Does men’s pro golf really need “reunification”?

There have been plenty of social media posts made and column inches written in the golf magazines lately on the issue of healing the rift in men’s professional golf. In a recent Golf.com article, Adam Scott is quoted as saying that a “reunification[1]” agreement whereby LIV Golf defectors[2] would be welcomed back to play PGA Tour events is one way forward. Flip-flop king Rory McIlroy has gone on record saying that reunification would be “the best thing for everyone”[3]—but does the men’s professional game really need the players who have signed on with the Saudi-backed league to come back to the mainstream fold? What is there to be gained from it?

The Saudi pick-up league, initially headed up by the perennially butt-hurt Greg Norman, lured players with promises of big paychecks, which they delivered on, and OWGR points so that LIV players could still earn their way into the four men’s majors, which they have not delivered on. This classic bait-and-switch played on the “have-my-cake-and-eat-it-too” mentality of entitled and/or desperate pro golfers, some of whom may in the near future be looking back wistfully on the good old days scrambling to make cuts and a paycheck.

Let’s look at a few of the golfers who play for LIV Golf and what they bring to professional golf. We’ll start with the chief rabble-rouser:

Phil Mickelson – Fan favorite, multiple-event winner, record-holder for the oldest ever to win a major championship, FIGJAM Phil (as he is known around the Tour) has won more money on the golf course (and lost more betting on sports, including golf) than most people would earn in a dozen lifetimes, but he has for years been at odds with the PGA Tour leadership on the subject of money. As in, why don’t the players, who provide the content, get more of the cash that the Tour rakes in from TV rights, video content, etc.?

Phil raised a storm of controversy when he phoned golf writer Alan Shipnuck in May 2022 and bared his breast concerning his decision to throw in his lot with Greg Norman in his Tour-busting alliance with the Saudi-funded LIV Golf League. The storm increased in intensity when he back-pedaled, whining that the conversation had been off the record (reader, it wasn’t–gkm). He allowed as how the Saudis were “scary motherf**kers” to work with, but he was going that route in order to gain leverage to try to squeeze more gelt out of the PGA Tour (in much the same manner, I imagine, as his bookies might have been putting the squeeze on him to settle his gambling debts.)

Aside from his record-breaking 2021 PGA Championship victory, which truly was a performance for the ages, Phil had been increasingly fading into a non-presence, last playing any non-major events on the PGA Tour in late 2021 and 2022, making only one cut out of three cut events – a T-36 finish at what was then the Fortinet Championship. He hasn’t exactly set the world on fire in his time playing LIV Golf’s team scramble format, either, carding only two Top 10 individual finishes since 2023.

So, does the PGA Tour need to bring this contentious, antagonistic, aging member of the over-the-hill-club back into the fold?

Dustin Johnson – DJ, as he is known, may be the quintessential laid-back, no-worries guy. Long of limb and stride, and long off the tee, Johnson was also fading in the stats when he accepted the Saudi gelt. In his last season playing non-major Tour events he managed two Top 10 finishes and eight cuts made in 10 cut events—not exactly covering himself in glory.

Other issues have clouded Johnson’s PGA Tour career, such as a six-month suspension in 2014 for drug use (marijuana, cocaine), and at the best of times it has seemed that the slow-walking, slow-talking (slow-thinking?) South Carolina native is only out there playing golf as an easy (for him…) way to make a lot of money and support a laid-back Low Country lifestyle. His LIV Golf record is no barn-burner, either, with two wins and eight Top 10 individual finishes in the first two full seasons.

Brooks Koepka – Brooks started his pro career in 2012 busting his hump on the Challenge Tour, the (then) European Tour’s equivalent of the minor leagues. He traveled so much that he had to have extra visa pages added to his passport, won several events, and in 2014 stepped up to the PGA Tour. He enjoyed success, if somewhat focused, in the big league of golf – his nine wins include back-to-back U.S Opens in 2017 and 2018, two Phoenix Open wins (2015, 2021) and three PGA Championship titles (2018, 2019, 2023) with the last coming after he kissed Yasir Al-Rumayyan’s ring in 2022, hauled a wheelbarrow-load of money home, and put the PGA Tour in his rearview mirror.

I remember when Brooks was a humble, soft-spoken newbie on the PGA Tour, telling the assembled media at the 2014 Fry’s.com Open about eating horse meat in Kazakhstan, and other tales of the Challenge Tour, in between going through the shots of his tournament-leading second and third rounds. No one could have been more surprised than I was when he morphed into a brash, prickly “big name” in pro golf with a fragile ego and more major wins than regular tournament victories. Koepka has played consistently well since jumping ship, with five Top 10 finishes in 2023 and four in the 2024 season – but would PGA Tour fans (or PGA Tour members) welcome him back?

Patrick Reed – Reed has been a lightning rod for controversy over the years. He came up as a hard-scrabble Monday qualifier, playing his way into six PGA tour events in 2013 to earn his card for the 2014 season, but controversy has haunted his footsteps from the beginning. There were hints, and later outright accusations from his Augusta State teammates, of cheating and marginal off-course behavior, and both on- and off-course controversy in his years on the PGA tour. There was the “embedded ball” incident at Torrey Pines in 2021, his “Captain America” schtick at the Ryder Cup matches over the years, and his wife, Justine, ran a (then) Twitter account called @useGolfFACTS which was a badly disguised Patrick Reed propaganda account. His LIV Golf record is in the upper echelon, with five Top 10 finishes in 2023 and three in the 2024 season, but perhaps the jump to a guaranteed prize, Sunday-scramble, team golf format league has taken the shine off of his “Captain America” persona.

Bryson DeChambeau – What can I say about Bryson DeChambeau that hasn’t been said by scores?[4]Sure, he has won two U.S Opens – the first, in 2020, by dint of a show of bomb-and-gouge golf that gave the lie to the “just grow the rough really deep” school of thought when it comes to reining in modern-day bulked-up big hitters; and the second, just last year at a woefully overmatched Pinehurst #2, by playing well and waiting for Rory McIlroy to make a mistake (which, sadly, he did).

