By Shane Ryan
GREENSBORO, N.C. — On the ninth hole at Sedgefield Country Club, Billy Hurley III missed a 22-foot birdie putt by inches. There were no groans from the gallery when he missed, and only tepid applause when he tapped in for his par. It was Hurley’s last hole of the Wyndham Championship, and thus the last hole of his 2017-’18 PGA Tour regular season. Everything about it screamed anticlimax, and that mood permeated most of the day. The crowds were sparse, the air was unbearably humid, and sporadic storm clouds threatened before moving on their languid way. Even the course wasn’t putting up a fight—birdies fell like pars, and the field was like a massive peloton fighting its way to 20 under.

Greensboro, N.C., is proud of its championship, and everything runs with the usual competence, but this is not a flagship tour event. The field, if it’s not the weakest of the entire year, comes close. The best players tend to stay away to get some rest after a long summer and with the FedEx Cup playoffs next on the schedule … unless they absolutely must come. On the World Ranking, you have to scroll down to No. 16—Hideki Matsuyama—before finding the highest-ranked player to make the trip to the Piedmont.

And yet, belying the lackluster atmosphere, there are very real, very personal, and very hidden acts of drama playing out on this course. Hurley thought he needed that putt on the ninth hole, and though nobody else realised it, and though you wouldn’t see the shot on TV, the stakes—at least for him—were quite high. He was playing in the last year of a full exemption after winning the 2016 Quicken Loans Invitational, and it had not been a dream season. As you’d expect for someone that far down the points list—he began the week 202nd—his 2018 story is a story of missed cuts.

Yet, though he didn’t know it at that moment he missed that final birdie putt missed, Hurley was projected to finish 200th in the FedEx Cup standings. If Hurley could finish 200 or better, he would earn a spot in the Web.Com Tour Finals series. From there, he could fight against a field of 150 golfers—75 from the PGA Tour, 75 from the Web.com—for one of 25 PGA Tour cards for next season. But if he stayed at 202 or 201, no such luck.

RELATED: Brandt Snedeker starts with a 59, ends with a victory at the Wyndham Championship

There are a few different cut-offs at the Wyndham—the most notable being trying to get into the top 125 and qualify for the FedEx Cup playoffs. But the one facing Hurley, the 200 line, was the darkest. Miss it, and your best bet may be the Web.com qualifying school. Fail there, and you’ve gone from the PGA Tour to nothing in the span of a year.

In Hurley’s case, he could use his status as a past champion for partial exemption, so his worst-case scenario was not as dire. But it still wasn’t great, and he still wanted that 200 ranking badly. At the moment when he made his par on No. 9, he had it, and so I expected to find someone happy, or at least relieved, at the scoring tent.

He was neither. “I thought I had to do more,” he said. “But it looks like Sangmoon did more for me.”

Bae’s two-over 72 on Sunday took him out of the top 200 as well, and was currently Hurley’s saving grace. But Hurley still wasn’t convinced—he mentioned the possibility of Blayne Barber making a late birdie, and hinted at various unforeseen forces that could diminish his finish by percentage points … enough to put Smylie Kaufman back at position 200, and leave himself scrambling in 2019.

• • •

Hurley wasn’t alone in his battle. The most public of the private dramas belonged to Sergio Garcia, who came in ranked 131st—six spots outside the top 125, and thus six spots outside of qualifying for the FedEx Cup playoffs. It wasn’t quite life-or-death, since Garcia has full status for the next few seasons thanks to his 2017 Masters win. But he had the added element of Ryder Cup pressure, and the need to impress Thomas Bjorn in his increasingly dim fight for a captain’s pick on the European team.

Streeter Lecka/Getty Images
Garcia failed to finish inside the top 125 on the FedEx Cup points list for the first time in his career.

Garcia came close. At 3:40 p.m., with the front nine behind him, the Spaniard was one shot clear of the cut-off. Then he made bogey on three of five holes—betrayal of the driver and the wedge—and he fell back into the shadowlands. The beneficiary was Seamus Power, who missed the cut here on Friday, but who now rose from 126th to 125th. Garcia had a chance to rescue himself, but he needed more than the two birdies he managed coming in. How he felt when he finished 128th is anybody’s guess—he managed to sneak away before any journalist could brave the difficult approach.

Nick Taylor faced a similar situation, starting out 129th on the FedEx Cup points list, but in arguably one of the biggest rounds of his life, he played superb. His bogey-free 63 on Sunday vaulted him to 119th, and spared him the pain of having to grind to the finish.

