:

“I definitely think it helps LIV, but I’m more interested in my own self right now,” he went on. “It’s a huge thing for LIV, but at the same time I’m out here competing as an individual at the PGA Championship.”

Koepka makes a poor patsy for LIV’s lickspittles. He was openly dismissive of regular PGA Tour events so the notion that he’s invested in 54-hole shotgun starts against the Andy Ogletrees of the world is fanciful. He was not a plaintiff in the Saudi-funded litigation, has chosen not to badmouth the tour he left, and has not been a particularly enthusiastic propagandist for the tour he joined. He gives the impression of a man checking the boxes required of him, nothing more.

I'm sure this will be a riveting episode of Full Swing II.

In that Monday Finish column, Dylan has a long bit on the Tweetstorm involving Phil, Brandel Chamblee and Eamon Lynch.  I'll just excerpt this opener:

PHIL LOGS ON

Lefty tweets.

Phil Mickelson had taken a break from Twitter for a while. Now? Not so much. In the past week alone Mickelson has used Twitter to sing LIV’s praises for major prep, dished on getting kicked out of CBS’s fantasy football league, came at Brandel Chamblee (several times), quoted John McEnroe, sold some gummies, blocked (and was blocked?) by Chamblee, complimented a youngster’s golf swing, offered to debate Chamblee (just not on Golf Channel), bragged about his driving distance and threw in a little shade at Eamon Lynch. One thing we know for sure: Mickelson’s paying attention!

He's got the tweets, so I'll not bother to embed them.  I find that Phil assertion that LIV is better major prep to be comically inane, given that their basic assertion is that they should be free to play wherever they choose.   Apparently, this assertion of the sanctity of free will only goes so far, because LIV requires their attendance everywhere, so were you not inclined to play the week before a major, go pound sand.

Claude Harmon's dyspeptic rant caught Brendan Porath's eye as well, and he went to the trouble to list all those that might not take well to it:

1. Brooks Koepka—The now five-time major champ is one of the LIV defectors who has made efforts not to get in squabbles with his PGA Tour contemporaries. It seems he’s largely been accepted, like DJ, and avoided using anything he does, like winning a major, as a way to win points in the LIV-PGA Tour battle. So I can’t imagine he’s thrilled with this becoming a dominant story after his win, because the headlines identify Harmon as “Brooks Koepka’s coach” before they do by the instructor’s name.

2. NBC—For obvious reasons, as they were a primary target of some of Harmon’s most incendiary accusations. As someone who likes to be on TV, Harmon’s napalming of at least one big media bridge and any prospects of working with the network seems to be an especially big unforced error.

3. Brandel Chamblee and Eamon Lynch—Whatever you think of them, Chamblee and Lynch are two voices in the game with some degree of prominence that Harmon has now chosen to make into enemies.

4. LIV Golf!—While the disruptor league and its associates may have quietly cheered on the screed, LIV has done better this year by taking a much more low-key, less directly confrontational approach in its battle with the PGA Tour. After some confusion about a snippy comment about Jay Monahan in Australia, a LIV spokesperson told Sports Illustrated that, “We are trying to avoid that kind of hostility in our press conferences.” Harmon took the opposite approach here, and anytime someone goes off like this on behalf of the league, it tends to have a counterproductive impact and put LIV under a microscope. So I’m not sure even LIV loved this becoming a high-profile story.

5. Will Zalatoris—Wow, what a drive-by by Claude on the injured Zalatoris! Harmon created unnecessary beef, but as a rip job that you didn’t see coming, it was entertaining. He also threw Max Homa into this crowned start bucket.

6. Tom Watson—Have we not dragged the old man enough for his blundering 2014 Ryder Cup captaincy? Maybe not! Because this was a new one, as Harmon told an appreciated behind-the-scenes story of Watson asking Brooks where he was a club pro at during an encounter at the 2014 PGA at Valhalla. Koepka was not yet Koepka, but he was far from an obscure club pro—Brooks had finished tied for fourth at the U.S. Open just two months earlier! This is the good stuff but Mr. Watson probably does not appreciate Harmon bringing this to light at this juncture.

Does anyone know where the Witness Protection Program is hiding Greg Norman?  Because the next place we see him will likely be on a milk carton...

That's it for today, kids.  Thanks for bearing with the schedule, but I'll see you next on Thursday. 

Thursday Threads - Phoning It In Edition

OK, having trouble summoning enthusiasm.... You've been warned.

Arnie Smiles - The brilliance of the format for the NCAA Golf Championships is that it's two tourneys in one.  We had the first bit on Tuesday when Rose Zhang defended her individual championship, but match play is a different animal entirely:

Wake Forest has a renowned golf pedigree, its foundation provided by the inimitable Arnold Palmer and reinforced through the years by Lanny Wadkins and Curtis Strange, among others, as well as

three NCAA men’s team championships. This time, the Demon Deacon women made their own remarkable contribution to Wake’s golf legacy.

The Wake Forest women’s team won its first NCAA Championship on Wednesday, defeating the University of Southern California, 3-1, at Grayhawk Golf Club in Scottsdale, Ariz.

“It’s easy when you have a team like this,” a euphoric Wake coach Kim Lewellen said. “They get along so well. They practice so hard and they’re veterans. They’ve been in this type of position before and they pulled it off. It was unbelievable to watch how they kept their grit and kept their foot on the pedal and got it done.

Since we're talking about the girls, I'd have added Jennifer Kupcho to that list.... Good fun and now they turn Grayhawk over to the men, though with an interesting twist.  You'll have grasped that this event has been scheduled to maximize its exposure, meaning providing weekday content for Golf Channel on Monday through Wednesday, when the professional game goes quiet.

Accordingly, the 72-hole stroke play event is conducted from Friday through Monday, hopefully coming to a rousing conclusion in that Monday evening TV window.  But one team will begin play on Thursday by playing their third round before they or anyone else play the first round.  Got it?  Does it help if I add that the team in question is BYU?

It’s fairly simple. For the fourth time since they first did it in 2018 in central Oklahoma, the Cougars will begin play on Thursday, a day ahead of the other 29 teams.