Quirky, mouthy, prone to using (and misusing) big words that most golf fans (and golf writers) don’t understand anyway, DeChambeau has always reminded me of that one nerdy only child with social-skills issues that we all knew when we were kids – the one who spent a lot of time around grownups, vying for their attention by showing off his awkward braininess. A physics major at Southern Methodist University who dropped out after his junior year[5], he was nicknamed “The Scientist” for his meticulous, technical approach to golf, but as a career mechanical engineer with an actual degree to my name I can tell you that a good 50% of the “technical content” he spouts is nonsense.

The quirky kid from Clovis, in California’s Central Valley, is a YouTube star now, embracing video sensationalism to “build his brand” as the kids say these days, and was a fan favorite while still on the PGA Tour. Fans might welcome home back to the home of real competitive golf – but does he deserve it?

Jon Rahm – Let’s wrap it up with the Big Man from Arizona State, the guy who told the world that he had made plenty of money and was staying with the PGA Tour, the organization that had made him, like it had the other players profiled above, a multi-millionaire. (By show of hands, who thinks that his representation team were negotiating with the Saudis at the very moment that he said this?) It has been reported that Rahm, whose physical size (6' 2", 220 pounds) is apparently matched by the size of his ego, has flattered himself that his jump to the Saudi golf league with a contract worth $300 million would be the impetus that would heal the schism and make men’s professional golf one big happy family again, though the last 20 months of ongoing negotiations between the Tour and LIV Golf representatives give the lie to that thought. Can the bitter taste that his “surprise” money-grab exit left in the mouths of players and fans be washed away sufficiently to allow his return?

There are a host of others, notable and not-so, who could be put up as examples, but compiling even the brief list above has left a bad taste in my mouth.

The bottom line is, does the PGA Tour really need these guys back? Like any athletic endeavor, professional golf experiences turnover as players age out of ability, or desire to play. Is the public recognition of the fading stars, pedestrian journeymen, and struggling newcomers that currently inhabit the LIV Golf roster such that losing them to the three-ring (round) circus LIV Golf tournaments will hurt the sport as played in the traditional, and more competitive, manner that it has been for decades?

I don’t think so.

---

[1] (Meaning a common competition pool for all men’s professional golf’s players across different tours or leagues, not necessarily a conjoining of the tours themselves.)

[2] (My descriptor, not his.)

[3] (By “everyone” I think he means his bank account.) 

[4] (Gold stars for those of you who recognize the reference.)

[5] (Because recruiting violations by the football staff brought a lockout of ALL SMU athletics teams from national championships for a year.)

Bob Harig’s “Tiger and Phil” now in paperback

If you are a fan of well-researched writing by a knowledgeable veteran golf writer and want to read about the years-long rivalry between two of the biggest names in pro golf of the last 20+ years—but prefer to wait for the less-expensive paperback copy of a new book to come out, you are in luck. Bob Harig, a long-time golf writer at ESPN, penned a comprehensive, deeply-researched book on the rivalry between Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson that came out in 2022—and it is now (as of 16 April, 2023) out in softcover.

A comprehensive look at an enduring
rivalry, now in paperback.

The hardback edition of the book came out in 2022, after Woods’s solo-vehicle crash in February 2021 but before Phil Mickelson’s departure from the PGA Tour in favor of the Saudi-backed LIV Golf tour, so it missed out on some of the most-current controversy in this rivalry. Frankly, I was a bit disappointed to not see an update chapter on the new developments in the softcover release.

Aside from that, Tiger & Phil is a very complete look at the sometimes fraught relationship between the two men who have most strongly defined PGA Tour golf in the 21st century—one a generally taciturn, frequently saturnine, presence on the golf course (and only when he couldn’t avoid it, in the media center interview room); the other a jovial, self-promoting—but sometimes sharp-tongued—raconteur who trailed in the shadow of the other. The book covers all aspects of the on-and off-course interactions between the two, from run-of-the-mill PGA Tour events to the majors, to special events like the Ryder Cup and the President’s Cup.

Curiously, I found the book to be rife with grammatical errors, clumsy sentence construction, and odd (sometimes incorrect) word choices. These are things that should have been caught in the editing process which may not bother, or even be noticed by, the casual reader, but as someone with editing experience I was tripping over them every couple of pages on average.

Minor writing blips aside, I am confident that anyone with an interest in the recent history of men’s professional golf will enjoy this book; it’s an important chronicle of the relationship and interactions of two of the most significant players in the closing years of the 20th century and the first quarter or so of the 21st.

Starting my second decade at the Crosby

Once again, my favorite week of the year has rolled around. No, it’s not Spring Break, or even Christmas vacation – it’s Crosby Week.

The poster for the first “Crosby” hints at the
fun-loving nature of the event in the early days.

For those in my audience who are below the age of, say, 50, “the Crosby” (officially the “Bing Crosby Pro-Amateur Golf Championship”, aka “the “Crosby Clambake”) is what the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am was called before AT&T brought a bucket of money to the table and started a decades-long run as presenting sponsor of the tournament. Started in the 1930s by crooner Bing Crosby (you youngsters can Google him) as a weekend get-together  for a bunch of his showbiz friends at Old Brockway Golf Course on Lake Tahoe’s North Shore, the tournament was later moved to Rancho Santa Fe, just north of San Diego, where the event’s pro-am format began. Bing would pair touring pros with amateur players drawn from the ranks of his show-business friends and the member of the Lakeside Golf Club in Hollywood, where he was a member (and five-time club champion).

The event came back from a 1942 wartime postponement with a move to the Monterey Peninsula in 1947, where it was played at Pebble Beach Golf Links and a rotating cast of supporting courses such as Cypress Point, the Monterey Peninsula Country Club’s Shore Course, Poppy Hills (home of the NCGA) and Spyglass Hill, over the years. In 1986 the people at AT&T bought out Bing’s widow, Katherine Crosby, changed the name of the tournament, and have been carrying on the tradition ever since.

My own history with this tournament started with watching it on TV as a kid growing up in nearby Salinas. I didn’t play golf, nor did any of my friends or their fathers, but everyone we knew watched the tournament. When I finally got interested in golf, many years later (thanks to the golf writing of Dan Jenkins…) and started playing and then writing about golf, I was lucky enough to get a foot in the door of the golf media world as a part-time freelancer, and get the privilege of entry to the media center at Pebble Beach for this event.

