By Christopher Powers
Thanks to the pandemic, which led to a shortened season, the Wyndham Championship is lacking in drama, which it normally has in abundance. Add in the fact it happens to be after a wild PGA Championship at TPC Harding Park, and we were due for our first true dud of the restart.

RELATED: Brooks Koepka regrets some, but not all, of his controversial comments

However, to steal a phrase from the legendary Lee Corso: “Not so fast, my friend!” Plenty of the top players in the world made the trip to Greensboro, N.C., and anytime Harold Varner III is in the mix is a good time to tune into the golf. We’re only through one round at Sedgefield Country Club, but there are still a ton of intriguing storylines to watch in the coming days.

Here are our four key takeaways from Day 1 at Wyndham.

Can this please be Harold Varner III’s week?
If there was ever a guy we were granted permission to cheer for in the press box, it’d be Harold Varner III, and not just because he was on the latest cover of Golf Digest Middle East. Nope, definitely not.

But seriously, everyone loves this guy. The term “real” gets thrown around with athletes. “Oh, he’s real,” or “the way he is on TV, that’s who he is in REAL life, too.” Most of the time that’s probably not 100 percent true, but for Varner it absolutely is true. He’s kind, he’s honest, he’s always himself and he’s the exact type of guy who should get way more press than he does. Of course, winning his first PGA Tour event would help a lot in that area.

Could this be the week? I think the entire golf world hopes so. Varner, playing this week less than two hours from where he was raised, opened with an eight-under 62 at Sedgefield Country Club, matching his career-low round on tour and giving him a share of the Thursday lead with Tom Hoge and Roger Sloan. It should be enough to keep him in the mix the rest of the week, provided he doesn’t start backpedalling later in the week. That’s something he’s had trouble with, though, particularly this season. Varner is 29th on tour in first-round scoring average, but then falls to 82nd on tour in the second round, 111th in the third round and 88th in the final round. We sincerely hope that changes at this “home game”, because it would be one of the best stories of the 2020 golf season.

Chris Keane

If it’s not HV3’s week, Wes Bryan is a good Plan B
Again, no cheering, but anytime Wes Bryan is in the mix is good for business. Good to see him playing well after coming back from injury. This is only his fourth start, but he’s made the most of them so far, with a pair of top 25s and now a five-under 65 in the opening round at Wyndham. Bryan drove it well and putted it well, two areas he’ll need to continue to excel in if he wants to contend this weekend. He needs an exceptional finish to jump from No. 199 on the FedEx Cup points list to inside the top 125, but if his exceptional iron play shows up, we like his chances.

Jared C. Tilton

You guys aren’t going to believe this, but Webb Simpson shot an under-par round at Sedgefield
Not sure if you’ve heard, but Webb Simpson likes the Wyndham Championship. Also not sure if you heard, but he named one of his daughters after it. You can thank me later for this brand new information.

Kidding aside, Thursday marks the 13th consecutive round of 68 or lower for Simpson at Sedgefield. If you take out 2016, when he uncharacteristically finished T-72 in the event, it’d be 19 straight dating back to 2014. In 11 starts at Wyndham, Simpson has one win, two runner-ups, a solo third, a T-5, a T-6, a T-8 and a T-11. How insane would it be if he finished in every place 1 through 10? Because that’s the trajectory he’s on right now, and I have no evidence to back this up, but I’d be willing to bet my life savings that no player has ever finished 1 through 10 in the same tournament before. All he needs is a fourth, a seventh, a ninth and a 10th. I’m not even trying to make a joke here, he might actually pull it off.

Jared C. Tilton

Let’s all OVERREACT to Brooks Koepka’s round
After all that Saturday night smack talk at the PGA Championship, Brooks Koepka has played his last 36 holes in six over par. He continued to putt miserably, and he drove it all over creation, hitting just five of 14 fairways. It’s obvious his knee is cooked, his confidence is shot and his swagger is almost non-existent. Not to be hyperbolic, but I think the next logical step for our boy Brooksy is retirement.

Sounds ridiculous, right? Well that’s the point. Let’s come back down to earth, people. After the events of this past weekend, the immediate, knee-jerk reaction to any poor showing from the four-time major champ is going to be to pile on, to dig his grave. In reality, we’re talking about the Wyndham Championship. He might say he’s trying to play better in order to vault up the FedEx Cup standings, but no one actually believes that, right? Brooks Koepka doesn’t play golf to earn FedEx Cup points. He plays to win majors, or at least attempt to peak at the majors. What he does this week, next week and the two weeks after that (if he makes it that far) could not be more irrelevant. The next time anyone should truly pay attention to him is at Winged Foot in September.

The post Is it finally HV3’s week? Plus three other takeaways from Thursday at the Wyndham Championship appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

Matthew Wolff reacts to his birdie on the 15th green during the third round of the Rocket Mortgage Classic. (Gregory Shamus)

By Christopher Powers

The birdie-fest at Detroit Golf Club, also known as the Rocket Mortgage Classic, continued on Saturday, and Matthew Wolff led the way. The former Oklahoma State standout made nine of them, plus an eagle and three bogeys to shoot a second straight eight-under-par 64. He’s alone at the top at 19 under, three clear of the next closest competitors.