That’s because the third round of the stroke-play portion of the event is on Sunday, and the school sponsored by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints does not compete on Sundays, for religious reasons.

After the other teams conclude their third rounds on Sunday at Grayhawk Golf Club, while BYU is relaxing at the hotel, attending church, etc., the Cougars’ Thursday score will be added in. The field will then be cut to 15 teams for Monday’s final round of stroke play, after which an individual champion will be crowned.

Would they do the same if a team from the Yeshiva qualified?

It's a bit of a set-up nightmare, as I assume they'll need to have the course in similar condition and use the same pins as planned for that third round.  I'd be out there scouting if I were in the event, assuming that would be allowed.  I further assume that they've made arrangements to have similar weather....  Get's a little dicey there, doesn't it?

But team match play rocks, so give it a watch if you're so inclined.

Who Are You And What Have You Done With Sergio? - There are few professional golfers that have made greater contributions to this blog than Sergio Garcia.  Whether it's spitting into the cup ("Nothing but net"), defacing greens in Saudi Arabia or melting down in bunkers, he's the gift that keeps on giving....

I will just remind of this exchange, which could be the perfect synecdoche for LIV:

A week ago, it was widley reported that the Spaniard had told his Northern Irish friend that they were now “finally getting paid what we deserve,” a comment that received the reply, “Sergio. We’re golfers. We don’t deserve to be paid anything.”

That's the entitled brat that we've come to know.  But what's the antithesis of entitlement?  There could be any number of answers, but I would posit that U.S. Open qualifying, with it's brutal 36-hole sectionals, is as good an answer as any.  So, imagine my surprise:

Sergio Garcia, who didn’t qualify for last week’s PGA Championship, assured himself of a spot

in the next major on the 2023 calendar after advancing through a final qualifying stage Monday in Dallas.

There were 120 golfers vying for eight spots at Northwood Club and Bent Tree Country Club. Garcia finished the 36-hole qualifier at 9 under, tie for fourth, capping his day with a birdie on his final hole.

Garcia was among close to 20 LIV golfers entered in qualifiers aiming to make the 156-man field at Los Angeles Country Club.

Leopard, spots!

Apparently, he was even grinding:

From Scott Harrington, who played with Sergio yesterday when he grinded through the 36-hole sectional qualifier to make the U.S. Open. Pretty cool to see a pro who’s been around so long so impressed by one of his peers. pic.twitter.com/0o2UIqNHXZ

— Dan Rapaport (@Daniel_Rapaport) May 23, 2023

 Fist pumps and everything.....  Good for him, now about that expectoration....

Harmon v. Chamblee - Claude Harmon has seemingly been sufficiently successful on his own to have dealt with his Daddy issues, though his epic rant after Brooksie's win is quite the piece of work.  Shall we sample?

First he tells us where he stands on the threshold issue of the day:

“I want LIV to succeed and I want LIV to work because I am pro-professional athlete,” he said. “I don’t think Rory McIlroy should go anywhere in the world without somebody paying him, including Memphis and Memorial. That’s how good he is. Jon Rahm, Scottie Scheffler, if you’re in that category, you shouldn’t be going anywhere without being paid because it’s how good you are.”

Did all these straw men have to die, Claude?  Was Rory not paid previously?   He and Sergio would probably see eye-to-eye on this, no?

What they intentionally ignore is golf's bifurcated compensation structure.  He brings up Lamar Jackson later in the piece, ignoring that Lamar is not allowed to sell his uniform and be paid for the football he tosses.  This whole debate is over the smaller portion of their compensation, and apparently believing that they should actually earn their riches is beyond the pale.

But then Claude gets personal, and does so in the context of a pretty transparent case of whataboutism:

Harmon saved some of his spiciest takes for the media — of which he also is a member having worked over the years for Sky Sports and as well as hosting his own podcast, “Son of a Butch,” including this on Brandel Chamblee and Golfweek’s own Eamon Lynch.

“Brandel is a paid actor by NBC and Golf Channel. All he’s trying to do is get his lines and shows for the Golf Channel. He’s just trying to get lines for Brandel … And I mean, I love him, I think Eamon is a fantastic writer, but for Eamon Lynch and Brandel Chamblee, who worked for NBC Golf Channel to utter the words ‘sports washing’ when the company they work for televised the last two Winter Olympics in Russia and China with the same leaders that they’ve had. It’s not like they were good leaders back then. It’s not like Putin was a good guy, right?”

We had a similar example of this from Alan Shipnuck, whereby any alleged sin of any country becomes a pretext for nullifying criticism of Saudi Arabia.  Of course, that Saudi citizen that opposes his government will have a Sunday date with the public executioner.

But the other aspect he elides is, like the Euro Tour holding an event in the Kingdom, it's whole other deal to cede control of the game to the Wahabis..... 

He's certainly got some ammunition in this fight:

“You guys all think LIVs, maybe you’ve changed your tune, but initially, it was all just bullshit, a bunch of guys playing who didn’t care, who got the money, who got the bag, and it’s 54 holes and there’s no competition and all that. So it was easy for you guys to just pretend like these guys just weren’t good players anymore. And I think you guys largely did that because you drank the Kool-Aid of everybody else. But how you guys all thought that these guys just weren’t going to show up and be great players is beyond me. I think it is an interesting Jedi mind trick that they played on you guys and you guys fell for it. Because you guys were all, ‘These guys were all washed up. They took the bag. They’re insignificant. They play against no competition.’ And that’s just not the case.

Fair enough, Claude, but did you happen to watch Full Swing?  All of your strong points are undermined by your client, who only took the money because his knee was so beat up he didn't think he could back to this kind of level.

You read this and scratch your head:

“In 2023, we still want golf to be this bullshit Truman Show. We want this Deane Beman-Tim Finchem we’re not the NBA or NFL for our sponsors. There’s no transparency, nobody has any issues, nobody has any problems and if they do, we’re not going to talk about it, we’re going to pretend it doesn’t exist. It’s the Truman Show. It’s Leave it to Beaver. And that’s not the reality.