I actually wrote about this event for the first time in 2011, the year that saw long-time celebrity entrant Bill Murray and his then-new pro partner D.A. Points score the historic double, their team taking the pro-am trophy while Points won the pro event. I wrote that article (Cinderella Story) based on watching the event on TV at home, but two years later I was walking into the media center in the conference rooms above the Pebble Beach Gallery shops, a 50-something semi-rookie (I had started my official golf media career the previous year at the 2012 U.S. Open at the Olympic Club), rubbing elbows with the men and women who do this for a living.

I have covered the event every year since (though physically absent during the lockdown year of 2021), so the 2023 tournament marks my eleventh go-round, and the first year of my second decade as more than just a fan of the event.

In that time I have made friends amongst the ranks of the people who cover sports for a living. I kept my ears open and my mouth shut (for the most part), learning what I could from the pros in what used to be called the “press room”, and have enjoyed enlightening conversations with the likes of Bay Area sports writing legend Art Spander; the San Francisco Chronicle’s Ron Kroichick; and Mark Purdy, the now-retired sports maven for the San José Mercury News. When my first media affiliation, with the Examiner.com website, ended with the site’s demise in 2016, the connection I had made with the NCGA through my fellow Salinas homeboy and now NCGA Communications Director, Jerry Stewart, has kept me “in with the in-crowd” (PGA Tour press credentials are not available to freelancers without an affiliation with an acknowledged media outlet.)

It has been a privilege to walk the cart paths of Pebble Beach and the affiliated courses over the past decade, and to write about the events that transpire over these four days. I have seen a varied cast of characters leading and even winning this event, from big names like Phil Mickelson (twice) to no-names like Ted Potter, Jr. (sorry, Ted), and the storied venue and its companions in the rota haves never failed to provide drama and excitement – not to mention the best scenery on the PGA Tour. I look forward to at least a few more years of bringing my audience the stories from Pebble Beach (I’m no spring chicken, after all…) and hope that people enjoy reading about it as much as I enjoy writing about it.

Alan Shipnuck pulls back the curtain on Phil Mickelson with unauthorized biography – ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Phil, Alan Shipnuck’s “rip-roaring (and unauthorized)” biography of Phil Mickelson is easily the most anticipated golf-related book of recent years, and I am completely confident in saying that readers will not be disappointed. Whether they are Phil fans (or not, as in my case), there is much for the reader to learn about the man who has recently found himself at the center of one of the biggest controversies to ever engulf the world of professional golf—a result, by the way, of the early drop of an excerpt from this very book.

Far from being a hatchet-job or a tell-all, the book is actually a well-balanced look at a very complex character. Philip Alfred Mickelson is a man of contrasts, and the book covers the full range of his complexities. There is a lengthy accounting of the many acts of philanthropy that Mickelson and his wife, Amy, have undertaken, both on their own and through their foundation, and on the other hand, no shrinking back from mentions of the less salutary aspects of his character and behavior. These range from the sophomoric trash-talking and pranking that he engages in, to a gambling habit that may be putting him in serious financial trouble, and borderline illegal financial dealings—some of which appear to be linked to his gambling activities.

The picture of Phil Mickelson that I take away from reading this book is that he is a smart, hardworking, physically talented man with an ego that drives him to constantly prove himself, always trying to show that he is the smartest person in any room that he walks into. While many people, among them his legion of fans, seem to buy into his act, the anecdotes in the book make him come across to me as a fast-talking BS artist who is, on balance, a hard person to like. To me he is the personification of the archetypal entitled rich man—he’s got his nugget and he wants to keep as much of it as possible (“my number one, two, three, four, and five issues are taxes”), all the while denying the contributions of others (e.g., the PGA Tour) to his success.

Alan Shipnuck has spent years working on this book—decades, actually, if you count the entirety of the time he has spent covering PGA tour golf, dating from 1994, Phil Mickelson’s second full year on tour, and interacting with Mickelson along the way. Curiously enough, the pandemic lockdown of 2020 was a boost to the effort. With pro golf, like so many activities, on hiatus during the early, highly restricted months of the pandemic lockdown, Shipnuck was able to engage his legion of sources, closeted at their homes and bored, via telephone, gathering anecdotes and impressions.

I got the impression that this book could have been longer if Shipnuck had been able to include the off-the-record material that he gathered along the way—and speaking of “off-the-record”, the golf world was treated to a bombshell last February when he dropped a revealing excerpt from the book.

In a phone conversation with Shipnuck which Mickelson later claimed was not for publication or attribution, he revealed that his courting of the Saudi backers who are bankrolling the LIV Golf league, which Greg Norman has been stumping for these past several months, was a calculated move to gain leverage against the PGA Tour for concessions regarding rights to players’ media content. His admission that the Saudi government has a terrible record on human rights, that they are “scary motherf--ers to get involved with” who he was nevertheless willing to snuggle up to for the sake of a big paycheck, had a cascading effect on his perception in the eyes of fans as well as the corporate sponsors who are the largest contributors to his income.

Several sponsors dropped Mickelson outright, and his biggest, Callaway Golf—who have a lifetime contract (as long as he is playing professionally) with Phil—pressed “Pause” on their contractual relationship with him. He subsequently stepped away from tournament golf and dropped out of the public eye, supposedly to “work on being the man (he wants) to be.” This self-imposed (or not, as far as playing PGA Tour events goes) exile even extended as far as his withdrawal from the 2022 PGA Championship, passing on defending the title which is arguably his most outstanding professional accomplishment, winning the 2021 event to become the oldest winner of a men’s professional major championship.

“A grownup version of Shipnuck’s first book, 2001’s Bud, Sweat, and Tees”

Even without the early excerpt and the ripple-effect consequences of that bit of breaking news, Phil – The Rip-Roaring (and Unauthorized) Biography of Golf’s Most Colorful Superstar is a groundbreaking work, a grownup version of Shipnuck’s first book, 2001’s Bud, Sweat, and Tees, which was a peek behind the scenes of the wild side of life on the PGA Tour as lived by the hard-living and -playing Rich Beem and his equally colorful caddie Steve Duplantis.

