You’d be forgiven for thinking it’s a strange decision. It’s the FedEx St Jude Championship, the first week of the playoffs. Play well now and there’s a big potential pay-off later. The Ryder Cup isn’t in the too distant future, either. This may not be the busiest stretch of the season, but it’s one with some of the highest stakes.

So why has their been a flurry of high-profile putter changes this week? World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler and World No. 3 Rory McIlroy are among the two most notable.

Scheffler spent a large portion of his putting session before his Tuesday practice round testing two TaylorMade Spider X putters against his Scottie Cameron Newport.

McIlroy, for his part, arrived at TPC Southwind on Tuesday without the TaylorMade Spider X putter he had been using, and instead with a Scottie Cameron Phantom X 5.5.

New flat stick for Rory this week ? pic.twitter.com/dB9OQpg4Fc

— LKD (@LukeKerrDineen) August 8, 2023

US Ryder Cup hopeful Sam Burns made a putter switch, too. Burns moved into an Odyssey Jailbird from his 7s head.

So, why the switching, and why now? There are a few reasons.

1. Looking for a last-minute spark

The first reason is the most obvious. Players don’t make a putter switch if they’re feeling great about their putting. Scheffler and McIlroy rank 140th and 86th in SG: Putting this season, respectively.
With most of the season behind them, now is a chance for a last roll of the dice, to see if mixing things up can generate some momentum.
“I’ve seen guys put a new putter into play for the first time the day of the tournament, and putt lights out,” one caddie said. “Sometimes it’s just about trying out a new look.”
Burns ranks sixth in SG: Putting this season, and the new putter he’s put into play is for exactly that reason. A new look to mix things ups. McIlroy is after the same thing this week.
“I just wanted a different look, just wanted to freshen it up,” he said. “Honestly, it was zero testing process. It was going into the garage, see what I had and just pull a couple out and go have a few putts. That was it.”

2. They’ve been working on it in the background

The putter McIlroy decided to put into play this week was from a batch he had built before his first putter switch of the season in the spring.
That’s because often, players have been brewing on making a putter switch long before they actually do. They work on some putters in the background that they know they’ll probably put into play eventually.
As Scheffler explains: “The guys at TaylorMade have done a lot of work for me with the putter,” he says. “I’ve always liked the visual of that Spider putter, but I really just did not like the feel. I’ve always struggled with putters that have a lot of weight in the back side of it, and this one is a bit different than a lot of the Spiders that they’ve made. The weight is more in the front, so it has the feel of a blade putter that I like but it also has a lot of that visual on the top where it’s easier for me to line up.”

Scottie testing a new putter, too. pic.twitter.com/K0x2YNxJE0

— LKD (@LukeKerrDineen) August 8, 2023

While the exact moment Rory or Scottie decided to switch was slightly impulsive, it’s been something on their radar for a while.

3. There’s time to remedy the change

Best case scenario? One of the new wands sparks some magic, and they use it to run through the playoffs then win the Ryder Cup in Rome. But of course, the Ryder Cup is still almost two months away, and the playoffs run over four weeks. In other words, if their new putters don’t work, there’s plenty of time to bench it and start again, with minimal consequences.
“I’ve got my Spider with me this week if that putter isn’t doing what I want it to do over the first couple days. I may go back,” McIlroy says. “I sort of treat it like a 12-round tournament. You’ve got 12 rounds to play.”

The post Big name players are making FedEx Cup playoff putter switches — here’s why appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

If you win in the shadows, you still win, and you can bet Sam Burns wasn’t bothered by the various narratives swirling around him as he took home the title in the final WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play with a 6-and-5 win over Cameron Young on a listless Sunday afternoon in the Texas capital. The glory, the $3.5 million prize money payout, the surprising shot of success in what has been a difficult year — all of it is sustenance transcending what everyone else might be thinking.

In other words, good for Burns. The highlight of his week came on Sunday morning, when the 26-year-old Louisiana native stared down his friend Scottie Scheffler, the No. 1 player in the world and the undisputed alpha of this event, in their semi-final clash. Burns survived a blown lead and a five-foot putt from Scheffler that would have relegated Burns to the consolation match, winning on the third extra hole with a gutsy putt. That sealed a date with Young, who also went to extra holes to defeat a juggernaut (Rory McIlroy). It was little surprise that both looked — and played — exhausted as the mercury rose at Austin Country Club.

Even the crowd, in full throat during the morning matches, seemed subdued. By his own admission Burns got off to a slow start with a bogey on 2. He was still 1 down two holes later, but then Burns brought the heat. If you thought the nifty 27 on the front-nine that Young posted earlier in the week against poor Davis Thompson was impressive, what Burns unleashed was almost as devastating.

Starting with an iron to six feet on the par-3 fourth, Burns birdied eight of his next 10 holes in a display so dominant that Young, who tried his best to hold strong, was reduced to shouting expletives after an errant tee shot on 12, and pouring two balls into the water on 12 and 13 as the match came to an anticlimactic finish. There is a saying in recreational golf that if you’re going to play poorly, at least play poorly fast. You could perhaps extend that metaphor to this match itself — it may have not lived up to what came before, but it had the courtesy to end early.