“There couldn’t be anyone that got more grief for doing the LIV thing than Brooks. He got a big dose of the anti-LIV hate. And he got a big dose of ‘he’s a bum, he’s washed up.’

See above.  The guy that thought Brooks was washed up was Brooks himself... Deal with it.

But the shark has been jumped:

“The good thing I think all of this is showing is, it’s just golf. You can be a racecar driver for NASCAR or you can be a racecar driver for F1. You’re still a race car driver. Nobody in NASCAR, nobody in F1 is asking you to choose between the two. For some reason, Jay and the guys in Ponte Vedra and a segment of you guys in media want the fans to choose between LIV and the PGA Tour, and you don’t have to. Because everywhere Phil goes, fans want his autograph. The Golf Channel tried to make out like he was literally Josef Mengele. In London, fans couldn’t wait to watch him and get his autograph. Here, they can’t wait to get his autograph. He’s a golfer. That’s all this is. I know Denny Hamlin, and he’s a NASCAR driver and I’ve helped him with his golf. And I’ve been to a race, I’ve been in his bus and everything. And I’ve helped Carlos Sainz with his golf and I’m an F1 guy. I don’t watch NASCAR, it doesn’t mean that it’s not cool. I just don’t watch it.

Dear readers, are you familiar with Godwin's Law?  This is known in the trade as a reductio ad Hitlerum, also known as playing the Nazi card.  

But, Claude, you know who else trashed LIV?  

“They’ll get their guys. Somebody will sell out and go to it.”

Who was that ogre classifying anyone that went to LIV as a sell-out?  Yes, that would be the same Brooks Koepka.... Isn't it funny what happens when the check clears?  All we can assume is that Claude got his....

Given that these folks wanted to go away, is it to much to ask that they actually do just go away?

I shall leave you there for today.  I will probably not be able to blog tomorrow morning, so prepare yourself for the eventuality that we might not see each other until Tuesday.  I know, it will be hard on me as well, but enjoy your holiday weekend.

Tuesday Tastings - Name Of The Rose Edition

I'm having to push myself to blog this morning, but golf will again intrude tomorrow....  we'll begin today with actual golf news, but then sort through our PGA Championship leftovers....

Zhang Dang Doodle - Yeah, I'm not so happy with that header myself, but I've already burned through every pun I know involving a rose.  But the girl is good at this golf thing:

Queen of college golf: Rose Zhang captures 2023 NCAA individual title, first woman to win back-to-back NCAA championships

Stay tuned, because this girl will be doing many things for the first time in women's golf:

Zhang won the NCAA individual title for the second straight year, becoming the first woman to do so. She shot a bogey-free 4-under 68 on Monday, finishing at 10 under and beating USC’s Catherine

Park and San Jose State’s Lucia Lopez-Ortega by one shot. The victory was also a crowning achievement on an incredible season that saw Zhang win eight times, tying Lorena Ochoa’s single-season NCAA record for victories, and set a new record for lowest scoring average in a single season, coming in at 68.81, besting her 69.68 record from last season.

“I still don’t know what is going on,” Zhang said. “And it’s really hard to process because when you’re chasing from behind, you really don’t know what’s happening.

“I genuinely just… I can’t believe this is all happening. It’s just simple to say I’m super grateful.”

She's just that much better than the other girls, so even a couple behind she seemed in control of things.

In addition to her eight victory of the season, it’s also the 12th of her career, the most of any Stanford golfer in school history. Tiger Woods, Maverick McNealy and Patrick Rodgers each had 11 on the men’s side.

She also helped the Cardinal secure the top overall seed in match play, which begins Tuesday. Stanford will first face No. 8-seed Pepperdine with a chance to win its second consecutive team title.

Until twelve months ago, that top seed was the kiss of death.  But then this very Stanford team ran the table, and I'd be reluctant to bet against them this year as well.

This is one of my favorite events of the year, with the fun stuff, team match play, starting today.  The shame is that it comes immediately on the heels of the PGA, when one tends to be golfed out already.  But I recommend it highly, as the format rocks and watching them carry their bags and tend the pin for each other is delightfully retro, at least to this observer.

My constant whining about open browser tabs might hvae gotten old, but here's an example of one open for more than a month that we'll make useful:

Hello, World: the Sequel

Almost three decades after the Masters debut of another Stanford 19-year-old, Rose Zhang introduced herself with a gutty win at the ANWA

For anyone unfamiliar with Michael Bamberger's 1996 reference, the photo will connect those dots:

 Although Mike's lede requires a spit-take warning?

Over the years, the Masters, bless her green soul, has introduced scores of interesting golf figures to the world—major and minor and in between. Arnold Palmer and Ken Venturi and Jim Nantz. Carl Jackson. Alister MacKenzie. Ed Sneed. Hideki Matsuyama. Hideki’s caddie. Tiger. Hootie. Earl. Jennifer Kupcho. Maria Fassi. Rose Zhang.

Ed Sneed?   Worth keeping the tab open just for that.... Yanno how you always hear about how only two players won a Masters in their first attempt?  Well, one of those is Horton Smith, who one the first Masters Augusta National Invitational.  The second is Fuzzy Zoeller, and Ed Sneed is the reason he's on this list.  Sneed was three up with three to play and, as you can guess, mentioning him in the same piece as Rose is quite the curious editorial choice....

I'm not even going to excerpt from it, as you can peruse it at your leisure.  Or not.

But I have closed that browser tab, and isn't that what's most important in such things?

Phil in Phull - he made the cut on a difficulty driving course at age 52, so he's still got some game.  Damn him for that!  But, curious times for sure, as this bit off the 18th green on Sunday shows his inability to read a room:

When speaking to reporters from the Oak Hill Country Club in Rochester, New York, where the

six-time major winner finished tied for 58th at 10 over after Sunday’s final round, Mickelson was pressed about his former PGA Tour, which he has continuously jabbed on social media following his defection to the rival LIV Golf last year.

“I guess it’s because I know some things that others don’t,” Mickelson said, according to ESPN.

“I just want to make sure everybody’s held accountable.”

