By Shane Ryan
ST. SIMONS ISLAND, Ga. — There’s an old saying that pros miss their putts on the high side of the break, but moments after shooting 60 to reach 15 under at the RSM Classic on Sunday—tied for second as the leaders made the turn—Tyler McCumber wasn’t buying it.

“Pros hit it in the middle of the cup,” he said.

To be fair to McCumber, his own birdie putt on the ninth green at the Seaside Course—he started on the 10th hole early Sunday morning—was miles from a gimme. Following a string of five birdies over his previous five holes, he blasted a 3-wood 123 yards from the hole, but hit his approach a groove low with his 52-degree wedge and left himself 53 feet for the 12th 59 in PGA Tour history. The long attempt, which tour players drain roughly 5 percent of the time, came shockingly close, and before it slipped by on the high side, McCumber thought it was good.

Making dad proud. ?

Tyler McCumber taps in for an impressive 60. pic.twitter.com/dJUZrj844w

— PGA TOUR (@PGATOUR) November 21, 2021

He was only one-under through his first five holes, but jump-started his round on the par-5 15th, his sixth, with a 3-iron into the wind from 224 yards that set up a 48-foot eagle putt. A birdie on 16 set him up for a 31 on his front nine, but it wasn’t until the fourth hole when he turned up the heat. Five straight approaches to within 10 feet set up that string of five birdies, and turned the idea of 59 from longshot to near-reality.

McCumber said he began considering the possibility on the seventh, and rather than making him nervous, it was a helpful goal to ensure that pushed hard for the finish rather than coasting in.

He was trailed by a favourable gallery all day, including his father Mark, a 10-time PGA Tour winner (whose career-low on tour was a 64, according to Golf Channel), and a group of family and friends wearing “Tito’s Banditos” hats. (Megan McCumber, his older sister, gave him the nickname Tito in childhood, and designed the hats.) Jay Haas walked with the elder McCumber, watching his own son, Bill Haas, in the same group.

“I’m happy for him,” Mark McCumber said after he made his birdie on eight. “I know how hard it is.”

Afterwards, when asked if his father had ever shot 60, Tyler McCumber laughed.

“He has not,” he said. “I know that for a fact. … I have a long way to go in that career to match him, but I’ll hold the 60 over his head tonight over a beer.”

There’s always a certain level of paradoxical disappointment when a player misses a putt for 59, despite the fact that it still indicates a brilliant round. McCumber is no different, but there was one subset of Tito’s Banditos who won’t be sad at all. Those are Megan McCumber’s kids, who told her before the round they didn’t want to leave St. Simons Island to go back to their home in Florida.

“I’ll tell you what,” she told them. “If your uncle shoots 10-under today, you don’t have go to school on Monday.”

She thought there was no chance, but her little brother proved her wrong, and her kids won’t be at all upset that Uncle Tito couldn’t quite make history.

The post Tyler McCumber comes agonisingly close to a 59 in his final round of 2021 appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Ryan Herrington
Tyler McCumber’s first career PGA Tour start came at the Corales Puntacana Resort & Club Championship in 2018, where he impressively played his way into the final pairing on the final day. But that Sunday didn’t come with a storybook finish; McCumber shot a 75, finished T-19 and watched playing partner Brice Garnett walk off with the title.

Thirty months later, in his 24th career tour start, McCumber used that finish as motivation when he played in the third-to-last pairing at Puntacana on Sunday. And while the 29-year-old didn’t win the tournament, his closing 66 was good enough for solo second, one stroke out of a playoff with Hudson Swafford. More importantly, it offered a much-needed confidence boost.

“All the stuff I was working on I feel like I did pretty well this week, staying patient and staying focused,” said McCumber, a 2019 Korn Ferry Tour graduate, whose $436,000 prize money payout more than double his career earnings on the PGA Tour. “So a lot of positives out this week obviously. And hats off to him for a clutch finish, too, birdieing 17 and two-putting from where he did on 18, it’s just really good.”