As for those shadows cast over Burns, the longest on Sunday was perhaps the anticipation of a McIlroy-Scheffler dream final turned not-much-consolation third-place match. As late as the 17th and 18th holes on Sunday morning, this outcome still seemed not just possible, but likely. Then Burns and Young turned things around completely, the action peaked in the extra holes, and everything that came after felt, almost by necessity, like denouement.

“This week is as mentally exhausting as it is physically,” Burns said, who made an impressive 49 birdies over 119 holes. “I think after 10 holes this morning, my caddie, Travis [Perkins], kind of gave me a good kick in the butt and said: ‘Come on man, let’s go, you got this.’ And I really needed it at the time. I’m just so thankful that he was out there with me battling every step of the way and thankful that we were the last one standing.”

That 10th hole, when Burns trailed Scheffler by two holes after leading early, was the low moment of his day, the nadir before the peaks to come. Burns’ putting all week had been among the field’s best, but he took it to a new level in the final, pouring in putts of 20 feet, 11 feet, and 20 feet again in his stupendous birdie stretch. There is likely no opponent that could have stood up to him after Perkins lit the fire.

It’s worth noting, speaking of caddies, that this was Young’s first week with Paul Tesori, who formerly looped for Vijay Singh and Webb Simpson. Though Tesori is far more of a talker, Young said he enjoyed the dynamic, especially the fact that Tesori’s frequent questions, in an effort to know his new player, also triggered some thoughts for Young himself about how he plays the game — a surprise kind of self-discovery that obviously worked well in their maiden outing.

Young, 25 and still looking for his first PGA Tour win after now collecting a sixth runner-up finish, made no excuses and seemed to leave with no regrets. Still, he deserve some pity anyway — he was at the top of the strokes gained leaderboards all week, in every category, and didn’t play badly against Burns. It’s never fun to run into a buzzsaw, particularly when you’re the one that had been chopping everybody else into bits all week. The words Young chose to describe what he faced in that last match were succinct but accurate: “a huge bummer.”

“I think if it had been a stroke-play tournament, who knows,” Young said. “You never know. Because I could have played totally differently. Maybe I start with a 31 and not a 27. So it’s hard to say. I’m really happy with where my game’s at and I’m just excited for the next couple weeks coming up to Augusta and then Hilton Head.”

The odd dichotomy between these two players is that Young, despite being winless, has already had great early success in majors (two top-three finishes last year), while Burns, just a year older, has now won five times on tour but has yet to register anything better than a T-20 at majors. (When asked to explain his poor performance in the big four, Burns told the reporter how excited he was to go to Augusta, but declined to answer the question.)

As all thoughts turn now to Augusta, let’s spare one last backward glance for Austin and the Austin Country Club, which has hosted the WGC-Match Play since 2016. It’s unclear whether a match-play event is coming back to the PGA Tour at any point, but we can be sure it won’t be here. The club reportedly asked for more money from the tour at a point in the LIV crisis when the tour wasn’t in the mood to negotiate. To some extent, it gave this week an air of nostalgia, melancholy or something in between, and it was possible to feel that energy on Sunday as the Austin era came to a close.

Credit where its due, though. This tournament gave us an exciting farewell, even with his anticlimactic finish, and the ending was appropriate in its way. If what the broader world desired most was Scheffler and McIlroy dueling it out as the last players in the very last match of the WGC-Match Play, they got exactly what they wanted. It just so happened to be the third-place bout, finishing on the 17th hole long after the championship had been decided … a kind of cosmic wink from a format, and a sport, that will almost always resist the perfect mano-a-mano duel.

Match play on the PGA Tour is a finicky beast — always seemingly on the verge of collapse, frequently maligned, yet routinely delivering far more than you expect. As the sun set on Austin this final Sunday, you had to wonder — at least for a moment — if it also had a sense of humour.

The post Sam Burns captures WGC-Dell Match Play in rout as PGA Tour says goodbye to Austin appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

After another BMW Championship victory, defending champ Patrick Cantlay jumps into the No. 2 seed, behind Scheffler and looking to become the first player to win the FedEx Cup title in back-to-back seasons. Behind them are Xander Schauffele and Sam Burns, followed Cam Smith, Rory McIlroy and the remaining 23 players in the field all looking to take home the $18 million grand prize.

With the distinctive staggered-stroke format, Scheffler will start the event at 10-under, a two-stroke lead over anyone else in the field, and each player will have their own respective starting score based on their place in the 30 players.

Just making the cut are Aaron Wise and Adam Scott, who both needed pars on the 72nd hole at the Wilmington Country Club to clinch a bid for East Lake. Scott Stallings also made the jump after starting at No. 46 heading into the BMW Championship; a solo second-place finish was more than enough for him to qualify for the Tour Championship for the first time in 10 FedEx Cup playoff appearances.

The winner will receive an $18 million cut of the $75 million purse.