While Beem, despite his 2002 PGA Championship victory, has been little more than a flash in the pan in the world of professional golf, Mickelson is one of the defining characters in late-20th/early-21st century professional golf, and this book will go down as an important chronicle of his life and impact on the game.

Alan Shipnuck previews new Phil Mickelson bio at Pacific Grove Golf Links

An appreciative group of golf fans got a preview of Alan Shipnuck’s upcoming unauthorized biography of Phil Mickelson the other evening, in a talk by the author at the restaurant at Pacific Grove Golf Links—and speaking for myself, it was well worth the 92-mile round trip from my home in San José for the preview, and the talk.

Speaking from the hearth of the fireplace in The Grill at Point Piños, Shipnuck told the audience, “This book has been three decades in the making. My first year covering the PGA Tour was 1994; that was Phil Mickelson’s second full season. I always gravitated to Phil, he was obviously very fun to watch on the golf course, he’s a very charismatic guy. More than any other modern superstar he’ll let you in a little bit. He’s always been good about reporters; he’ll court them, he’ll charm them, he’ll cajole them, he’ll bully them—I’ve been on the receiving end of all of that.”

In the wake of the success of Shipnuck’s 2012 golf novel The Swinger (with co-author Michael Bamberger), which was something of a roman á clef centered on a thinly disguised Tiger Woods-like character, he signed a contract with Simon and Schuster for a future “unspecified golf book”. He kicked ideas around for years, but was always most interested in Phil. In 2020, knowing that he was going to be leaving Golf magazine, the idea for this book was reanimated. In a sort of gruesome serendipity, the pandemic lockdown facilitated the process—with people stuck at home, Shipnuck was able to “ring up random Hall of Fame golfers” who talked for hours. One day he talked to half a dozen guys, a group with 130 PGA Tour and Champions Tour victories between them, and talked so much that he lost his voice.

After spending the summer and the fall of 2020, and into early 2021, working on the book, Shipnuck left Golf magazine to help start up Matt Ginella’s new media group, The Firepit Collective, and for three months did no work on the book. Calling his editor in early May of that year, he told him that there was no way that he could get the book done in 2022. “Fine, no problem,” he was told, “It’s evergreen—’23, ’24, whenever it’s ready.”

And then, a couple of weeks later, Phil Mickelson won the PGA Championship.

At the age of 50 years, 11 months, and seven days, Mickelson became the oldest winner of a major golf championship, surpassing Julius Boros, who won the PGA Championship in 1968 at the age of 48. That night Shipnuck got a text from his editor that read, “Book is due December 1st; don’t let me down.”

Thus jumpstarted, work on the book picked up. Approached by Shipnuck to be interviewed for the book, to present his side of the stories that had been collected, Mickelson declined, intitially—then, early this year he called Alan on the phone. Without asking for or receiving an “off-the-record” assurance, Mickelson launched into a discourse on his involvement with the controversial Saudi golf league that is being spearheaded by Greg Norman, dropping the revelation that he was powwowing with the Saudis solely as a means of gaining leverage in his push against the PGA Tour for greater player control of and access to media rights.

“Phil knew that I was writing this book. I had asked him to talk to me—and he calls me up,” Shipnuck said. “Anything he says to me is going directly into the book unless we expressly agree otherwise. The whole thing about off-the-record is that it is a two-way street; both parties have to agree. He gets on the phone and he just starts talking, he never asked to go off the record; I never consent to it. He was very blunt, he was very honest. Some of the things he told me were quite provocative. Did he mean to go that far, or did he just get carried away by trying to show me how smart he was? It’s hard to say what he was thinking. I’m still baffled, to this day, why he called me. He could have called any other reporter to share his innermost feelings (about the Saudi Golf League.)”

The subsequent publication, in February 2022, of an early excerpt from the book revealing those revelations created, in Shipnuck’s words, “a global firestorm”, and he did interviews with the BBC and Al-Jazeera, among others. In the wake of the revelations, Mickelson went into exile—whether purely self-imposed or as the result of a suspension by the PGA Tour is not (and may never be) known.

The flames of the “firestorm” were fanned by the release of a statement from Mickelson claiming that the comments were off the record, but Shipnuck maintains that it was never discussed, and he has witnesses to the conversation (which was not recorded.)

“That’s part of what has made the last three months very complicated in my life, dealing with the fallout from that excerpt. I’m just happy that the book is here; when you guys get to read it you’ll see it’s a very balanced, fair portrait of a really complicated person. Phil has done a lot of great things in his life, and I celebrate all of it—his random acts of kindness, his mentorship of younger players, but there has also been a lot of messiness, a lot of controversy, and that’s in the book, too. I’m happy that it’s finally here, and that people can read it and make up their own minds.

I had received an electronic advance copy of the book the day before the get-together in Pacific Grove, and had read about 100 pages into the 239-page volume before hearing Alan speak. I’ll have more to say when I publish a review of the book, but I can say that it is a balanced look at a very complicated person, and that I am very happy to have had the opportunity to hear Shipnuck speak about the process and experience of writing this book.

The lucky group who attended this talk have their (autographed) copies of Phil – The Rip-Roaring (and Unauthorized!) Biography of Golf’s Most Colorful Superstar, but the rest of the world doesn’t have to wait much longer; the official publication date is just a few days away, on May 17th, 2022. It is available for pre-order (which publishers and authors really appreciate) from all the usual outlets, including (and this is my preference) your local independent bookseller.

Friday is a Power-play day at the 2022 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am

At the end of the first round of play at the 2022 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, Fargo, North Dakota native Tom Hoge stood atop the leaderboard after posting a 9-under 63 at Pebble Beach Golf Links—but as anyone who is familiar with this tournament knows, not all rounds are created equal here in the Del Monte Forest.

It is generally acknowledged that of the three courses in the tournament rota—Pebble Beach, Spyglass Hill, and the Shore Course at Monterey Peninsula Golf Club—Spyglass Hill, with its more severe elevation changes and coastline to forest routing, is the toughest test of golf, with Pebble and the Shore Course trading off second and third depending upon the strength and severity of the wind.