Win-win, baby!  Couldn't agree more that everyone should be held accountable, so in that spirit of agreement I'd like to offer a selective list:

1.  MBS for the murder and dismemberment of Jamal Kashoggi;
2. Saudi Arabia for those 81 public beheadings last year;
3. Anyone with unpaid gambling debts;
4. Those using insider information to profit in the stock market
5. Anyone who doesn't pay their caddie in full.

I'm sure I could come up with more, but you'll have discerned that Phil's desire for accountability has certain obvious limitations....

Of course, my favorite times are when they say the quiet bits out loud:

Furthermore, Mickelson was asked by reporters what he felt the biggest accomplishment of LIV is so far.

Pulling no punches, the 52-year-old, six-time major winner said: 'It's provided 48 new professional golf opportunities at the highest pay, which is incredible.'

Phil, don't think you were supposed to admit that it was all about the money, not that we hadn't guessed.

But something quite weird happened Sunday, and it seems that no one wants to acknowledge it.  Here were the early morning pairings:

7:50 a.m. — Ben Taylor, Mark Hubbard

8 a.m. — Joel Dahmen, Kazuki Higa

8:10 a.m. — Taylor Montgomery, Taylor Moore

8:20 a.m. — Phil Mickelson, Justin Thomas

8:30 a.m. — Rikuya Hoshino, Lee Hodges

8:40 a.m. — Sihwan Kim, Zach Johnson

8:50 a.m. — Padraig Harrington, Matt Wallace

Any of those jump out at you?  That 8:20 group catches my eye, because I can't quite remember who is looping for JT these days....  Didn't he used to work for another player?

But the weird part is that there seems to be a press blackout on this grouping, as not a single report on the event seems to even acknowledge this highly awkward pairing.  Although Googling the names did remind your humble blogger that this wasn't the first time they've seen each other since the split:

When Justin Thomas needed an emergency fill-in caddie on Tuesday, he called Jim "Bones" Mackay, one of the best to ever carry a bag on the PGA Tour.

Thomas could have never imagined the circumstances in Sunday's final round of the WGC-FedEx St. Jude Invitational, when he was paired in the third-to-last group with Phil Mickelson, who was Mackay's boss for 25 years, when they worked together to win 42 times, including five majors.

Thomas came from four shots back to win for the third time this season, shooting a 5-under 65 to beat Brooks Koepka, Daniel Berger, Tom Lewis and Mickelson by three shots at TPC Southwind.

That was way back in 2020, before Bones' ex-boss became a non-person, but also before we learned from Alan Shipnuck's biography that Phil couldn't be bothered with such niceties as actually paying his looper.  A man I simply can't hear enough from about accountability....

But why no coverage of the pairing and the awkwardness?  Are the protecting Phil or Bones?  I'd guess the latter, but just not clear on how that wouldn't be news, especially when they were all over the Saturday Bryson-Brooksie pairing.

The Legend of Michael Block - That 15 minutes should be up by now, but we can all use laughs such as this:

Who should play who in the inevitable Hollywood adaptation of Michael Block’s incredible PGA performance?

Gee, tough one....Shall we start with the lead?

Michael Block - Adam Sandler

Works for me, mostly because I've actually heard of Adam Sandler....

In contrast to this guy:

Viktor Hovland - Rory Culkin

To be clear, I know who Viktor is, it's the other guy....

Rory McIlroy - Barry Keoghan

Sad that the only thing that would get Rory a role this week was that he's the one that told Block his shot on No. 15 went in..... 

Nick Piastowski did solid for your humble blogger.  His 50-item notebook dump lumped all of his Michael Block observations sequentially, limiting your humble blogger to just the one copy-and-paste:

23. OK, it’s time. Block o’clock. Let’s talk Michael Block. He could probably get his own 50 observations. We’ll keep it to five. First off, I love that the 46-year-old club pro from California was as surprised as you were.

24. I love the emotion. You’re OK in thinking that it was an act — but that’s only because we’re used to robots.

25. Speaking of that, I loved meeting all of his friends and family this week. And my favorite quote from Block came when he was talking about his wife, Val — and how she coached him to talk to reporters.

“My wife used to give me so much crap because for the first 100 interviews of my life back in the day, not with you guys but much smaller interviews, I was very, yes, yes, mm-hmm, mm-hmm, kind of what I hear honestly with a lot of the guys here when I see them doing this. It’s just like, dude … I just became way more natural. My wife really kind of told me to do that, and it’s worked out beautifully, so she was right.”

26. I love his game. He knows who he is. And plays to it. No matter that he was playing in the PGA. Or with Rory. That helped with the nerves. 27. I loved this moment. After the trophy ceremony, ahead of his final press conference, Block stood outside of the press tent — with a glass of pinot noir. He told me he wasn’t much of a wine drinker, but hey, why not. He sipped on it. When it was time to talk, an official told him to put down the half-full glass — at which point he chugged the rest, put the glass down and gave one of the best interviews of the week.

28. OK, one more. I love that when (if?) things go back to normal for him, he says he’s going back to being Michael Block.

It was great fun, though probably time to move on....

Well, maybe not just yet, because this might make you love the guy any more.  First, the photo:

 In case that isn't clear, the header will explain this Friday shot:

Even stunning shank can’t derail PGA Championship’s Cinderella story

What a week for him and us.

How Many Is Too Many -  Eamon Lynch uses that Blockfest to propose....well, not sure this will be very popular:

The PGA of America has a right, an obligation even, to honor members. But inviting the top 20 finishers at the PGA Professional Championship to compete in the PGA Championship dilutes its premier asset while inflating the value of its member tournament. The bar ought to be raised. Awarding places to only the top 10 finishers sets a higher standard for both events. A top-10 cut-off would not have denied us the Block storyline, since he qualified by finishing tied second in the PPC.

There are accomplished tour players who sit home watching club professionals routinely underperform in a major. The obvious retort — that they should just play better to get into the field — has limited utility. They have played better, they just lost out to someone who played okay and finished 20th in the PPC. Club pro loyalists might validly point out that this is the only major not to invite amateurs, and that the PGA Championship is giving members spots that other majors grant to the young and innocent.