Tee Times (all times EDT)

11.45am (7.45pm UAE) — Aaron Wise
11.55am — Sahith Theegala, Adam Scott
12.05pm — KH Lee, JT Poston
12.15pm — Corey Conners, Brian Harman
12.25pm — Billy Horschel, Tom Hoge
12.35pm — Viktor Hovland, Collin Morikawa
12.45pm — Jordan Spieth, Joaquin Niemann
12.55pm — Max Homa, Hideki Matsuyama
1.05pm — Cameron Young, Matt Fitzpatrick
1.15pm — Scott Stallings, Justin Thomas
1.25pm — Sungjae Im, Jon Rahm
1.35pm — Tony Finau, Sepp Straka
1.45pm — Cameron Smith, Rory McIlroy
1.55pm — Xander Schauffele, Sam Burns
2.05pm — Scottie Scheffler, Patrick Cantlay

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Crushed with disappointment, all the rookie from Mississippi could muster on Thursday in the opening round of the Memorial Tournament was a five-under 67 in his first official round at Muirfield Village Golf Club. Which was good for a share of lead.

Yeah, no. He wasn’t crushed. He just continues to crush it.

Riley, 25, could have sulked and hung his head after he pumped a drive out of bounds on the 14th hole Sunday at Colonial Country Club and suffered a double-bogey that dropped him out of a tie for the lead. He eventually finished T-4, his sixth top-10 in a season that also includes a playoff loss to Sam Burns at the Valspar Championship.

Instead, he wasn’t about to let one poor swing overshadow all the good ones he made at Colonial — and for much of the year.

“That was a tough one to swallow,” Riley said after storming home with a 31 on the inward nine at Muirfield Village on the strength of an eagle at the par-5 15th secured with a “perfect little cut 3-wood” approach from 262 yards to 17 feet. “I really felt like I had that tournament right there. And I feel like I’ve had a good chance, had a chance to win three or four golf tournaments in the past few months. That’s been really nice. All I can do is keep putting myself in that position.”

T1 at -5 ?@DavisRiley68 joins the leaders after an impressive 2nd shot from the bunker. pic.twitter.com/ln2miSZenT

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) June 2, 2022

His attitude is as solid as the pass he makes at the ball. Or maybe it’s a product of it. Either way, he had no trouble shaking off the disappointment or talking about it.

“It’s like I was one golf swing away from being in a playoff or winning a golf tournament,” he said. “And I’ve had that a couple times, like in Mexico, I lost by two to [Jon] Rahm, hit a shot at 16 and came up short and plugged in the bunker. It’s like if that lands five yards further and goes on the green, actually I’ve got a good-looking birdie and that can change everything. Just little things like that.”

Yeah, well little things like that might bother somebody less mature or lacking confidence. Riley, who attended Alabama and has formed a natural bond with fellow Crimson Tide product Justin Thomas, seems to roll with the punches quite admirably. One bad swing isn’t cause for alarm, just a little introspection.

First round leaderboard @MemorialGolf

T1. Cameron Young (-5)
T1. Luke List
T1. Cameron Smith
T1. K.H. Lee
T1. Mackenzie Hughes
T1. Davis Riley
T7. Will Zalatoris (-4)
T7. Denny McCarthy
T7. Sahith Theegala
T7. Wyndham Clark

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) June 2, 2022

“It’s just one bad golf swing. It’s like you tell yourself don’t do that. But it’s easy to do that,” he said with a wide smile. “I think the biggest thing in those situations is just you learn your tendencies when the pressure is really, really on. And I’ve kind of learned that about myself. I’m learning what shots I tend to hit more of when I’m under pressure or things I can do better under pressure. I think that’s the biggest thing when you get in those moments.

“I’m playing good golf. And I’ve had a handful of top 10s in the past month, month-and-a-half. It’s like I’m doing the right stuff. I’ve just got to keep on doing it. It’s like eventually it will happen.”

In his last five starts since missing the cut at the RBC Heritage, Riley has finished T-4, fifth, T-9, T-13 (in his PGA Championship debut) and that T-4 last week at the Charles Schwab Challenge. He ranks 35th on the PGA Tour with a 70.266 scoring average. He’s made $2.6 million and is now ranked 94th in the world. Yeah, he’s doing the right stuff.

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The post Davis Riley shakes off another missed chance, quickly jumps into mix in first Memorial start appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Welcome to another edition of The Grind, where we still can’t get our left ear unclogged after going to the pool for the first time this year. I’ve had some ear wax issues in the past and the water just made it worse. Huh? What’s that? Too much information? Sorry, I can’t hear you. Anyway, here’s what else has us talking after a fun Memorial Day weekend.

WE’RE BUYING

Sam Burns: Talk about the floodgates opening, what a season this guy is having. After finally grabbing his first PGA Tour title last May, Burns has now won three more times, including on Sunday at Colonial, where he took down the reigning King of the floodgates opening, Scottie Scheffler. And Burns did it in a playoff after a two- hour wait that included a gym session. “Just one of those things where you don’t know if you’re going to get the opportunity, but when coach calls your name, you’ve got to be ready to play, and I think we did a really good job of being ready.” He sure did:

Unbelievably clutch.@SamBurns66 drained the 38-footer from off the green to win @CSChallengeFW. pic.twitter.com/DaQmWt5MRe

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) May 29, 2022

The guy has a real knack for making bombs in playoffs. For winning the Charles Schwab Challenge, the 25-year-old also got a pretty dope car to ride off into the sunset with:

And apparently he drove that bad boy right to a Buc-ee’s to celebrate:

Of course Sam went to @bucees after the W. Man of the people!