That being the case, it was generally acknowledged among the cognoscenti that Hoge’s Friday 63 at Pebble, under clear skies and in calm conditions, had to take a back seat to the 8-under 64 put up by Irishman Séamus Power at Spyglass Hill in the first round. Starting on the tenth hole, Power opened with a 3-under 33 for nine holes, opened the front nine with another birdie and caught another gear toward the end of hit round, dropping a string of birdies in the last four holes to close out the round in style.

Teeing off at #1 at Pebble Beach on Friday morning, Power kept his foot down, coming out of the gate with another 3-under 33 on the home course’s front nine, with birdies at the second, sixth, seventh, and ninth holes, marred only by a three-put bogey at #5.

The momentum from his birdie at the intimidating par-4 ninth, the centerpiece of the three-hole string of cliff-top par fours—eight, nine, and ten—that sportswriter Dan Jenkins dubbed “Abalone Corner”, carried over to the next three holes as the course turned inland. Birdies on both of the back nine’s par-fives, 14 and 18, and the par-four 16th hole, rolled back by a tough bogey from a green-side bunker on the par-three 17th, brought Power home in 31, for back-to-back 64s, 16-under for the tournament, and a new 36-hole tournament scoring record of 128.

The previous holders of the 36-hole scoring record of 129, Nick Taylor (2020) and Phil Mickelson (2005), each went on to win the tournament.

Meanwhile, a mile or two or three down the 17-Mile Drive, first-round leader Hoge was slipping off the pace a bit with a two-under 69 at the par-71 Shore Course that dropped him to second, five strokes back of Power at 11 under, after 36 holes. Andrew Putnam, who posted a 6-under 65 on the Shore Course in the first round, carded a 5-under 67 at Spyglass Hill and moved up into a tie with Hoge for second; they were joined by Canadian Adam Svensson who followed a first-round 69 at Pebble with a blistering 8-under 63 at the Shore Course.

Power’s five-stroke lead after 36 holes ties another record; former Cal golfer Charlie Wi held a five-stroke lead after 36 holes in 2012—only to lose to Phil Mickelson, and Bob Rosburg held a five-stroke lead after 36 holes in 1958, but lost to Billy Casper (Rosburg would go on to win the Pro-Am in 1961.)

A five-stroke lead is nothing to sneeze at going into the third round, but there are some players not so far behind that are capable of putting up a low score late to pounce on any potential missteps that might be made by Power, Hoge, Putnam, or Svensson. Patrick Cantlay put up a second-round 68 at Spyglass to wrap up 36 holes at 10-under, T-5, while a resurgent Jason Day followed up Thursday’s 4-under 68 at Pebble with a 5-under 66 at the Shore Course and is currently seven strokes back—but with the tougher test of Spyglass Hill to come on Saturday.

Something to consider for a look ahead to Saturday’s round is the fact that Power, who seems to be thriving under the benign conditions that have prevailed so far, and which should continue through the weekend, will be playing the easier of the three courses, MPCC’s Shore Course, while his closest competitors, Hoge and Putnam, will be at Spyglass Hill and Pebble Beach, respectively.

That’s something to look forward to for Saturday/cut day at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am.

Offshore Flow defeats Crosby Weather at the 2022 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am

The phrase “Crosby Weather” has traditionally been the shortcut term for the wild & woolly weather conditions that players and spectators are called upon to endure during the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am; it is so endemic that even non-golfers in the local area use it to describe stormy weather in January and February.

Some of the most famous examples of “Crosby Weather” include the 1962 snow storm that delayed the tournament by a day (prompting Jimmy Demaret, the 1952 champion, to quip “I know I got loaded last night, but how did I end up in Squaw Valley?”); the heavy rain in 1998 that shortened the tournament to 54 holes, persisting over the weekend to the extent that the final round was delayed six months, finally being played on August 17th; and the brief but heavy hailstorm on tournament Sunday in 2019 that carpeted the putting greens with white pellets, resulting in a two-hour delay that pushed the event to a Monday finish[*].

The forecast for the week of the
2022 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am is
uncharacteristic for the time of year.

This year, however, in keeping with the new world order that seems to be affecting all aspects of life on planet Earth in 2022, the new two-word buzzphrase for the weather at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am is “offshore flow”. High pressure over the inland areas of the western United States is causing winds that blow from the interior to the coast, northeast to southwest; the air compresses as it descends to lower elevations and, as you know if you were paying attention in your high school science class, warms up as a result.

The forecast for what we locals still call “Crosby Week” is for mostly clear and sunny, if somewhat chilly, conditions. The winds will generally be calm at the low, coastal elevations where the three courses in the tournament rota are located, so we are likely to see some low scoring this year.

We are also seeing the return of spectators and amateur playing partners to the event after their absence in 2021 due to COVID-19 restrictions, and the third course in the rota, Monterey Peninsula Country Club’s Shore Course, which sat out last year due to the reduced field size.

As much as some PGA Tour pros, and some golf pundits, don’t like the pro-am format of this event, the presence of celebrity golfers and even the deep-pockets non-celebrity amateurs in the field is a unique and very special factor in the success of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, and we are very happy to see things getting back to something like normal.

Except for the weather, which is going to be spectacular.

[*] Five-time AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am winner Phil Mickelson seems to thrive on delayed finishes at this event; the 1998 and 2019 tournaments were his first and fifth wins at Pebble Beach.

Ben Hogan owns a unique Ryder Cup record that may never be equaled

While the eyes of the golf world are focused on the Ryder Cup this week, I thought that it would be fun to pull away from the drama of the current year’s events to take a look at some Ryder Cup history, and ask a question. What constitutes the “best” record in the Ryder Cup? Is it the most wins, or the most points scored over time? Or is it a perfect record, unblemished by losses, or even halves? And if it is the latter, who has achieved such a record?

Well, I can tell you that only one man has, and I’m willing to bet that most golfers, if asked who that man was, would guess and toss out names like Nicklaus, Palmer, or Woods from the American side; or Faldo, Ballesteros, or Montgomerie from the GBI/European side—but they’d be wrong.

That man is Ben Hogan.

