Record hopes still alive for Woods, Koepka, and Spieth in PGA Championship

The three players I highlighted in my pre-tournament story, Tiger Woods, Brooks Koepka, and Jordan Spieth—all of whom were coming into this week’s PGA Championship with a line in the history books hanging on a win this week—are all still alive, so to speak, in the pursuit of their respective accomplishments. But much like what Magic Max said of The Dread Pirate Roberts—“It just so happens that your friend here is only mostly dead, … mostly dead is slightly alive.”—there are varying degrees of “still alive”.

Brooks Koepka, the 2018 and 2019 PGA champion, is in good position to successfully defend his title going into the final two days of the tournament.

 (Photo by Darren Carroll/PGA of America)

Tiger Woods, who is chasing the PGA Tour all-time wins record and a co-leader spot on the all-time PGA Championship wins podium; and Jordan Spieth, who would lay claim to the Career Grand Slam with a win this week, just scraped their way into the weekend today.

Tiger, after an opening-round 68 in which he made nearly 115 feet of putts with the backup Scotty Cameron putter he brought out for the occasion, couldn’t buy a putt today; his Strokes Gained-Putting score dropped from 1.249 to -1.671. He hit more fairways—nine of 14, vice seven yesterday—but fewer greens; indeed, his SG scores were worse across the board except for off the tee. He scraped into the weekend at even par, one stroke to spare against the +1 cut line, and unless the Big Cat scares up a Big Change in his game on Saturday and Sunday his pursuit of those records will have to wait for another weekend, and another year, respectively.

Jordan Spieth, on the other hand, who cut it even more fine, making the cut on the number with rounds of 73 and 68, saw an uptick in his play today. His stats improved across the board, compared to Thursday—he gained 3.3 strokes on the field today, overall—and a lone bogey at the par-four 18th hole was the sole black mark on his round. Still, going into the weekend trailing the leader, China’s Haotong Li, by nine strokes, and with 57 guys above him on the leaderboard,  his chances of eking out a win aren’t looking good.

And then there’s Brooks Koepka. The man who has won more majors (four) than regular PGA Tour events (three) saw his game dip a bit today, but rounds of 66 and 68 put him squarely in the pack of six players who are two strokes back of the 36-hole leader, Li. Koepka was getting on-course work done by his trainer during today’s round, for a tight adductor muscle—“It’s no problem,” he said in a post-round interview—and his stats slipped across the board from Thursday to Friday, Tee-to-Green and Putting most significantly. 

All three played early-late for the first two days of the tournament, and the extent to which the afternoon conditions—generally windier, and with greens firmed up by a day’s worth of sun (mild, San Francisco-by-the-sea sun, but still sun…)—affected their results is open to speculation. Tiger and Spieth will be going off earlier on Saturday; 9:50 and 8:40 a.m., respectively; but Koepka, with his high finish over the opening two days, will again be playing in the afternoon, with a 2:40 start time. With no significant changes in the weather forecast being predicted, those early start times may prove to be the more favorable.

Still, it’s Koepka, with a red “-6” next to his name on the scoreboard going into the weekend, and a history of coming from behind in majors—he was three shots back going into the final round in five of his last eight majors, and finished outside of the Top 10 in all but two—who stands the best chance of coming out of this weekend with the Wanamaker Trophy, and another line in the history books, in hand.