(? @Samburns66) pic.twitter.com/1YFiFsOLfo

— Caddie Network (@CaddieNetwork) May 30, 2022

You could really do some damage there with $1.6 million. Anyway, Burns is back into the top 10 of the Official World Golf Ranking with his fourth career win. What a stud. Speaking of studs …

Gordon Sargent: How about this Vanderbilt freshman who won the NCAA individual title? Gordon really turned heads on the final hole of regulation with a booming drive that registered 194mph ball speed.

Gordon Sargent dropping ??? at the #USJuniorAm. pic.twitter.com/Rr2IuA3XYY

— Vanderbilt Men's Golf (@VandyMGolf) July 21, 2021

Crazy. Remember a few years ago when we were told then Texas A&M prospect Cameron Champ was a unicorn with speeds like that? Well, not anymore. These powerful young guns are coming. And they’re coming fast.

Steven Alker: This is truly the most remarkable golf story of the past year. Heck, I’d go as far as to say it’s the biggest Cinderella story going in all of sports. But it’s gone largely under the radar because Steven Alker plays on the PGA Tour Champions, and, well, he’s Steven Alker. Hardly anyone had even heard of this journeyman from New Zealand when he Monday qualified for his first senior event last summer after turning 50, but since then he’s become the tour’s dominant force with four wins in 19 starts, including three in his last five after capturing a first major at the Senior PGA Championship.

How is this possible for a guy who had zero top-10s and 47 missed cuts in 80 career PGA Tour starts? “Just perseverance,” Alker said. “That’s all I can say. Just perseverance with a capital P.” Better late than never, huh? Seriously, they should make a movie about this guy.

This house: Check out this golf pad that’s basically one giant enclosed mini-golf course (start with the second photo):

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by Zillow Gone Wild ? (@zillowgonewild)

You want to improve your putting? But this place. Who needs a dining room these days anyway?

WE’RE SELLING

Harold Varner III’s back nine: HV3 is one of the easiest guys to root for in sports, and we really, really hope that first PGA Tour title comes. Heck, he could be another floodgates guy considering his other victories in Australia and Saudi Arabia. But there’s no sugar coating the fact that this was one of the biggest back-nine meltdowns in history.

Four putts from 19 feet.

A triple bogey for Harold Varner III to fall out of the lead. pic.twitter.com/MXkRk7XVIM

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) May 29, 2022

After taking a share of the lead (and that can’t be a coincidence) with pars on 10 and 11, Varner went triple bogey, double bogey, triple bogey on his next three holes. He added one more double bogey at No. 18 to shoot a back-nine 45 and not even finish in the top 25. Yikes.

Ryan Fox’s final hole: Of regulation, that is. The New Zealander was a -5000 live “lock” at sports books when arriving at the par-5 18th at the DP World Tour Dutch Open with a three-stroke lead, but a disastrous double bogey (and a later birdie by Victor Perez) put him in a playoff with Perez that Fox ultimately lost. Ouch. Although, not as ouch as the pain anyone who actually bet on him in that spot is feeling.

Also, we should mention that we’re buying Perez’s putting as the Frenchman made four bombs over the final six holes, including the final nail in Fox’s tournament coffin on the fourth extra hole. So, again, a LOT had to happen for Fox not to win this thing. Of course, that’s golf, folks.

This pin placement: Many years ago, I set up a Google news alert for stories involving golf crime. Well, this didn’t show up in one of those alerts (I can’t figure out how to turn them off), but it should have. Because this pin placement at an Iowa high school state championship is a straight up golf crime. Have a look:

Today at the Girls 3A State Golf Tournament at The River Valley Golf Course in Adel, the average score on hole 18 was a quadruple bogey.

No, the golfers weren't bad, but this had to have been the most unfair pin placement I've ever seen. This slope gave the athletes no chance. pic.twitter.com/F7OyqIjbkO

— Jake Brend (@JakeBrendTV) May 28, 2022

Those poor girls had no chance. Just sick, sick stuff. Whoever is responsible should do jail time.

Scottie Scheffler: The guy hadn’t made a bogey all week at Colonial until his 53rd hole. He then blew a two-shot lead on Sunday while making two. What a fool! Of course, we’re kidding. The World No. 1 showed that he’s human over the weekend, but he’s still clearly the World No. 1. And how about that hustle to make it to his sister-in-law’s wedding?

A photo finish.

Scottie Scheffler went straight from the playoff to his sister-in-law’s wedding. pic.twitter.com/GjRcMoSXVp

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) May 30, 2022

ON TAP

The PGA Tour heads to Muirfield Village for the Memorial, AKA Jack’s Tournament, AKA that tournament where players post pics of their milkshakes all week. If I could choose any tournament to attend that I haven’t been to, it would be this one. And yes, that’s solely based on said milkshakes. But wait, there’s more! The US Women’s Open is at Pine Needles, a course I was lucky enough to play a couple years ago. What a great spot. I can’t wait to watch both — preferably with an inferior milkshake in hand.