Or, yanno, they could just cut the field to seventy players, because our pampered alpha dogs don't like having to beat the riff-raff.

Eamon is mostly right, the problem is that this year was a wacky one-off.  Mostly we get maybe one of the twenty making the cut on the number.  With only ten, in most years no club pro will even sniff the cut line, and that won't, as Eamon put it, honor the organization's members.

The dissenting opinion looks like this:

Respectfully disagree. Having 20 PGA pros qualify means 20 courses/facilities with members & students glued to their TV’s to watch their pro play. This major only exists because of club professionals. The Tour branched off from the PGA and this brings them together. https://t.co/DWSX028gst

— Kelsey Nicole, PGA (@kelseygolf) May 20, 2023

That's a little rich, as you no doubt discerned.  The club pros get no air time, so you hardly have 20 golf clubs with members glued to their TVs.  This major only exists because of a historical oddity, so I would think the club pros might just want to go low profile on this.

Jay Monahan has bigger issues, so chances are he won't be looking for opportunities to squeeze Seth.

Ryder Cup Chaos - Yeah, this will get interesting for sure....  Do we think Zach had any sense of what he might have taken on?  I'm guessing that he felt for Trevor Immelmann, but didn't foresee that his circumstances could be even touchier.

Shane Ryan channels the early, funnier Woody Allen, and cross examines himself on this very subject.  First, he indicates that I was in error yesterday, not that I'll take responsibility:

In a Ryder Cup year, it's never too early to ask the big questions about what's coming in the fall. And this year, after Brooks Koepka's win at the PGA Championship, we have a really big question: Should he make the U.S. Ryder Cup team?

Before we begin in earnest, let's acknowledge that there are six spots for automatic qualification, and with the win at Oak Hill, Koepka moved into second place on that list. You get lots of points for winning a major, and he'll have two more chances to rack up even more points at the U.S. Open and Open Championship. If he finishes in the top six, this question is moot—he makes the team.

Why should I own it, when this official Ryder Cup page shows him still in 22nd place, indicating that the results have been updated as of today?  Obviously, like your humble blogger, they don't want to deal with this issue, but have they been slow-rolling it since the Masters?

But Shane does at least note that, whatever comity was displayed at the two majors, the parties are still very much at war:

Why is it more complicated than a simple "yes"? Because there's something to be said for solidarity. A major factor in the U.S. Ryder Cup resurgence of the last six years, complete with two blowout victories at home, is that the team learned some hard strategic and psychological lessons from the past. Koepka still seems to be well liked by his peers, and certainly respected as a competitor, but it doesn't change the fact that he's on a breakaway tour that stands in direct opposition and poses an existential crisis to the PGA Tour. LIV Golf is suing the PGA Tour. No matter how Koepka distances himself, he's part of that; being paid by them, driving profit for them. Even if they smile and get along, there's a de facto conflict here, and the U.S. leadership at Ryder Cups and Presidents Cups has been masterful at diminishing conflict. There's very much a question of whether adding someone like Koepka is worth it, or if they even need him in this new era of success.

There's also a competitive imbalance worth mentioning. In Europe, the Ryder Cup is managed by the DP World Tour, and most European players in the course of the schism withdrew their memberships from that tour after sanctions were imposed on them, and in some cases paid a fine. The minute they resigned, their Ryder Cup eligibility was at an end. It was technically possible for them to retain membership, and with it eligibility—Thomas Pieters and Paul Casey have thus far done so—but practically it doesn't compare to the American situation; most LIV golfers with DP World Tour ties aren’t going to be eligible to play.

This ties into one of my frustrations, that so many of the LIVsters and their apologists (Alan Shipnuck, call your office) want to portray LIV as just another choice being made by individual players, the accretive nonsense.  Which is great, at least until you realize that the4 LIV business model will destroy the PGA Tour and that, as Shane notes, they're suing the Tour for the purpose of destroying their business model and existing sponsorships.  So, sure, we can all get along just great...

But is this correct?

In the U.S., the PGA of America runs the Ryder Cup, not the PGA Tour, and thus the PGA Tour is powerless to impose any kind of Ryder Cup ban. The American players on LIV start in the hole because they can't earn points in actual PGA Tour events (only majors), but they're still eligible for captain's picks and can still play their way into automatic qualifying through the majors. You can't do anything about automatic qualifying, but is it "fair" for Johnson to use his captain's picks on a LIV player when Luke Donald and Team Europe are prevented from doing so? Is it OK to exploit an imbalance that arises from the circumstance of which governing body oversees which team?

Powerless?  Isn't it PGA Tour players that fill out the U.S. team?  I'm not saying Jay will get his way, but I wouldn't characterize the Tour as powerless...

Could Zach get away with not taking a LIV player out of fairness to Luke Donald?  They'd scream bloody murder, though I'm not sure there's much they could do about it..... After all, they don't get paid that week, which would lead most to the logical conclusion that the LIVsters wouldn't be interested....

I haven't watched this, but you can write the script yourself:

Brandel Chamblee-Brad Faxon Ryder Cup debate got tense Sunday night

But this may have been the funniest bit:

'I didn't know that': U.S. Ryder Cup captain Zach Johnson didn't know the CW broadcasted LIV Golf

 Don't feel bad, Zach, no one does.

I'll see you later in the week.

Weekend Wrap - Crow-Eating Edition

This is my tenth year of blogging, that's seventy in dog years, but I'm convinced that I am about to write my least favorite blog post ever...  

Koepka Kharmelion - Where's that Brooksie I've so come to enjoy?  Yanno, the one that coughs up final round leads.... We all kind of knew this would be different from April, as no one has ever confused the affable Viktor with Jon Rahm.  

Cue the obligatory hagiography:

For Claude Harmon III, the biggest surprise was receiving a call from Brooks Koepka last July to help him with his swing again. After more than two years without speaking, Harmon watched him

hit balls for 15 minutes at LIV Bedminster in New Jersey, but it was what Koepka said that left a lasting impression.