McCumber’s first career top-10 tour finish secured a start in this week’s Sanderson Farms Championship. He’ll arrive there with 300 FedEx Cup points locked in, putting him T-5 very early in what will be a long 2020-’21 season. Yet, if history is any measure, he’s only need roughly 100-120 more points to finish inside the top 125 and secure his card for another season.

Of course, Swafford with his win on Sunday locked up PGA Tour playing privileges through the end of 2022 and got himself starts in several big events in the next year (you’ve heard of the Masters, right?). Yet McCumber’s performance, and the net effect of it on his game and his psyche, could be viewed in a very similar light when you consider the trajectory his 2020 has been following.

Since the PGA Tour restart, McCumber had played in eights events prior to arriving in the Dominican Republic and had made the cut in just one (T-29 at the Barrcuda Championship). The son of former 10-time PGA Tour winner Mark McCumber wound up finishing 161st on the FedEx Cup points list at the end of the abbreviated 2019-’20 season which in any other campaign would have meant losing his tour card and needed to win it back in the Korn Ferry Tour Finals series. But when the tour decided to freeze everybody’s status because of the COVID-19 pandemic’s impact on the schedule, McCumber could clear his mind of the mess from the summer and start over this fall.

“I think you can take confidence out of it,” McCumber said. “Keep using that word ‘momentum,’ I don’t know why I like it so much, but yeah, any good finishes out here, try to roll with them and keep it going.”

The post Why this tour pro might have just saved his 2020-’21 season in only his second start appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Christopher Powers
If you turned the TV off when Hudson Swafford took a three-shot lead into the back nine on Sunday at the Corales Puntacana Resort & Club Championship, then saw that he won by a stroke on the 18th hole, you’d probably think it was a pretty ho-hum finish. Well, the joke’s on you then. (And how dare you turn off a tour event before it’s over, even if this is NFL season. You call yourself a golf fan?!?)

Swafford stumbled down the stretch, but somehow impressively rallied, and there was excitement right until the very last putt fell.

Don’t worry, we’ll help fill you in on what you missed. Without further delay, here are our four takeaways from Sunday’s final round in the Dominican Republic.

Hudson Swafford’s got guts
Unlike his Georgia Bulldogs football team against Arkansas a day earlier, Hudson Swafford got out to a fast start at Corales Golf Club Sunday. He effectively stepped on everyone’s neck, shooting a front-nine 31 to give him a seemingly insurmountable three-shot lead heading into the back nine., one he even stretched to four shots with six holes to go.

But no lead on the PGA Tour is insurmountable, especially when you throw shots away like Swafford did down the stretch. A double-bogey on the 13th and a bogey at the 15th saw his four-shot lead vanish, and he found himself in a three-way tie at 17 under on the par-3 17th tee. Not only did he let the field back in it, he was in danger of losing outright.

RELATED: The clubs that Hudson Swafford used to win the Corales Puntacana Championship

Instead of wilting, Swafford dialled up his favourite shot—a flighted 6-iron that settled eight feet from the hole. He made the birdie putt, his only birdie of the week at the difficult 210-yard par 3, to take back the lead.

“It was kind of like the shot on 17 at PGA West when I won [the 2017 Desert Classic)],” Swafford said. “I actually hit two great shots on 16, hit a great putt. Was kind of bummed out [it didn’t fall for birdie], and I was just like, ‘Man, you’ve got to just step up and hit a good flighted 6-iron.’ I’ve done it a 100,000 times, I love hitting that golf shot. Man, it was a good one, and an even better putt.”

The hard work was just beginning for Swafford, though. First, was something he couldn’t control, sweating out Mackenzie Hughes, who was tied with Tyler McCumber at 17 under, making birdie in the group ahead of him on the 18th hole. Then, he needed to make a par of his own on 18 to close it out. After Hughes bogeyed, Swafford hit his approach well short, leaving him with a testy two-putt. His first was 10 feet short, setting up a much longer par putt to win than he would have wanted. He poured it right in the heart, just like his birdie putt at 17, to capture his second career tour win.