Harris English was not so lucky. Starting 132nd, the two-time PGA Tour winner needed a miracle. At least by his own standards—he’d missed the cut in 10 of his last 12 events, and here he needed not just to make the weekend, but to finish near the top 10. The miracle happened, for a while. But when English reached 16 under at the turn, and threatened to actually win the tournament, nerves or bad play hit. Two straight bogeys brought him down to 14 under, and the tour’s “strokes back” tab on the little Lenovo computers dotting the media center told us that one more bogey would put him outside the playoffs. He birdied 15 for some breathing room, then made an immediate bogey to fall perilously close to the edge. English hated this, he told us later—hated the mindset of trying not to mess up, hated the anonymous pressure of the bubble, the “game within the game,” and never wanted to do it again.

By the time he was on the 18th hole, the air in Greensboro was so thick that it felt like a spontaneous rain might burst. A poor drive left English barely clear of the trees in the left rough, but his iron cleared the ridge—just cleared—and gave him two putts to make par and stay on the good side of the top 125. His lag from 60 feet was near perfect, and minutes later he was smiling that sheepish smile as he fielded questions by the scoring tent, and the children behind the ropes yelled for his hat, his glove, his signature.

He was playoff bound.

Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images
Harris English needed a harrowing two-putt par from 60-feet on the 18th hole to get inside the top 125—and pulled it off.

• • •

Martin Piller, who was undoubtedly watching English’s putt on 18 with great interest, will not be heading to New Jersey for the Northern Trust next week. He started the week ranked 124th, but finished 126th after missing the cut in Greensboro by one measly stroke. Joining him in the “playing themselves out of contention” category is Tyrone Van Aswegen, who started the week 125th but missed the cut (also by one measly stroke) and fell to 127th.

Matt Jones, Retief Goosen, Bill Haas and Chris Stroud all fell out of the top 150—another numerical milestone in that being inside the 150 gets you conditional PGA Tour status in 2019 (Stroud will still have full status thanks to his 2017 Barracuda win). Rod Pampling fell out of the top 200, and D.A. Points played his way from 214th to 176th with his first top-10 of the season.

After Brandt Snedeker won the Wyndham with a spectacular 20 under, I checked the standings one last time on the black Lenovo. Everything looked right until I scrolled to the bottom of the FedEx Cup leader board. There, I saw Billy Hurley III. And I also saw the number beside the name: 201.

I have no idea how it happened. Someone made a timely birdie in the hour after he finished, Hurley’s position decreased incrementally, and it gave Smylie Kaufman the slightest edge at 200. It doesn’t matter if Kaufman chooses not to play the Web.Com Tour Championship, or seeks a medical exemption—Hurley is out. He’ll have to find his own way back to full status, and he’ll find no mercy in the numbers, emerging as they do from the dark arteries of the Wyndham’s secret soul. Greensboro is not the end, except when it is.

The post The hidden, merciless drama of the Wyndham Championship appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

I came in with high hopes, and I wasn’t disappointed. One of the first things Blixt told me was that the girls at his primary school used to call him “the tomato” because he blushed so easily. They’d run up to him and hug him just for the pleasure of watching him turn tomato-red, and he’d never gotten over his fear of women.

“I’m still scared of them,” he said, and went on to tell the story of the only two times he’d gathered his courage to approach a woman at a bar. The first time, he’d barely started speaking when his hope was crushed by an expression of pure ridicule, making it crystal clear that his overtures weren’t welcome. The second potential conquest was even less subtle—she reached out and pushed him away by the forehead.

It was one of my favorite interviews of the year, and one of the few times I’d seen a golfer display even a trace amount of self-deprecation. Later, reading through his transcripts, I saw that he was giving out gold even in his press conferences. There were stories of how he ended up accidentally living in a retirement community in Jacksonville because of bad advice from a swing coach, how he asked a mechanic neighbour to look after his car for a few weeks while he was on tour, and came back to find 2,700 extra miles on the odometer, and how his immediate emotion after winning his first PGA Tour event was terror at the prospect of having to make a speech.

Blixt was funny in an easy, self-aware way that made me like him instantly. I was forced to cut him out of the book I was writing (at gunpoint) since he didn’t win anything that year, but my time with him stood out in stark contrast to the dozens of other golfers I got to know in 2014. Many of them were interesting, some were not, but almost none were truly funny.