It’s a good week to figure that out https://t.co/C8o0ExHkOg

— max homa (@maxhoma23) May 30, 2022

Random tournament fact: Technically, Patrick Cantlay is the defending champ at Muirfield Village, but we all know Jon Rahm would have won if he hadn’t tested positive for COVID. And since Rahm won by three shots the year before, well, yeah, he’s the guy to beat. “The way I played there the last two years it should be at least six,” Rahm joked of a potential staggered leaderboard this week like the PGA Tour uses for the Tour Championship. “Maybe more.” No argument here, Jon.

PHOTO OF THE WEEK

Cheers to an eventful 3 weeks on the road. Might have ended with an MC but hey, at least I still get to bring this home ? pic.twitter.com/rJjoCsxd8p

— Justin Thomas (@JustinThomas34) May 28, 2022

Indeed, you do, JT. And cheers to you for even playing at Colonial.

VIRAL VIDEO OF THE WEEK

This might be the all-time best video of Jordan Spieth interacting with caddie Michael Greller—and that’s saying something:

"I just don't see it Jordan." ? @JordanSpieth sees the game differently than all of us. pic.twitter.com/PCqL7Yikk9

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) May 26, 2022

Greller trying to call him off a crazy shot. Jordan persisting. Michael apologising to give his guy confidence. Jordan pulling off an insane Jordan shot. Just an instant classic.

THIS WEEK IN PUBLIC DISPLAYS OF AFFECTION

First, there was your standard WAG PDA between Sam Burns and his wife, Caroline:

pic.twitter.com/NMIKK5gGJU

— Golf Digest (@GolfDigest) May 29, 2022

Good stuff. But then we got Burns gushing about his good friend Scheffler: “Yeah, we’re probably best friends. But at the same time I can assure you, he wanted to beat me more than anybody else and I wanted to beat him more than anybody else, and it just happened to be the two of us at the end. Yeah, it’s going to be a fun story that we’ll get to have for the rest of our careers, and fortunately I got the better end of it this time, but hopefully we’re at the beginning of these situations in the future.”

Sam Burns and Scottie Scheffler. Tom Pennington

And Scheffler responding:

Awww. Nothing — not even that sweet Firebird Trans Am — can get between these guys.

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“It would have been more fun if we had to do it for 18 holes. I kind of joked with him at the end, he ruined all the fun making a 40-footer.” — Scottie Scheffler on his BFF.

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The post Scottie Scheffler and Sam Burns’ bromance gets tested, an all-time Jordan Spieth-Michael Greller moment, and the biggest Cinderella story in sports appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

“Crazy (expletive) can happen,” said Varner, still in search of his first PGA Tour title. “Man. You’re sitting there on … you just never know.”

Unfortunately, Varner was more spot on than he could have imagined during a chaotic final round at Colonial Country Club in Fort Worth. On the tee at the par-4 12th hole on Sunday, Varner was two-under for the round and 10-under for the tournament, holding a share of the lead with Scottie Scheffler and playing partner Scott Stallings. Varner successfully found the fairway off the tee, but with a wedge in his hands he wound up burying his second shot in a greenside bunker, the whipping winds starting to pick up the pace even more.

As this was going on, Stallings hit his approach on the 12th hole over the green and needed a ruling to get relief from a TV tower. Varner played his third shot, blasting it out on the green but leaving himself a 19-footer for par, a putt he had to wait roughly 15 minutes to hit as Stallings worked to get his ball on to the green.

Finally, Varner was ready to try to hole his par putt. But that’s when things really went sideways.

Four putts from 19 feet.

A triple bogey for Harold Varner III to fall out of the lead. pic.twitter.com/MXkRk7XVIM

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) May 29, 2022

Varner four-putted from that position for triple-bogey seven and missed two putts in that sequence from inside four feet. That result then lingered, which explains what happened on the next two holes.

From co-leader to T9 ?

Double bogey on the next has Harold Varner III 4 shots back. pic.twitter.com/T0Ugr45aWI

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) May 29, 2022

On the par-3 13th Varner hit his tee shot into the water and walked away with a double-bogey 5. He then hit his drive on the par-4 14th out of bounds right. That set up another triple-bogey 7. In the span of three holes, Varner was eight-over par after being 10-under through his opening 65.

But that wasn’t the end of the roller-coaster. He impressively bounced back on the par-4 15th hole, when he hit his approach shot to five feet and made a birdie. After par on the 16th Varner made another double-bogey on the 17th and closed his miserable round with a bogey on the last. Varner shot 10-over 45 on the back nine, signed for eight-over 78 on the round and tumbled into a tie for 27th place.

While Varner was nine shots behind winner Sam Burns it still was another missed opportunity to grab his first PGA Tour win. He’s had a fine career so far without it, although a week earlier at the PGA Championship, the 31-year-old joined an auspicious club by becoming the 11th golfer in PGA Tour history to make $10 million for his career without a win.

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The post WATCH: Harold Varner III could have used a hug after this four-putt started a triple-double-triple stumble appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

But no one appeared to want to win on Sunday at Colonial Country Club in Fort Worth. With windy conditions blowing in during the afternoon, Scheffler, Harold Varner III, Scott Stallings, Brendon Todd and Davis Riley, all tied for the lead at one point, all faltered down the stretch.