“I still feel like I can win majors, I still feel like I can be one of if not the best player in the world,” Koepka said. “You know, just gotta get my golf swing doing what I want it to do and just gotta get healthy again.”

Koepka completed a remarkable return to glory, shooting 3-under 67 on Sunday at Oak Hill to win the 105th PGA Championship by two strokes over Viktor Hovland and Scottie Scheffler. In doing so, Koepka became the 20th player to win at least five majors and joined Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods as the only players to win the Wanamaker Trophy three times in the stroke-play era.

“This is probably the sweetest one of them all because all the hard work that went into this one, this one is definitely special,” Koepka said. “This one is probably it for me.”

If only he were serious that this is it for him....

We don't get much detail on their injuries, but this should have been a comeback we could savor:

The 33-year-old Koepka was considered washed up, done in by injuries that included a torn patella tendon in August 2019, a hip injury in 2020, and a potentially career-ending injury to his knee cap and patella tendon in March 2021. His short-game coach, Pete Cowen, said Koepka couldn’t compress down on his left side and the result was a two-way miss.

“It was almost game over,” Harmon III said.

No one knows,” Koepka said during his winner’s press conference. “There’s a lot of times where I just couldn’t even bend my knee.”

Should have, but won't be able to.... One amusing bit is his insistence that he found that one killer app to prevent a recurrences of his Augusta Sunday meltdown, but this is as close to masking sense of it as we'll get:

Koepka did admit to working at slowing down under pressure.

“I've got to slow down, for me,” he said. “I've got to start walking slower because my stride just wants to keep going. Want to be the first one to the ball and hit it and just play the quickest round of golf ever.

“I've got to take my time and really just kind of assess things, but it's difficult to say. I don't think my hands or my heart rate gets up. I don't think about the next shot. I always just think about what's going on. Like, if you walk down 16, I'm not thinking, oh, I've got to do this on 17 or 18. I'm just thinking, whatever the next shot might be and then until I run out of shots.”

Not the pressure I wouldn't think, just the inevitably sluggish pace of play which clearly discomfitted him at Augusta.  Of course, Koepka has always been a quick player, so this is lesson you'd have thought he'd have learned back on that European development tour, but whatev.

Brooks Koepka won the PGA Championship at Oak Hill Country Club in Rochester, N.Y., to claim his fifth major title, as he held on to a 54-hole lead he wasn’t able to keep at the Masters last month. What impressed you most about Koepka’s week? And in hindsight, should we be surprised he won this one?

Sean Zak: How slow it was. It was a slow, plodding 72 on Thursday. Then nine pars to open his second round. Only on the back nine Saturday, when everyone was worried about Corey Conners,

did it start to get real. But this is what Koepka did at Bellerive and at Shinnecock and at Erin Hills. He works his way through the breaks of the game in the first few rounds, grabs a lead on the weekend and his grip is tighter than most. We should not be surprised in the slightest. He gave us a great warning in Georgia.

Zephyr Melton: His killer mentality is back. These sorts of performances were the standard in the late 2010s, but the last several years have shown a more vulnerable BK. This week, he showed us that he still has that mental edge that makes him so dangerous in golf’s biggest events.

Jessica Marksbury: After watching Koepka play so well at Augusta, it seemed like a foregone conclusion that he would contend this week. But it’s still so, so impressive to watch him, as Sean said, plod along. It wasn’t flashy, just consistently good. That even-keel-ness is enviable, and his mental strength is clearly his primary differentiator.

Josh Sens: But what stands out to me is the Ruth-ian call he made on Saturday night. He said he’d learned from his mistakes. He promised it would be different. He said he had it sorted. It sounded almost… inevitable? Not many golfers make those kinds of forecasts; everyone knows you shouldn’t tempt the golf gods and all that. One of the things he seemed to have clearly learned is not to be in a rush only to get stuck waiting on too many tee shots. The way he took his time over short putts, in no hurry to get to the next hole — the man was not going to let himself get Cantlay-ed again.

He had it in double-digits under par, which is pretty damn impressive given the obvious difficulty.

Lots to muse upon, so seems silly to squander pixels needlessly:

Koepka battled injuries, his swing and his confidence over the past year-plus, but he’s now followed up a lackluster 2022 major season (two missed cuts, nothing better than T55) with a T2 and a win. Is there a chance this version of Koepka is better than the one that ruled the major championships a few years ago?

Zak: I don’t think so? And I’m not sure we’ll ever know. We only have two more events this year where BK will play against the best players on the planet in a 72-hole, 144-person tournament. That’s no LIV critique. It just is what it is. I think he’ll need to win the final two majors to elevate above where he was at his peak a few years ago. I’ll bet against it and hope that he does it. It’s way too fun watching him make it look easy.

Melton: I can’t imagine this version of Koepka is going to be better than BK 1.0, if only because of the scar tissue he’s now built up. Five years ago, there was zero doubt Koepka would win if he got to the top of the leaderboard. In the time since, we’ve seen some lackluster Sunday performances. Although he reversed that trend this week, the scars from those wounds remain.

Marksbury: I don’t think this Koepka is better than the previous version, but chip-on-the-shoulder Koepka has proven to be the best version of Koepka, at least in terms of major performance. I can’t help but wonder if the defection to LIV, plus the close-call at the Masters, may have given him just what he needed to re-awaken that aspect of his personality to channel it accordingly.

Sens: Maybe not better, but an even more impressive climb to the top. He sounded so completely defeated in that Full Swing episode. Better or not, though, he’s obviously back. Can’t wait to see him in the final group with Rahm or Scheffler at LACC.

Look, the guy won three majors in four years, so even if he played just as well as he did from 2017-19, it's still a longshot that he could rack up that kind of total.  I also maintain a bit of skepticism just because, when facing down Jon Rahm, it didn't go quite as well.  Hovland and Corey Connors just don't offer the same challenge, so we'll just have to see how he plays at LA and Liverpool.

The good news for Brooksie is that it'll be hard for us to hold lackluster performance in the LIV events against him, since he never did much in normal PGA Tour events either.