There’s nothing worse than explaining a joke, and analysing humour is almost as bad, so rather than try to rank the players or score them on their comedic abilities, I’ve decided to simply present a list of the golfers who seem to have demonstrated actual senses of humour in a sport that can be too dry. If you hear any of these guys being asked a question, stick around to listen for the answer. It will probably make you laugh, sometimes really hard.

Henrik Stenson
When I asked Patrick Reed if he had any friends on tour, he flailed around for a second before coming up with Henrik Stenson. Here’s what Stenson had to say about that, tongue firmly in cheek:

“I wouldn’t say that we go way back. I played one practice round with him at Wells Fargo a couple years ago. And … well, it’s nice if he thinks that everyone he knows a little bit is one of his friends. That’s obviously a way to look at it.”

Scott Halleran/Getty Images

Someone who can sting with that kind of vicious understatement (it’s practically British in its lethal restraint!), but who will also play golf in his underwear has clearly mastered every part of the comedy spectrum. Someday, I will write a 9,000-word essay on every funny thing Stenson has said or done, but for now I’ll have to settle for assuring you that his press conferences are unmissable.

• • •

Jamie Donaldson and Thomas Bjorn
After the 2014 Ryder Cup win in Gleneagles, Donaldson came into the team press conference riding Bjorn piggy-back style and slapping his butt while Bjorn neighed like a horse. That’s all you need to know for this one, right?

Harry Engels/Getty Images

• • •

Eddie Pepperell
I only had to go like 10 tweets down in his timeline to find the tweet below. Pepperell is probably the most philosophical golfer around, but he can also drop the comedy when necessary:

I’m not saying I deserve to win this, but I deserve to win this. The struggle I’ve gone through to reach this point is incomprehensible to many, myself included. I’ve been fat shamed, trolled, even sexually abused by my dog. I’ll also donate nothing if I win. Vote for Eddie. https://t.co/Jp2vXn0kZd

— Eddie Pepperell (@PepperellEddie) March 5, 2018

• • •

Billy Hurley III
I think his caddie wrote most of this, but I’m still giving Hurley props for going with it. It shows, at the very least, a familiarity with humour:

• • •

Chesson Hadley
Confession: I had no idea Hadley was funny until GD’s own Joel Beall cued me in. Skeptical, I watched this video, and I am SHOCKED at how good he is. That’s some bona fide talent. Also, he earns eternal comedy legend status for this:

Disappointed in how much we are playing for this week @THEPLAYERSChamp. Had to make some cash on the side. @PGATOUR pic.twitter.com/ebmPKchtQg

— Chesson Hadley (@chessonhadley) May 6, 2015

• • •

Phil Mickelson
The wonderful, hilarious thing about Phil is that he can simultaneously present himself as an unrepentant know-it-all, a flamboyant risk-taker and a grinning avatar of his own relentless self-belief, yet also wink at you—without breaking character, even a little!—to let you know that yes, this is all pretty funny. It’s one hell of an act.

5⃣0⃣ TOUR wins for Phil?

“Oh I will, yeah I’ll get there.” ? pic.twitter.com/3uVLn00s21

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) March 5, 2018

• • •

Bubba Watson
I hate doing this, believe me, but you need one “dumb funny” guy. Bubba sometimes captures that “defensive southern boy cracking an accidental joke that makes you laugh in spite of yourself” vibe, like Will Ferrell doing a George W. Bush impression. Here he is in that same Ryder Cup, after getting beat two days in a row by Stenson:

Q. I know you’re here to talk mainly about your own performance, but can you throw any light at all on Henrik Stenson’s injury?

BUBBA WATSON: On his what?

Q. He has a back injury apparently.

BUBBA WATSON: I didn’t see it. He beat me pretty good two days in a row (laughter). I don’t know anything about it, so I wouldn’t know. Obviously he beat me. Maybe I’ve got an injury.

That’s an annoyingly decent line. Let’s move on.

• • •

Max Homa
This deserved more than 113 likes:

Really hoping everyone knows that it’s never good to stare at the sun. Didn’t realize it needed to team up with the moon to make this point

— max homa (@maxhoma23) August 21, 2017

• • •

Sergio Garcia
This is one of my favorite examples of golfer self-deprecation ever, and I’m still convinced it’s why the karma gods let him win at Augusta:

McIlroy and Garcia on American fans after the last Ryder Cup. https://t.co/YCOfcD9am0 via @YouTube

— Golf Digest ME (@GolfDigestME) March 11, 2018

• • •

Pat Perez
Perez is like John Daly, but without the uncomfortable sense of witnessing human decay. This interview takes an excellent turn at 1:55.