Enter Sam Burns. The 25-year-old Louisiana native had wrapped up his final round nearly two hours ahead of the leaders, and his five-under 65 gave him a clubhouse lead at nine-under. It was good enough to get into a playoff with Scheffler, who posted a two-over 72 but got up-and-down from a bunker for par on the 18th hole. And after making a 38-foot birdie from off the green on the first extra hole, Burns claimed his third win of the 2021-22 season and fourth career win, all in the last 13 months.

With the victory, Burns claimed a first-place prize money payout of $1.512 million from an overall purse of $8.4 million (up from $7.5 million in 2021). Here’s the prize money payouts for each golfer who made the cut at Colonial

Win: Sam Burns, 271/-9, $1,512,000
2: Scottie Scheffler, 271/-9, $915,600
3: Brendon Todd, 272/-8, $579,600
T-4: Tony Finau, 273/-7, $353,500
T-4: Davis Riley, 273/-7, $353,500
T-4: Scott Stallings, 273/-7, $353,500
T7: Cam Davis, 275/-5, $246,540
T7: Kevin Na, 275/-5, $246,540
T7: Mito Pereira, 275/-5, $246,540
T7: Patrick Reed, 275/-5, $246,540
T7: Jordan Spieth, 275/-5, $246,540
T-12: John Huh, 276/-4, $178,500
T-12: Matt Jones, 276/-4, $178,500
T-12: Pat Perez, 276/-4, $178,500
T-15: Christiaan Bezuidenhout, 277/-3, $132,300
T-15: Tyler Duncan, 277/-3, $132,300
T-15: Sungjae Im, 277/-3, $132,300
T-15: Chris Kirk, 277/-3, $132,300
T-15: Russell Knox, 277/-3, $132,300
T-15: Andrew Putnam, 277/-3, $132,300
T-21: Beau Hossler, 278/-2, $98,700
T-21: Viktor Hovland, 278/-2, $98,700
T-23: Daniel Berger, 279/-1, $77,700
T-23: Max Homa, 279/-1, $77,700
T-23: Zach Johnson, 279/-1, $77,700
T-23: Danny Lee, 279/-1, $77,700
T-27: Talor Gooch, 280/E, $56,332.50
T-27: Bill Haas, 280/E, $56,332.50
T-27: Denny McCarthy, 280/E, $56,332.50
T-27: Chad Ramey, 280/E, $56,332.50
T-27: Chez Reavie, 280/E, $56,332.50
T-27: Webb Simpson, 280/E, $56,332.50
T-27: Alex Smalley, 280/E, $56,332.50
T-27: Harold Varner III, 280/E, $56,332.50
T-35: Tommy Fleetwood, 281/+1, $41,832
T-35: Dylan Frittelli, 281/+1, $41,832
T-35: Lee Hodges, 281/+1, $41,832
T-35: Adam Long, 281/+1, $41,832
T-35: Patrick Rodgers, 281/+1, $41,832
T-40: Luke Donald, 282/+2, $30,660
T-40: Lucas Glover, 282/+2, $30,660
T-40: Kurt Kitayama, 282/+2, $30,660
T-40: Collin Morikawa, 282/+2, $30,660
T-40: Ryan Palmer, 282/+2, $30,660
T-40: Ian Poulter, 282/+2, $30,660
T-40: Adam Svensson, 282/+2, $30,660
T-40: Michael Thompson, 282/+2, $30,660
T-48: Lucas Herbert, 283/+3, $22,092
T-48: David Lipsky, 283/+3, $22,092
T-48: Sebastián Muñoz, 283/+3, $22,092
T-48: Nick Taylor, 283/+3, $22,092
T-52: Mark Hubbard, 284/+4, $20,008.80
T-52: Max McGreevy, 284/+4, $20,008.80
T-52: C.T. Pan, 284/+4, $20,008.80
T-52: Rory Sabbatini, 284/+4, $20,008.80
T-52: Martin Trainer, 284/+4, $20,008.80
T-57: Rickie Fowler, 285/+5, $18,984
T-57: Troy Merritt, 285/+5, $18,984
T-57: Matthew NeSmith, 285/+5, $18,984
T-57: Matthias Schwab, 285/+5, $18,984
T-57: Brandt Snedeker, 285/+5, $18,984
T-57: Sahith Theegala, 285/+5, $18,984
T-63: Joel Dahmen, 286/+6, $18,228
T-63: Emiliano Grillo, 286/+6, $18,228
T-63: Austin Smotherman, 286/+6, $18,228
66: Charley Hoffman, 287/+7, $17,892
67: Jason Kokrak, 288/+8, $17,724
68: Aaron Rai, 289/+9, $17,556
69: Harry Higgs, 295/+15, $17,388

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The post From Burns to Higgs: Here’s the prize money payout for each golfer at the 2022 Charles Schwab Challenge appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Burns’ final-round 65 tied for the day’s low round, but it took a number of miscues from the leaders for him to even get into overtime. Sunday at Colonial Country Club in Fort Worth boasted a crowded leaderboard as the final nine got underway. That’s when the gusty winds started to take their toll on the field. Davis Riley hit a drive out of bounds on the 14th and made double bogey, followed by Brendon Todd bogeying the par-5 11th. Scott Stallings was next to falter, making bogey after airmailing the green at 12 closely followed by Harold Varner III coming up short from 124 yards, plugging in the bunker and making a mess with a four-putt for a triple bogey. That put Scheffler in the lead alone before he bogeyed the 11th with a three-jack from the fringe, which suddenly made Burns a very viable contender as he finished his round.