Ben Hogan at the 1967 Ryder Cup awards ceremony
Credit: PGA of America via Getty Images    Copyright: PGA of America

Hogan is not a name that comes up much in conversations about the Ryder Cup these days, but it should. The American players who are most strongly associated with the biennial competition include Jack Nicklaus, Paul Azinger, and Phil Mickelson; on the GBI/European side you’ll hear about Seve Ballesteros, Nick Faldo, Colin Montgomerie, and Ian Poulter. Ben Hogan didn’t play in as many Ryder Cups as those big names, or score as many points, but he has one distinction that none of the rest of them can match: he was undefeated, both as a player and as a captain.

****************

The 1947 Ryder Cup marked the return of the event to the world stage for the first time since 1937, and Ben Hogan’s first appearance in the event, as a playing captain—he remains the only man to have been chosen to captain the American squad without having played on a previous team. Foursomes and singles were the only matches that were contested in those days, and Hogan played in only one match, teaming up with good friend Jimmy Demaret in a foursomes match against Jimmy Adams and Max Faulkner, defeating the GBI duo 2-up.

Played at Portland Golf Club, in Portland, Oregon, the 1947 event was marked by controversy that came at playing captain Hogan from both sides. First, American player Vic Ghezzi, perhaps disgruntled by the serial disappointment of having been selected for three consecutive Ryder Cups that were cancelled by the war—19391, 1941, and 1943—complained that he had been discriminated against by Hogan when the captain eliminated from consideration for qualification the results of several invitational events in which Ghezzi had finished well.[i]

Second, Ghezzi also accused Hogan of pressuring tournaments to ease restrictions on the alteration of grooves on wedges, an infraction that Ghezzi had been accused of earlier that year, an accusation that was reported in the press. It is possible that these reports encouraged GBI captain Henry Cotton in alleging that the Americans were using clubs with illegal grooves. This accusation came to naught when Captain Hogan allowed the Americans’ clubs to be inspected, and all were found to be legal and conforming.

****************

Hogan’s next appearance in the Ryder Cup came in 1949 as a non-playing captain—the youngest, to this day, in the history of the event. Just seven-and-a-half months after the February, 1949 head-on collision with a Greyhound bus that had come close to claiming his life, Hogan led a nine-man team consisting of four veterans; Sam Snead, Jimmy Demaret, Lloyd Mangrum, and Dutch Harrison, and five rookies; Skip Alexander, Bob Hamilton, Chick Harbert, Clayton Heafner, and Johnny Palmer, against a 10-man GBI squad of eight veterans and two rookies.

The event was again marked by some controversy, on two counts: First, Hogan reopened old wounds from the 1947 Ryder Cup when he leveled charges, on the night before play was to begin, that some of the British players were using irons with grooves that were deeper than were allowed by the rules. Unlike Henry Cotton’s accusation in 1947, the charges were found to have some merit: Jock Ballantyne, the head pro of the host club, Ganton Golf Club in Yorkshire, reportedly stayed up half the night grinding the faces of several sets of clubs to bring the grooves into conformance.

Second, the U.S. team brought along their own provisions, including fresh butter and eggs, half a dozen Virginia hams, thirty pounds of bacon, and some six hundred pounds of Texas sirloin steaks, to a United Kingdom that was still subject to wartime food rationing. The furor surrounding this culinary affront died down when Hogan offered to share the American bounty with the host team.

This was still in the era of foursomes and singles matches only, and while the GBI squad led 3-1 at the end of the Friday foursomes, the U.S. team rallied back in the Saturday singles, winning six of the eight matches to post an overall winning record of 7 and 5.

****************

Hogan returned to Ryder Cup play in 1951 as a team member. Though thankfully unmarked by controversy, the 1951 event did score an oddity— play was split between Friday (foursomes) and Sunday (singles) so that participants and spectators (presumably) could attend a college football game on Saturday in nearby Chapel Hill, where home team North Carolina hosted the visiting Tennessee Volunteers.

The U.S. team went out to a 3–1 lead in the Friday foursome matches, Hogan and good friend Jimmy Demaret teaming up once again and defeating the GBI duo of Fred Day and Ken Bousfield, 5 & 4.

Despite their strong play on Friday (the three matches they won went 5 & 3, 5 & 4, 5 & 4), the American Ryder Cup squad stayed in Pinehurst and practiced on Saturday, while the visiting GBI squad attended the American football game (and likely wondered at the name, given that only one member of the team ever touches the ball with his foot.) The visiting team, Tennessee, won in a rout, 27–0, but any hopes of foreshadowing for the GBI Ryder Cup squad was crushed during Sunday’s singles matches.

The U.S. team dominated the Sunday singles, 6-1-1, adding 6½ points to their Friday total for a 9½–2½ trouncing of the GBI squad. Hogan, playing in his first, and only, Ryder Cup singles match, defeated Britain’s Charlie Ward 3 & 2. It was to be the last Ryder Cup point he ever scored.

****************

Hogan didn’t return to the Ryder Cup until 1967, when he took the U.S. squad down the road to Champions Golf Club in Houston, Texas as a non-playing captain.

Not taking it any easier on his team than he ever had on himself, Hogan imposed a 10:30 pm. curfew and early practice sessions on his squad of five veterans and five rookies.

It was evident, however, that Hogan had confidence in his team. At the opening night dinner, after GBI squad captain Dai Rees, a loquacious Welshman, waxed lyrical (and overlong) about the virtues of each of his players in his introductory remarks, Hogan kept his speech short and sweet. After introducing each player by name only, and with his entire team standing, Hogan said, “Ladies and gentlemen, the U.S. Ryder Cup Team—the finest golfers in the world.” 

There was noticeable friction between Hogan and one of his players, though: Arnold Palmer. The two had always had a frosty relationship, and a couple of incidents during the 1967 Ryder Cup only deepened the permafrost.