“Just hit it solid,” Swafford told himself before the winning putt. “I’ve been putting beautifully all week, hitting a lot of good putts. Obviously a couple on the back nine that just burned the edges, but I putted great on the front, putted well all week. Kyle [Bradley, Swafford’s caddie] just said ‘just hit one last solid putt,’ and you never know. The first one I thought I hit it pretty hard but it started bouncing like some of my chips on the back nine and it just hit and stopped. But it was a solid putt and went right in.”

This win could not have come at a better time for the 33-year-old Florida native. Swafford had still been playing on a major medical extension and needed all the FedEx Cup points he could accumulate to get off of it. Now, he’s set for the next two seasons on tour, and he’s earned an invitation to the 2021 Masters, which will be just his second appearance in the event. If last year’s fall swing is any indication, Swafford may be a lock for East Lake next August. This past season, eight of the 10 winners of the fall events made it to the Tour Championship.

“Man, it’s amazing,” he said afterwards. “Words can’t really describe it. Last two years have been tough. Not family-wise though. Me and my wife had our first son, so, life’s great. Golf is really hard. To do this, it’s fun, this is why I get up and grind.”

• • •

Andy Lyons

Have a Sunday, Tyler McCumber
As nice as a win would have been, a solo second could be just as valuable for a player like Tyler McCumber. The 29-year-old failed to finish inside the top 125 of the FedEx Cup standings a year ago, but still has status thanks to finishing in the top 50 on the Korn Ferry Tour in 2019. On Sunday in the Dominican Republic, while everyone was faltering down the stretch, McCumber shot up the leader board. A bogey-free 66, which included a long birdie putt at the 72nd hole, put him at 17 under, enough for the runner-up after Hughes’ bogey at the 18th. It jumped him 108 spots in the 2020-’21 FedEx Cup standings, where he now sits at fifth. It’s not a three-year exemption or a spot in the Masters, but McCumber, son of former PGA Tour pro Mark McCumber, relieved himself of some serious pressure for the rest of the year. It will only take one or two more good weeks to lock up a spot in the playoffs.

• • •

Andy Lyons

Much respect to Mackenzie Hughes
PGA Tour players don’t pay much attention to their odds, but these days it’s almost impossible to not even hear about them in passing. That’s especially true for tournament favourites, which Mackenzie Hughes was this week prior to Thursday’s opening round.

Well, he was actually a co-favourite along with Will Zalatoris and fellow Canadian Corey Conners, but you could argue he was most primed for a victory out of the three. Hughes was runner-up in this event a year ago and had collected four top-10s finishes since February. Much of his success was due to a hot putter, which isn’t always the most sustainable game plan.

Because of that, and because of the pressure of being the betting favourite (whether Hughes knew about it or not), he seemed primed for a letdown. Instead, he damn near won the thing and didn’t back down coming down the stretch. Hughes made a gutsy par save at the 17th and then gave his birdie putt at the 18th a great roll. A bogey dropped him to solo third, giving him his third third-place or better finish since March 1. If the putter stays hot, the 2016 RSM Classic winner could nab a second trophy soon.

• • •

Andy Lyons

Will Zalatoris is COMING
Zalatoris, the other betting favorite based off his U.S. Open performance, did seem to be having a come down from Winged Foot after three days. Then, the 24-year-old threw up a Sunday 65 to tie for eighth. Has the dude shown us enough of his talent over these last 14 days? Just to repeat: Zalatoris, a Korn Ferry Tour player, was favored to win a PGA Tour event this week. That is absolutely unheard of. He may not be a KFT player for long, though. The top 10 at Puntacana secured him a start in next week’s Sanderson Farms Championship. And he’s now earned 185 FedEx Cup points with his finish Sunday and at the U.S. Open, which puts him 103 points away from earning special temporary membership on the big tour. Can we bet on that happening? I’ll take whatever odds you got.