In winning Burns leaned on two normally reliable parts of his game: strong play off the tee and a deft touch on the greens. Burns was sixth in the field in strokes gained/off-the-tee as well as in driving distance at 321.3 yards.

Burns’ driver is a 10.5 degree Callaway Rogue ST Triple Diamond with a Fujikura Ventus Blue 7x shaft. The driver fits Burns’ desire to work the ball and shape shots off the tee while dropping the spin rate to a more optimal level.

On the greens, Burns ranked sixth in strokes gained/putting, more than five strokes better than the field average with his Odyssey O-Works Black #7S mallet putter. On Sunday Burns holed birdie putts of seven, 10, nine, nine 15, 10 and eight feet allowing him to pick up 4.116 shots on the field in the final round alone.

Burns’ putter is a club he has primarily had in the bag since turning pro in 2017. “I’ve changed a few times, but not for long,” Burns told Golf Digest earlier this year. “It’s a club I’m really comfortable with and it sets up well for me. I’m not one to change much. Having the comfort level and seeing good results with it would make it hard to switch.”

If he keeps making putts like he did at Colonial in the final round, expect that putter to stay in the bag a little bit longer.

What Sam Burns had in the bag at the 2022 Charles Schwab Challenge:

Ball: Callaway Chrome Soft X
Driver: Callaway Rogue ST Triple Diamond (Fujikura Ventus Blue 7x), 10.5 degrees
5-wood: Callaway Mavrik Sub Zero, 17 degrees
Hybrid: Callaway Apex UW, 21 degrees
Irons (4-AW): Callaway Apex TCB
Wedges: Callaway Jaws MD5 Raw (56, 60 degrees)
Putter: Odyssey O-Works Black #7S

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The post The clubs Sam Burns used to win the 2022 Charles Schwab Challenge appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Right?

Two hours and 13 minutes later, at 6pm, Burns rolled in a 38-foot downhill putt from off the green, watched his friend and World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler narrowly miss a similar prayer and won the whole thing.

Unbelievably clutch.@SamBurns66 drained the 38-footer from off the green to win @CSChallengeFW. pic.twitter.com/DaQmWt5MRe

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) May 29, 2022

How did it happen? How did the 25-year-old Louisiana native tie the largest comeback in this venerable tournament’s history? Well, you can define the strange events of Sunday at Colonial either positively — by what Sam Burns did — or negatively, but by what everyone else failed to do.

Let’s start with Burns, who came out scorching on a sunny but windy day in Fort Worth, on a course that he had visited as a child when his mentor David Toms won in 2011. Burns’ major adjustment at Colonial this year was to play more aggressively by hitting more drivers on a Perry Maxwell track that known in recent years for taking the driver out of players’ hands.

It worked. Burns’ opening nine was a birdie fusillade, one after another, starting with a seven-footer on the first hole. On the second, he drove 350 yards, hit his short pitch to 10 feet and buried the putt. Indeed, everything seemed to be working early. A brief bogey hiccup on the fifth hole was the only break in a stretch of six birdies culminating with a nine-footer on the ninth to come into the turn at 30.

Birdie
Birdie
Par
Birdie
Bogey
Birdie
Birdie@SamBurns66 is racking up birdies early. He's 3 back. pic.twitter.com/NESQwOrHtk

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) May 29, 2022

The mid-range birdie putts continued to fall on 11, but an errant drive on 12, which he bemoaned in his post-round interview, led to his second bogey of the day and halted his momentum in its tracks. He wouldn’t make another birdie, though he came within inches on almost every hole. Insofar as a 65 can be “disappointing” in any way at all, it was a disappointing finish considering his red-hot start.

“I thought I needed to make that putt on 18 in regulation to get to 10,” he said later, “and to be honest I thought I did make it. I hit a really good putt and just missed barely low.”

At that point, the tournament was up for grabs. Harold Varner III, Davis Riley, Brendon Todd and Scheffler, the 54-hole leader, had found their way to 10-under, by various means, and the trophy was there for the seizing. Instead, gravity reached for and caught them all, one by one, as nerves and the difficult conditions made their mission increasingly impossible.

“I can assure you I did not envy them while they were out there playing,” Burns said. “It didn’t feel like it was blowing any less than we were out there, it was just one of those things when you finally finish, you’re just ready to be done.”

Varner, perhaps unsurprisingly, was the first to take his hat out of the ring. He’s long had trouble playing in tense situations close to the lead on Sunday, and this was an exaggerated version of all his worst moments. A three-hole stretch starting on 12 was almost unspeakably poor, resulting in a triple bogey, a double bogey, and another triple (and a fair amount of 757 jokes on Twitter). This torpedoed his chances, and two more disastrous holes to close left him with a head-scratching 45 on the back nine. He finished even par for the tournament, in a tie for 27th place, and a whole slew of questions about how to fix his pressure performances.