In an interesting move that would form the basis of the one question I would most like to ask Mr Hogan, given the chance, he opted for his team to play the smaller (1.62-inch diameter) British ball, as was the option in those days.[ii] The decision to play the smaller ball led to a bit of internal controversy between Hogan and Palmer. Details of the exchange vary, but allegedly when Palmer, who had obviously forgotten to practice with the 1.62-inch ball, asked Hogan if he had brought any, Hogan snapped back, “Did you remember to bring your clubs?”[iii]

Of course, it probably hadn’t helped things that Palmer had shown up a couple of days late for practice rounds, and then took a few members of the GBI squad up for a ride in the Rockwell Jet Commander aircraft that he had bought the year before.[iv] After climbing to 8,000 feet and rolling the aircraft, Palmer circled dangerously low over the golf course on final approach before landing. Billy Casper was on the course at the time, and later recalled that when Palmer flew over in the jet, with his wheels down, he was so low that, “I could have hit a wedge over that plane.” Tournament host and Champions Club co-founder Jimmy Demaret quipped, “The only time I’ve ever seen a plane fly under the eaves of a clubhouse.”[v]

The stunt earned Palmer a letter of severe reprimand from the Federal Aviation Administration, and a rebuke from Hogan.

After Palmer and partner Gardner Dickinson won their Friday foursomes matches 2 & 1 over the Anglo/Irish duo of Peter Alliss and Christy O’Connor in the morning, and 5 & 4 over another Anglo/Irish pairing, Malcolm Gregson and Hugh Boyle in the afternoon, Palmer was sat out in the morning for the Saturday fourball (better-ball) matches, a 1963 addition to the Ryder Cup format. This is often seen as a slight against Palmer, who agreed in public with his captain’s decision, and later admitted in private that he was a bit tired.[vi] Julius Boros, who had 14 PGA Tour wins to his credit by this time, and two U.S. Open wins (1952, 1963) also sat out Saturday morning after playing morning and afternoon on Friday.

Saturday afternoon saw the two rested players, Palmer and Boros, paired up against Scotsman George Will and Irishman Hugh Boyle in a hard-fought match. The American pair were 4-down at the turn, and battled back to a 1-up win that was the closest U.S. victory of the afternoon.

The Sunday singles matches were dominated by Captain Hogan’s American players 5–3 in the morning and 5½ –2½ in the afternoon, for an overall score of USA–23 ½, GBI–8 ½.

****************

Ben Hogan’s record of three Ryder Cup wins doesn’t sound too impressive compared to the points totals toted up by some modern-day players, but his opportunities to rack up points was limited by the war years, and by the fact that his Ryder Cup playing days came before the addition of a day of fourball matches between foursome and singles. In one category, though, he stands out above all others: he is the only man whose Ryder Cup record, both as a player and a captain, has that pair of zeroes after the win count: 3–0–0. 

Ben Hogan – undefeated.

---

[i] Dodson, James; Ben Hogan: An American Life, pg. 213

[ii] The Montreal Gazette; October 20, 1967 

[iii] Sampson, Curt; Hogan, pg. 229

[iv] https://www.arnoldpalmer.com/aviation

[v] Dodson, James; Ben Hogan: An American Life, pg. 475

[vi] Feherty, David & Frank, James A.; David Feherty’s Totally Subjective History of the Ryder Cup, pg. 146

Day One is in the books at the 2021 Fortinet Championship

Given the variety of weather and playing conditions stress that has plagued the PGA Tour’s Napa Valley stop in recent years—high winds, fires, smoke-filled skies—a day that begins under a cool, grey overcast and finished under clear, sunny skies, with only light, fitful breezes, has to be considered a total win. Such was Day One of the 2021 Fortinet Championship at the Silverado Resort and Spa.

Tournament spokesman Phil Mickelson had a fair first round, opening with a 2-under 70, slotting him in at T-34 at the close of play; it was a good fit with his opening round record here at Silverado from 2016 through 2020: 69–69–65–75–71. The two other most notable names in the field, and the two top-ranked players at Silverado this week, World #1 Jon Rahm, and 2021 Masters champ and #20-ranked Hideki Matsuyama, had mixed results, due mostly to moderate to poor performances on the greens. Matsuyama closed out the day with a 3-under 69, T-23; while Rahm carded an even-par 72 to sit T-104 at the end of the day.

Sitting atop the leaderboard at the end of the first round was Kansas native and ASU grad Chez Reavie, who carded a 7-under 65 on the strength of Top 10 rankings in both Strokes-Gained-Approach and Strokes-Gained Putting. Tied for second behind Reavie are American Cameron Tringale and Canadian Adam Hadwin, both a stroke back at 6-under 66.

Among NorCal-adjacent players, SoCal native and former Cal Men’s Golf player Max Homa got his tournament off to a strong start with a 5-under 67, T-4. This is by far his best first-round performance on Silverado’s North Course, where he has opened with rounds of 72, 80 (ouch!), 72, and 70 in his past recent appearances.

Three Stanford Men’s Golf alumni, Patrick Rodgers, Maverick McNealy, and Joseph Bramlett, are next in the pack of NorCal-connected players, at 4-under, 3-under, and 3-under, respectively.

Among the former winners of this event that are in the field this year, Emiliano Grillo (2015), Brendan Steele (2016, 2017), and Kevin Tway (2018) all came in at 2-under 70, while Cameron Champ (2019) struggled to a 1-over 73.

A leavening of big names enriches the field in Napa this week for PGA Tour season opener

Before the PGA Tour’s changeover to the split schedule in 2013–2014, the events which were played in the Fall and early winter, after the Tour Championship, were known as the Fall Series. These tournament were generally played by a mix of young guns, mid-packers, and former greats who had slipped off their game—players who had to scramble for starts in the regular season and were looking for opportunities to play their way into, or back into, the mainstream events of the Tour.

With the onset to the split schedule some things changed, and some things stayed the same. FedEx Cup points and a shot at a Masters berth were added to the plate for these events, adding further incentive for their traditional fields, but the fields generally remained the same, with few of the big names wanting or needing to tee it up and play before the traditional season-openers in Hawaii in January.

The newly revamped Fortinet Championship (formerly the Safeway Open; before that the Frys.com Open) sits in a somewhat precarious spot in the schedule this year—after the FedEx Cup and the week-long PGA Tour “off-season”, and immediately before the Ryder Cup. The crème de la crème of American players are in Wisconsin practicing at Whistling Straits with Ryder Cup skipper Steve Stricker, so some of the big names that golf fans would love to see this week won’t be in the field. Despite that, there will still be plenty of talent, and a few big names, striding the fairways of the North Course at the Silverado Resort & Spa in Napa later this week.