The post Hudson Swafford shows serious guts to claim the Corales Puntacana Championship appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Alex Myers
With another PGA Tour season starting at this week’s A Military Tribute at The Greenbrier, it’s time for our annual tribute to golfers not to be overlooked as we head into 2019-’20. This year’s list of sleepers is a bit different than past editions. While we kept the same criteria—a player has to be younger than 30, with no PGA Tour titles and no appearances in the Tour Championship—the make-up skews younger than years past. And that’s even with Matthew Wolff and Collin Morikawa playing their way off this list thanks to quick maiden victories on tour in 2019.

Although fewer returning PGA Tour players made our cut than normal, most of the youngsters below already have serious name recognition. They obviously have serious game as well. So we’re pretty confident that a handful will join Wolff and Morikawa as PGA Tour winners this season—and add to our prior success (Jon Rahm, Bryson DeChambeau, Cameron Champ, etc., etc.) in picking breakthrough stars.

Viktor Hovland

Streeter Lecka

It almost feels like cheating to include this Norwegian native who turns 22 next week, but technically, he meets our super-scientific criteria. Hovland waited to turn pro in 2019 until after he used his U.S. Open exemption from winning the 2018 U.S. Amateur, then narrowly missed earning his PGA Tour card from his play in the summer while competing on sponsor’s exemptions. He earned his spot in the big leagues through the Korn Ferry Tour Finals and is the frontrunner to win Rookie of the Year. Take a look at these stats!

Strokes Gained leaders since June:

OFF-THE-TEE
1. Viktor Hovland, +1.13
2. Rory McIlroy, +1.09

APPROACH
1. Adam Scott, +1.35
2. Viktor Hovland, +1.01

(minimum 20 rounds)

— Sean Martin (@PGATOURSMartin) September 9, 2019

Like I said, leaving him on this list feels like cheating. Anyway, Hovland has also quickly become a pressroom favourite:

Viktor Hovland is now a living legend. pic.twitter.com/ufA4knxDB2

— Skratch (@Skratch) July 10, 2019

Yep, this kid is going places.

Scottie Scheffler

Richard Heathcote

There was a two-month stretch during the 2019 Korn Ferry Tour season in which Scheffler didn’t finish worse than T-7, winning one tournament and finishing second two other times. The 23-year-old Texas product added another victory in the postseason and is No. 1 on the priority rankings of guys coming from the developmental tour. That means Scheffler is the only 2019 Korn Ferry Tour graduate to be fully exempt on the PGA Tour for 2019-’20, which includes a spot in the Players. If Hovland is the clear favourite for ROY, Scheffler is probably No. 2.

Joaquin Niemann

Andy Lyons

Welcome back, young fella! Although not the youngest player on this list, Niemann, who turns 21 in November, is certainly the youngest with a full PGA Tour season under his size-28 belt (we don’t know his actual belt size, but the kid is skinny). And it was a solid season at that. After getting off to a slow start to his official rookie campaign (Niemann earned his PGA Tour card through sponsor’s exemptions the previous year), the native of Chile found his form once summer rolled around. Starting with back-to-back T-5s at the Travelers Championship and Rocket Mortgage Classic, he finished worse than T-31 only once over his final eight starts while racking up four top-15s.