One of those guys just so happens to be Bryson DeChambeau, who was stunned and beaten by Wolff this time a year ago on the 72nd green at the 3M Open. Are we in for another DeChambeau dagger?

Here are our five takeaways from Day 3 at the Rocket Mortgage Classic.

Wolff v. DeChambeau, Part II

A year ago this week, Wolff earned his first victory in his fourth PGA Tour start at the 3M Open in Minnesota. If you recall, the man he clipped by one stroke was DeChambeau, who eagled the final hole to reach 20 under, only to watch Wolff also eagle minutes later. It made for one of the great screengrabs of the 2019 golf season:

Now, just imagine a year later, and Bryson about 50 pounds heavier, if Wolff does something similar again. After weeks and weeks of top 10s, this week was supposed to be DeChambeau’s, especially considering how relatively weak the field was. Other than Webb Simpson, nobody coming into Detroit was playing better than Bryson. Wolff, who missed two of his first three cuts post-lockdown, didn’t appear to be much of a factor.

After rounds of 69, 64 and 64, not only is Wolff a factor, but he’s the man to beat at 19 under. Unfortunately, we won’t see them in the same pairing, but DeChambeau will once again finish before Wolff, just like he did at TPC Twin Cities last July. What a bit of deja vu it would be for Bryson to post a number and then lose by one on a 72nd hole Wolff birdie.

Ryan Armour watches shot during third round of Rocket Mortgage Classic. (Stacy Revere)

What a wild finish from Ryan Armour

Heading to the par-5 17th hole, Armour had made only one bogey in his previous 34 holes. He played those holes in 14 under, including making his 14th ace during Friday’s second round. All was well.

That was up until his third shot sailed the 17th green, where he left himself with a poor lie and a difficult chip to get up and down. His fourth jumped out of the rough and rolled 25 feet past the hole, and he three-putted for a disastrous double bogey, seemingly undoing two exceptional days of work.

Impressively, Armour bounced back on 18, rolling in a 21-footer from off the green to salvage a five-under 67, which puts him three off Wolff’s lead and in the final pairing. Prior to the shutdown, Armour missed six consecutive cuts. The two-month break turned out to be just what he needed.

“When we shut down [March 13], I took three weeks to just let my body heal, and I was able to kind of start over,” said Armour, who was going through a grip change before the hiatus. “We were just trying to make the grip a little stronger; it allowed me to get reps. We had a lot of good games at the Dye Preserve [in Jupiter, Fla.], which allowed me to get in the heat of battle a little bit before we got back out here.”

It’s paying dividends so far. Armour finished T-6 last week and now has a chance to spoil the Wolff-Bryson party on Sunday.

Mark Hubbard putts on the third green during the third round of the Rocket Mortgage Classic. (Gregory Shamus)

The other spoilers

In addition to Armour, there are a number of guys who can ruin the Wolff-Bryson fun. First up we have Troy Merritt, who is five back and has been known to throw up a few random 61s. He’s more than capable of tearing up this Donald Ross track and waiting in the clubhouse to see what happens. Who knows these days.

Next up is Mark Hubbard, who, despite a rough day on the greens, still posted a 69 and is tied with Merritt at 14 under. Hubbard came close to tasting his first victory at the Houston Open earlier this season, so you know he’s hungry to get it done. Rounds in the low 60s are out there, as we’ve seen.

Finally, there’s Seamus Power and Chris Kirk, both also at 14 under. And that’s before getting to the group at 13 under, which includes Simpson, Viktor Hovland, Wesley Bryan and Matt Wallace. We would not be the least bit surprised to see a member of that group steal one, though it’s going to take something very special.

Oh yeah, how about Wes Bryan?

Bryan shot seven-under 65 on Saturday to be six back and everything this guy does on tour is impressive, given he was once just a trick-shot guy. To come back the way he has after injury might be his most impressive feat yet. On Sunday, he’ll look to lock up his first top 10 on tour since [checking notes] the 2017 John Deere Classic. It’s been a long road back for this guy. Respect the grind.

Being able to hear everything remains the best

Personally, I can’t wait for fans to return to sporting events. Anyone who says golf is better without fans is a prisoner of the moment at best, and flat out foolish at worst. Would Tiger’s Masters win have been better without fans? Spieth’s walk-off chip-in at Travelers? Gary Woodland’s chip on the 17th green at Pebble?

But being able to hear everything these guys say is tough to beat. It wasn’t the greatest soundbite, but I really enjoyed a quick conversation between Wolff and his caddie at the 17th hole. Wolff pulled his drive into the left rough, robbing him of any chance of going for the green. “I’m expecting this to come up 20 yards short of that right bunker,” said Wolff, pointing to the bunker he was aiming at. “Then I’ll just chip up from there.”

Wolff then went on to execute the plan exactly as he mapped it out, hacking one out short of the bunker, chipping up to two feet and rolling in his ninth birdie of the day.

There was another funny exchange caught earlier in the round when Wolff hit a shot and said with a laugh, “I heard the ice cream truck.”

Wolff swore afterward that the music from the truck stuck in his head and helped him.

“I think I have to give credit to the ice cream truck that was circling the property. I’m not joking, actually,” Wolff said. “Just had that little like ice cream truck song in my head, and I think that helped me just not think about the speed or the line or anything [on putts]. Just keep my head free, which I’ve been giving a lot of credit to this week.”

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