Riley was next to go, and though his fall wasn’t as dramatic as Varner’s, it was equally decisive — a bogey on 13 after a missed four-footer for par and a double-bogey on 14 after the first out-of-bounds drive anyone hit on the hole all week ushered him from the dizzying heights and down to a safer part of the leaderboard.

That left the final pairing of Todd and Scheffler, the former falling to eight-under after bogeys on 11 and 12. Todd couldn’t escape that number despite a strong effort in the closing stretch. This narrow birdie miss on 16 was particularly galling after a seemingly perfect read:

Brendon Todd to tie the lead … pic.twitter.com/jo07Zy8NPo

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) May 29, 2022

Like Burns, Todd couldn’t make anything happen on the back nine despite a few close calls, and when his approach shot found the bunker on 18, he was effectively eliminated.

“This is my favourite course on tour,” said Todd after his one-over 71 left him in solo third. “It’s a place I feel like I can contend, and I’ve done that again. It’s tough, because I feel like if I had just a couple things go my way today, I would have been the clear winner.”

With everyone around him blowing over, the tournament seemed to be Scheffler’s to seize, and after his many wins this season — four in his last nine starts, culminating at the Masters — there was no question of the pressure affecting him. As Burns would say later, “the way that guy is playing right now, who would have ever thought that you’d have a chance seven back?”

Scheffler and Burns are good friends off the course, taking a little of the sting away from Scheffler falling short on Sunday at Colonial.

And yet, after a 66-65-68 start to the tournament, Scheffler somehow put together a round of zero birdies when simply shooting even par would have been enough to win by two shots. Strange as it sounds, Scheffler was actually fortunate to hang tough at nine-under as his day wound to a close, sinking par putts of nine feet, eight feet and six feet on three of the last four holes to narrowly eke his way into a playoff. A triumph at Colonial would have given him five PGA Tour wins on the season, making him one of just six players to accomplish that feat since 1981.

Instead, in the playoff with Burns (and with his sister-in-law’s wedding to attend Sunday night), Scheffler watched his “best friend on tour” knock in the improbable putt and take the championship from his grasp.

For his troubles, Burns pocketed his fourth PGA Tour win in the last 13 months, $1.512 million, and a fully restored 1979 Pontiac Firebird. And the quote of the day came in his post-round press conference, when a reporter asked Burns a simple question:

“Are you a car guy?”

“I am now,” he said.

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When Burns tugged his drive into said water, it created another decision of sorts: Where exactly did the ball cross into the penalty area?

A discussion ensued between Horschel, Burns, Jason Day (who was playing with Jason Scrivener in the same pairing) and an on-site rules official. Horschel believed that the ball hit the bank before bounding left into the water, which TV replay confirmed. The question, though, was whether the ball hit outside the red line marking the penalty area, in which case Burns and Horschel could take their drop beside the green, roughly 30 feet from the hole? Or did it land inside the red line, in which case Burns and Horschel would have to take a drop farther back toward the fairway, at least 50 yards from the green?

The PGA Tour posted a video of the discussion on Twitter.

As you can hear, Horschel did not see precisely where the ball landed but felt that the ball likely hit outside the red line because he believed that he would not otherwise have been able to see the ball bounce from the tee box given the elevation difference from the teeing area. Day said he didn’t see the ball splash but didn’t pay attention to where the ball crossed.

Unfortunately, the angle of the TV replay did not show specifically where the ball landed, either. Because of that, in consultation with head rules official Gary Young, it was determined that given the information Horschel and Burns had and using their reasonable judgement, they could drop beside the green as if the ball did bounce outside the red line.

From there, Horschel played his third shot to two feet of the hole and Burns rolled in the par putt.

Still within two shots of the leaders, Horschel had the tee on the par-3 17th but proceeded to overcook it. He and Burns wound up making bogey on the hole to fall three shots back, essentially ending their bid at victory.

After the round, Horschel and Burns, who finished the day with a four-under 68, talked more about what happened.

Billy Horschel and Sam Burns discuss a drop after their tee shot finds the water on No. 16. pic.twitter.com/4kYXbSscdv

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) April 24, 2022

“So, from where we were, Sam pulled his drive a little bit and it was coming back,” Horschel said. “Conversation was did it land above the red line? Well, I saw a ball land and bounce. From the tee box and everything, you really can’t see the red line.”

“The ball was six inches into the water,” Burns interjected. “If it lands close to the edge, it’s going to kick pretty hard in, but if it lands higher up it’s going to kind of …”

Horschel then continued: “It’s going to take a couple bounces. From what I saw and not being able to see the red line and where the red line was, I couldn’t see below that from the tee box when I got up there, so I figured that ball had to land up on top of the red line. We asked TV and everything, and TV didn’t have clear-cut evidence. Travis, [Burns’] caddie, saw the ball bounce.

“I’m one to play it safe, but I was pretty confident that ball landed above the red line.”

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