• • •

All four of these guys
I had to include an Irishman in Paddy Harrington, but I’m particularly impressed with Kaymer’s perfect delivery. Germany is the new Sweden:

The post The humour roll: Who are the funniest golfers on tour? appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Hurley elaborated on both as a guest on a bonus episode of the Golf Digest Podcast. His hilarious takedown of Spieth was the talk of social media earlier in the week, revealing Hurley’s underrated talent as a deadpan comic, and underscoring that even as one of the game’s biggest stars, Spieth can clearly take a joke.

“Yeah, I texted [Spieth] about it and he just laughed and said ‘That’s great with me,’” Hurley said on the Podcast. “I had no intention of really swaying the votes. We just figured we can make this really funny, and we obviously did.”

For those of you who don’t know, I am running against @JordanSpieth for Chairman of the @PGATOUR Player Advisory Council. One final push for the voting that ends tomorrow pic.twitter.com/dO2uLiTg3B

— Billy Hurley III (@BillyHurley3) February 12, 2018

The voting for PAC chairmanship closed on Tuesday and when we spoke to Hurley that evening, he hadn’t heard the results. (Update: Golf Channel reports on Wednesday evening that Spieth was elected chairman over Hurley). Already a member of the 16-player PAC, he explained what role the organisation plays, what issues its confronting most these days, and how he remains upbeat during a difficult start to 2018.

The post Billy Hurley III discusses the genesis of his ‘attack ad’ against Jordan Spieth, and what the PGA Tour Player Advisory Council actually does appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Obviously, Spieth is one of the most popular players in the game—not just with fans but his fellow players. So Hurley has a tough fight ahead with the 24-year-old “Golden Child” in Tuesday’s election. Conversely, Hurley might’ve swayed some votes with this hilarious video he shared on social media on Monday.

For those of you who don’t know, I am running against @JordanSpieth for Chairman of the @PGATOUR Player Advisory Council. One final push for the voting that ends tomorrow pic.twitter.com/dO2uLiTg3B

— Billy Hurley III (@BillyHurley3) February 12, 2018

Fabulous work by Hurley, the winner of the 2016 Quicken Loans Invitational, who served five years in the U.S. Navy after graduating from the Naval Academy. You know even Spieth cracked up after watching this.

The rest of the 2018 PGA Tour Player Advisory Council, which was named in January, includes Justin Thomas, Steve Stricker, Paul Casey, Roberto Castro, Ben Crane, Andres Gonzales, James Hahn, J.J. Henry, Matt Kuchar, Geoff Ogilvy, Rod Pampling, Harold Varner III, Johnson Wagner and Tim Wilkinson.

The post Billy Hurley III calls Jordan Spieth ‘disgusting’ and a ‘thief’ in satirical attack ad that is absolute gold appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Brian Wacker

Jordan Spieth had just won the Travelers Championship with a dramatic hole-out for birdie from a greenside bunker in a sudden-death playoff against Daniel Berger. A few minutes later, Spieth’s caddie, Michael Greller, was on the hunt for the rake that he’d sent skyward when the shot went in and he and his boss embarked on a wild celebration that included golf’s equivalent to a bat toss from Spieth and a chest bump between the two.

Greller eventually found the rake, and he was keeping it. Then the moment hit him.

“Oooh, that’s going to count for double actually,” Greller said of the sand shot. “I think that makes it 12 or 13 for this year.”

Every year they’ve been together, the pair have made a bet. Greller sets the number of times Spieth has to hole out from off the green. If Spieth surpasses the total, Greller is on the hook for dinner—plus Spieth gets to invite anyone he wants to join them.

A few years ago in San Diego, the tab was for about 20 people. During last year’s Australian Open, it was Spieth who had to pay up, at Café Sydney, a fine-seafood restaurant nestled atop Customs House with sweeping views of the harbor and an extensive wine list.

This year’s number? Spieth has to get to 19.

“I think I’m in trouble this year,” Greller said. “Which is a good thing.”

Speaking of good things, Spieth is often criticized for not having the prettiest swing or being among the game’s best ball-strikers. Sunday, he certainly didn’t have his best performance in this area, with the 23-year-old hitting 66 percent of his greens.

But to suggest he struggles with his irons would be a bit misguided. The numbers this year suggest otherwise. Spieth leads the PGA Tour in strokes gained/approach to the green and is fifth in greens in regulation. He’s also 13th in approaches from 125-150 yards, second from 150-175 yards and seventh from 175-200.