Beau Hossler

Michael Reaves

Another returner, Hossler is breaking a record he didn’t know existed by making our list for a third time. In a way, that’s not a good sign for his career—when’s he finally going to make good on his potential? But in another, it bodes well in that so many people still believe he’s going to turn into a big-time player. Hossler briefly lost his PGA Tour card this past season, but he quickly got it back with a runner-up finish in the first Korn Ferry Tour Finals event. And now he’s back on this list. Again. So congrats on the record, Beau. Until you break it again next year …

Robby Shelton

Steve Dykes

Like Scheffler, this former college All-American broke out this past season with two Korn Ferry Tour titles. Shelton struggled trying to earn win No. 3 and that battlefield promotion to the PGA Tour, but the 24-year-old still enters this season No. 4 on the priority list of the top 50 grads. In other words, he’s in good shape to get a lot of early starts. We look forward to Shelton and Justin Thomas bragging about how good Alabama football is all season. (Kidding. We’re not looking forward to that.)

Wyndham Clark

Andy Lyons

Clark’s solid rookie season on the PGA Tour finished with top 20s in four of his final seven starts, including a T-5 at the 3M Open. The University of Oregon golfer certainly has the skills for success in today’s tour. Clark ranked fifth in driving distance and eighth in strokes gained/putting this past season. Only 25, there’s plenty of upsides here. And plenty of opportunities for cheeky Wyndham Rewards commercials.

Doug Ghim

David Cannon/Getty Images

The University of Texas golfer (yeah, this list is getting a bit Longhorn heavy) became the latest example of the razor-thin margins at golf’s highest ranks. At the Korn Ferry Tour Championship, Ghim converted an eight-foot curler on the 72nd hole to earn his PGA Tour card and give us one of the best reactions of the year in sports.

For a @PGATour card…. pic.twitter.com/x7wdT33Dqu

— GOLFTV (@GOLFTV) September 2, 2019

In addition to being the low amateur at the 2018 Masters, Ghim has had four top 25s in his 11 starts as a pro on the PGA Tour. That proves the 23-year-old can hang with the big boys—and that clutch stroke certainly won’t hurt his confidence going forward.

Tyler McCumber

Christian Petersen/Getty Images

The son of 10-time PGA Tour winner Mark McCumber has steadily climbed pro golf’s ranks the past few years. First, through the PGA Tour Latinoamerica, then with a dominant three-win campaign on the PGA Tour Canada in 2018 and, finally, a solid rookie effort on the Korn Ferry Tour in which he finished 24th on the regular-season money list despite no victories. At 28, he’s the old man on this list, but he’s also got great genes from his old man.

Maverick McNealy

Michael Cohen

Yes, this is the guy who tied Tiger Woods’ record for victories at Stanford. Yes, he’s the son of a billionaire. Yes, he’s the dude dating LPGA star Danielle Kang. In many ways, McNealy has already established himself as a known commodity in pro golf, but he’ll get his first full-time crack at the PGA Tour after finishing 23rd on the Korn Ferry Tour’s regular-season money list. He’s certainly got the talent to be a star, and if this whole golf thing doesn’t work out, we’re pretty sure he’ll be OK.

Kristoffer Ventura

Steve Dykes

Another stud from that incredible Oklahoma State 2018 title team, Ventura graduated and spent this past season trying to make it as a pro. With no status on any tour as of June, a trip to Q school looked like a given until he turned a sponsor’s exemption at the Korn Ferry’s BMW Charity Pro-Am into a T-3. Three weeks later, Ventura won the Utah Championship and added another victory at the Pinnacle Bank Championship the next month. Quite a heater. Between Ventura and Hovland, Norway is suddenly a golf powerhouse.

Akshay Bhatia

Matt Sullivan

He’s definitely the youngest player on this list, and he probably won’t earn any PGA Tour status this season, but … just in case … we don’t want to be late to the party when it comes to predicting big things for this 17-year-old phenom who is turning pro this month. The clear-cut top-ranked junior golfer in the country, Bhatia became the youngest player ever to earn a spot on the U.S. Walker Cup team. He begins the 2019-’20 season with no status on any professional tour, but the lanky lefty should get his full allotment of sponsor’s exemptions. Hopefully, he has his driver’s license as he begins life on the road.

The post 11 PGA Tour sleepers to watch in the 2019-’20 season appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.