Geoff has a long list of relevant numbers:

20: Players to win five or more majors (Koepka joins the group with his win Sunday).

3: Players with three or more PGA Championship wins in the stroke play era (Koepka, Nicklaus, Woods).

44 of 72. Greens in regulation hit by Koepka.

32 of 56. Fairways hit by Koepka.

316’3”. Feet of putts made by Koepka. 

0. Three putts by Koepka.

0. Double bogeys by Koepka.

All impressive, especially those last two.  No doubt you heard much blather about who he tied at five majors, though the category errors are profound:

Of that impressive list on five majors, only Seve played a reasonably full schedule thereof.  The two triumvirates (Braid and Taylor) played only the Open, and Lord Byron retired once he had earned enough money to buy his ranch.

That said, if he can stay healthy, who knows where he might end up on this list?

The Legend of Michael Block -  Hard for a mere blogger to do it justice, I'll just excerpt his description of the scene when he made that ace that so electrified the proceedings:

“Rory hits. He misses the green right. I'm just like, oh, yeah, you can't go there; right? So I'm

over my tee shot, and the crowd goes crazy. Like, the crowd went nuts and I had not even hit yet. So I had to step back. I'm, like, this is pretty cool; right? This huge reception, and I haven't seen hit.

”So I sit back for a second. I'm, like, this is cool, but I've got this nice flight at 7. I could hit a hard 8, but all day long when I tried to hit anything hard, I was pulling it. So I was, like, I'm going to flight a little 7 in there into the breeze from 150. It was playing about 167 in my head. So I hit it, and it's just right at it, but I can't say it, just like now, and all of the you sudden it disappears, whatever. I'm like, cool. I'm like, thanks, guys. Rory is walking down the pathway 20 yards away from me and turns around and starts walking back towards me with his arms open to give me a hug. And he goes, you made it.

“I go, what? I'm like, seriously? He's like, yeah, you did. He had to tell me five times that I made it. So it was a pretty cool experience to have Rory be telling me that I made a hole-in-one in front of God knows how many people that were supporting me.”

Wow!  All I can say is that Employee No. 2 took one of the worst-timed biological breaks ever....

That TC panel couldn't come up with much, to which I can completely relate:

PGA professional Michael Block was the talk of the tournament, as the 46-year-old teaching pro from California turned heads with not only his play, but his easygoing, relatable persona (and an unbelievable ace on Sunday). Block, who tied for 15th, wasn’t short on publicity this week, but was what he accomplished an overrated or underrated storyline from the PGA? Can you put what he did into context?

Zak: The context will come over the next decade or so, when no other PGA pro does what he did. And when PGA Championships pass without a single club pro making the cut. That’s the reality!

He broke reality this week. It is not overrated in any sense. Did it get overplayed? You can have that opinion, but I’d call you un-fun. It was a delightful appetizer or dessert, or both!

Melton: Was it overplayed? Maybe. But it sure was fun to watch. It’s always cool to see a new personality inject some juice into an event. As far as context goes, that’ll become clearer in hindsight.

Marksbury: Underrated, for sure! It’s no secret I’m team #clubpro. My husband is one, and many of our friends are. What Michael Block accomplished this week is extraordinary. It’s so, so hard to just qualify for a place in the PGA Professional Championship, let alone get through that to the PGA Championship. Making the cut is everyone’s goal once they get there, and as we know, it’s rare. Actually contending like Block did is like a unicorn-level dream. It was a blast to watch him achieve something incredible, and to do it with gratefulness and humility, man. Gave me chills. It’s what sports are all about.

Sens: Ordinarily, I don’t have a lot of stomach for all the saccharine the networks sprinkle on these kinds of stories. But everything about Block’s run — that hole-in-one was almost enough to make me believe in fate — right down to his teary post-round interview, deserved the coverage. It would have been a hard one to overplay. And mercifully, we only got a few bad “Block party” puns from the media along the way.

I'm in shock....  Not that he could play that well, but that he could hold it together that well four four days.  You've got the ESPN/CBS cameras all over him, the pairings with Rory and Justin Rose then the ace on No. 15, yet he still has enough control to deliver that "up-and-in-for-the-ages" on No. 18?  A guy that likely plays mostly 36-hole events in a cart, to the extent that he even plays.  Wow!

Rory is a gracious man and obviously enjoyed the pairing, but your humble blogger couldn't help but be amused.  This is a man that absorbed a beatdown from Augusta National marker Jeff Knox a few years back, and now he watched a club pro steal his thunder on a Sunday at a different major.  It's a weird game we play, but Rory seems to be absorbing more than his fair share of it.

The TC gang closed with an appropriate query about this venue:

Oak Hill Country Club hadn’t hosted a PGA Championship since the 2013 PGA, but the East course, which had some work done since, seemed to be one of the stars of the week. How would you grade the host venue, and where would you rank it among recent non-Masters major venues?

Zak: This is what I want from major championship hosts: A) a course that makes pros uncomfortable on the tee AND hitting into greens; B) a course where double bogey is out there on every hole, but two great shots earn a look at birdie; C) a course where the championship committee can make any hole play wildly different on consecutive days. (On four consecutive days? WAHOO!); and D) a town that embraces their week to shine. This week was check, check, check, check. Four-and-a-half stars from me. Slot it right in next to Southern Hills and bring the event back there every 15 years.

Melton: The course was excellent. It was hard, but not U.S. Open hard, and it made for some great viewing. I’d love to see it host the PGA again in the future.

Sens: Grade A on the venue. Right there with Southern Hills, though I suspect we have an even better one coming up in June.

Marksbury: Totally agree with the ranking, guys! I liked it. A B+ from me, and the weather was the only real damper. The PGA has taken some heat for a seemingly uninspired list of future venues, but if they’re all set up to produce a week like this one, all will be well!

Obviously, Jess is a hard grader....

I would make two points here.  The first is to acknowledge the importance of the architecture to the week we enjoyed.  Oak Hill's set-up featured what was to me perfect rough, juicy enough to challenge the lads but not so deep that they couldn't advance the ball.  But what really made it work is the design of those restored Donald Ross greens, which allowed for run-up shots that were a delight to watch.   