“He’s been hitting the ball great all year,” Greller said. “If you listen to the narrative, he’s not a good ball-striker is what people would lead you to believe. When the putts drop and it matches up, you’re going to get weeks like this.”

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Andrew Caballero-Reynolds

RAHM’S ANNIVERSARY

A year ago, Jon Rahm made his pro debut at the Quicken Loans National, opening with a 64 and eventually tying for third (which earned him a spot in the Open Championship). Turns out it was a sign of things to come. Three starts later, he finished second in Canada, and this past January he won at Torrey Pines in just his 12th career PGA Tour start. He also has added a handful of top-five finishes since.

This year, however, Rahm isn’t playing in Maryland but rather just outside of Paris at Le Golf National, site of the HNA French Open, one of the European Tour’s newly minted Rolex Series events. It’s the first of handful of starts across the pond for the world No. 11, who next week will play in the Irish Open (another Rolex event) and is in the field at the Open Championship at Royal Birkdale.

“I think it’s a great thing it’s doing for the European Tour,” Rahm said of the Rolex Series, a collection of eight tournaments each with a minimum $7 million purse. “I want to show as much support as I can, and I’ll try to play as many as I can. Obviously, I can’t play all of them, but I’ll try.”

Much the way the PGA Tour’s new 1-in-4 rule requiring players with fewer than 25 starts to add a new tournament they hadn’t played in the previous four years, the Euro Tour’s creation of the Rolex Series seems to be paying dividends. The strength of field projections for the next two weeks, plus the Scottish Open in three weeks, far exceeds that of the next three PGA Tour stops (Quicken Loans, The Greenbrier and the John Deere Classic).

On a side note, Le Golf National, a course Rahm played in 2009 as a young amateur, is also site of next year’s Ryder Cup.

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Hurley received the winner’s trophy in 2016 from Quicken Loans host Tiger Woods. (Photo by Stan Badz/PGA TOUR/Getty Images)

STILL ANONYMOUS

Being a winner on the PGA Tour doesn’t always equal instant stardom. Last year, Billy Hurley III won the Quicken Loans National not far from where he went to school at the Naval Academy and near his hometown in suburban Virginia. On a recent trip back to school, there was a parking spot with Hurley’s name on it. The only problem? Someone was parked in it.

“I don’t know what to tell you,” he cracked. “You would think at the Naval Academy they would follow rules.”

Similarly, he was at a local coffee shop and wearing a Masters shirt. Someone asked him if he was there, or if he simply got it as a gift.

“I enjoy those interactions really,” he said. “I wish I would have the wherewithal and the time to kind of take those to the next level.

“Hey, I’m not, you know, Dustin Johnson, Rickie Fowler. I’m not top-10 in the world like really, really recognizable players, and I’m fine with that. I guess it’s humbling. I walked into a coffee shop the day after I won and walked right by two of these guys talking about me winning and that sort of thing. I enjoy it, it’s kind of humorous to me.”

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Andrew Redington

NOT-SO-RANDOM THOUGHTS

On Sunday night, I wrote about Spieth having that “It” factor. Want more proof? CBS’ 2.7 overnight rating for Sunday’s final round of the Travelers Championship was the second-best Sunday rating on any network to date this season. …

A lot of people pointed out that the winning score of the U.S. Open was 16 under on a 7,740-yard course versus 12 under on the 6,840-yard track for last week’s Travelers Championship. That’s missing the point a little. The numbers that matter were 272 at Erin Hills (Brooks Koepka’s final score) versus 268 at TPC River Highlands (Spieth’s winning total). …

It was a pretty good weekend for Cameron McCormick. He coaches Jordan Spieth and So Yeon Ryu, whose victory Sunday on the LPGA Tour catapulted her to No. 1 in the world in women’s golf.

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WHO I LIKE THIS WEEK

This year’s Quicken Loans National moves to TPC Potomac at Avenel Farms, where the tour hasn’t been since 2006 (and 1987-2004 before that) following a major facelift to the property. Despite Tiger Woods’ name being attached to the event, the field is a bit depleted for a variety of reasons (date being one) with just three of the top 20 in the world and five of the top 30 teeing it up. Translation: The door is open for someone else to win. Two names to keep an eye on: David Lingmerth (below), who won there on the Web.com Tour in 2012 and has four-straight finishes in the top 26, and Brendan Steele, a good and oft overlooked driver and ball-striker who has netted three top-15 finishes in his last four starts.

Getty Images

The post Jordan Spieth and his caddie’s big bet, Jon Rahm’s one-year anniversary and Billy Hurley’s continued anonymity appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.