The second point is a bit of a downer.  Because, as much as we loved the venue, I'm not at all sure when or if we see it again.  Despite Thursday's frost delay and all the rain, the PGA got quite lucky with the weather, both this week but, perhaps more importantly, over the winter and early spring.  In a more unfavorable (normal?) year would the rough have grown in sufficiently?  I don't know that the PGA can risk another May date in Rochester, which would limit the possibilities to the USGA, who can squeeze them in perhaps in 2074.  I kid, but there are precious few open years during your humble vlogger's normal life expectancy....

OK, just gonna scratch the surface on a couple of obvious issues.  I assume we'll be pondering these with perhaps a dollop more perspective in the days to come....

Wither LIV - First, that TC panel squandering another opportunity:

In large part due to Koepka, but with the help of others, LIV Golf followed a strong showing at the Masters (three in the top six) with another at the PGA Championship (three in the top 11). Is LIV Golf’s slightly lighter schedule allowing its player to stay rested and perform better in majors, or is this just a convenient coincidence?

Zak: I think the light schedule is a convenient coincidence. Koepka was upset before the Masters at the lack of reps he got in ahead of the first major. You don’t get to feel that way and then also applaud the light schedule. I don’t think Cameron Smith is thriving via the light schedule.

Melton: It feels like coincidence. If the trend continues over several years, then perhaps we can revisit this conversation, but the sample size is too small to draw any definitive conclusions at this point.

Marksbury: Small sample size, yes. But I think there might be something to it. Jordan Spieth made headlines recently for admitting he’s tired. Rory paid a huge fine to back out of the RBC Heritage. The PGA Tour’s designated event schedule has made the top players seemingly busier than ever. Add to that the long days, weather delays, media obligations … LIV players are definitely carrying a lighter load. How valuable is that? It will be interesting to see how things play out at the remaining two majors.

Sens: Nah, unless we’re going to blame rust for any LIV player who misses the cut. The schedule is a distant second to the simple fact we’ve known all along: LIV snagged a handful of the world’s best, including multiple major winners. The talent doesn’t just vanish because they’re now playing on teams with goofy names.

Jess, you're not very bright, are you?  Of course, she's not helped by asking completely the wrong question....  I'll get to LIV in a sec, but what Jess is pointing out is the insanity of what Jay and Rory propagated for 2023, requiring these guys to show up fourteen times on top of the majors.  Is LIV better than that?  Sure, if only because anything would be...

While I continue to believe that the LIV circus can't be good for competitive readiness, it's not like these guys lost their golf skills in a few months.  And, at least with this week's winner, it was never about his skill set in any case.... just about whether he could stay healthy.

But does it in any fundamental way change the status quo ante?  I'm not going to minimize that Jay Monahan's collar is likely a little tighter this morning, as each individual skirmish takes on a slightly different hue in the aftermath of Brooksie's win.  But does it make any other player decide to go to LIV?  If not, then we're stuck in Groundhog Day, and I'm still hard-pressed to see how LIV creates anything sustainable from their assets.

They've had some success in creating turnout at their events, but there's a reason they've stopped reporting viewership numbers, and you can't make those numbers work without a large TV contract in the U.S.  But, stay tuned....

Wither The Ryder Cup - The OWGR will be interesting because of this, but the Ryder Cup just went to Defcon-5.  For month I was dreading that European arbitration decision, envisioning that the Euros placing a LIVster on their Ryder Cup roster, unclear as to how Jay might react.  But I've just been informed, as they say in horror moves, that the call is coming from inside the house....

I can stall by excerpting this from the TC panel:

Ryder Cup captains Zach Johnson and Luke Donald both addressed the media at Oak Hill, and while they didn’t give too much away, they didn’t exactly close the door on LIV players representing their respective Ryder Cup teams. Based on what we know, will any LIV golfers play in the Ryder Cup? And how critical, for the U.S. specifically, is Johnson’s decision to include or exclude them if it comes down to picks outside of the top-six auto qualifiers?

Zak: Brooks Koepka will play in the Ryder Cup. I think his relationships with the Jupiter collective of pros — who will factor into the team building — will make it much easier to accept him. I don’t think Bryson has that going for him. And I don’t know that Dustin Johnson will be in as impressive of form, though I bet he’ll get a look.

Melton: It feels like Koepka solidified his spot on the Ryder Cup team with his performance on Sunday. But even if he (along with the other LIVers) doesn’t get included, Team USA has plenty of depth to win the Cup in Italy.

Sens: I partly agree with Zephyr. Koepka will be on the team, but an upstart European squad will win.

Marksbury: If Koepka’s not on the U.S. team, I think we’re in for some serious drama. Especially if the U.S. loses.

I start at a far more granular level, as I'm not even clear whose decision it will be.  Nominally it's Zach Johnson's, but exactly no one thinks he's got complete autonomy.  Prior to this I had assume he would have been instructed to ignore the LIVsters, and for quite a while that seemed like it could work.  Nobody was going to take heat over Talor Gooch, but a healthy Brooksie in 2017-19 form is a different kettle of fish.

Secondly, none of us are privy to the pillow talk Jay is receiving from his lawyers, including whether he has the legal right to exclude them from this event.  His ability to sanction them has thus far been upheld, but they still apparently retain their PGA of America membership, and this event is controlled by that latter entity.  It appears that it will require a Captain's pick, because this updated points list still has Koepka only in 22nd place, so at least Jay seems unlikely to face a LIVster automatically qualifying.  But that brings us back to Zach, who might not want to squander his captaincy on the internecine war.   

Jess's is an interesting take, though perhaps the most interesting aspect of it would be to ponder whether Jay would really care.  More substantively, if Koepka isn't chosen, whoever gets that last spot is going to be in an impossible position, no?  You better win your matches, otherwise each and every one of us can script those awkward press conference questions?  And if the lose without Brooks?  At least Phil won't be there, though they could be partying like it's 2014.

Developing, as the kids like to say.

Catch you all down the road.  They say that the cure for grief is time, so let's hope they know what of they speak.