One big-name early commit is fan favorite Phil Mickelson. Mickelson was the official tournament spokesman for event during its four-year run as the Safeway Open, thanks to his association with tournament organizers Lagardère Sports, and has remained in that role after the handover to cyber-security company Fortinet as presenting sponsor of the event. Presumably he doesn’t need to be in Wisconsin this week to prep for his role as a Ryder Cup vice-captain.

One surprising, and very welcome, name in the field this week is Jon Rahm, the current holder of the World #1 ranking and a member of the 2021 European Ryder Cup team that will be in Whistling Straits next week.

You have to read down the OWGR list to #20, Hideki Matsuyama, for the next top-tier name that is appearing in the field at Silverado this week, hopscotching over a bunch of guys who will be teeing it up at Whistling Straits next week, on both squads. Webb Simpson and Kevin Na round out the rest of the Top 30 players who are in the field this week.

Plenty of other notable, recognizable names are in the field, though, such PGA Tour stalwarts as Charley Hoffman, Charles Howell III, Matt Kuchar, Pat Perez, Jason Dufner, Brandt Snedeker, and Harold Varner III.

Former champions of the event who are in the field this year include Sangmoon Bae (2014) and Emiliano Grillo (2015) from the Frys.com Open days; Brendan Steele (2016, 2017), the first Safeway Open champ, who liked it so well he came back and did it again the next year; and Kevin Tway (2018). Other players of note whom fans will be able to see this week are Danny Willett, who benefitted from Jordan Spieth’s 2016 Masters meltdown to take home that year’s green jacket; and newly named PGA Tour Rookie of the Year, Will Zalatoris.

Players of particular interest to Northern California golf fans include 2019 winner Cameron Champ, of Sacramento; Kevin Chappell, out of Fresno and UCLA; former Stanford Men’s golf team members Patrick Rodgers, Brandon Wu, San José native Joseph Bramlett, and Hillsborough’s Maverick McNealy; Cal Men’s golf graduates James Hahn, of Alameda, and Max Homa; former SJSU Spartan Mark Hubbard, and Sacramento native and Fresno State grad Nick Watney.

Fortinet Championship: New kids on the block look forward to their spot on the PGA Tour calendar

It’s a fact of life in the world of corporate sponsorship of sporting events that sponsors come and go, and though not as regular as the changing of the seasons, it is as inevitable as the tide. The time has come, in that irregular cycle, for a much-loved Northern California event—the erstwhile Safeway Open, held at Napa’s Silverado Resort and Spa for the last four years, is turning over a new leaf to become the Fortinet Championship.

The Mansion at Silverado Resort and Spa, on the east side of the Napa Valley, once the home of United States Senator John Miller. (photo courtesy Silverado Resort and Spa)

Fortinet is not a name that you will necessarily be familiar with unless you are a commercial IT professional; they are a 20-year-old Silicon Valley company, headquartered in Sunnyvale, that provides enterprise security services to businesses, and educational and government institutions. The $4 billion company stepped in to take up the sponsorship of the season-opening PGA Tour event when Safeway ended a four-year run as title sponsor in 2020.

Fortinet has committed to a six-year run as title sponsor of the event, with an option for a seventh. Asked during a media day press conference last week if the company is committed to keeping the event at the Napa Valley venue, Fortinet’s Chief Marketing Officer John Maddison said that while they are not contractually obligated to the Silverado Resort and Spa, they consider it an ideal location for the event for their purposes.

The new title sponsor will be conducting a cyber-security symposium during tournament week along with partners IBM and CDW, among others, but while the IT executives and professionals are schmoozing and networking, golf fans who are just looking for a nice day out on a beautiful golf course will still get to enjoy good food, drink, and post-round entertainment, along with some golf competition on the Johnny Miller-designed North Course at Silverado Resort and Spa.

The full list of competitors for the 2021 event isn’t known yet, but Phil Mickelson, who stepped into the role of tournament spokesperson during the Safeway Open period (I’m going to miss those big cardboard Phil cutouts at my local Safeway…) through his association with sports-marketing firm Lagardére is continuing his commitment to the event. The 2019 winner, Cameron Champ, a NorCal local from Sacramento, is also committed to the tournament. Champ’s non-profit, the Cameron Champ Foundation, will hold a pro-am and a charity golf tournament on the Monday of tournament week, September 13th.

More information on the event, including parking, food and drink, volunteer and sponsorship opportunities, ticket sales and the lineup for the Thursday, Friday, and Saturday night live music concerts can be found online at https://www.fortinetchampionship.com

Don’t give up on the 2021 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am

 Circumstances have really piled it on to the 2021 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am. Public health restrictions due to the COVID-19 pandemic mean that there will be no fans allowed on the property this year. There will be no amateurs—celebrities or CEOs— playing in the event, and the resulting reduction in the size of the field means that the scenic Monterey Peninsula Country Club Shore Course will be left out of the mix, leaving just the pros to duke it out on Pebble Beach Golf Links and Spyglass Hill. Not only that, but the field is not just lacking star power of the celebrity kind; for the most part the stars of the golf world are staying away, too.

Still, for the fans watching from home—which is all of them—there are still a lot of reasons to tune in Thursday through Friday. With a polar vortex and yet another oddly named winter storm pounding much of the country east of the Rockies, the prospect of seeing golf being played on your TV set against the backdrop of the picturesque coastal scenery of the Monterey Peninsula isn’t a bad thing to look forward to.

Of course, the weather is always a consideration here in Steinbeck Country in early February—they don’t call it “Crosby Weather” for nothing—but the forecast as I am writing this is calling for a chance of rain Thursday after sundown, partly cloudy skies Friday, another chance of rain Saturday, and partly cloudy conditions again on Sunday. Compared to the deep freeze most of the country is being subjected to, this forecast is heavenly.

But who are the fans going to be seeing this week? One of the criticisms that has been leveled at this year’s event is a less-than-stellar gathering of golf talent. The tournament could initially lay claim to only one player in the Top 10 of the World Golf Rankings, World No. 1 Dustin Johnson, a two-time winner of this event; the next highest ranked players in the field were #11, Patrick Cantlay; #15, Daniel Berger; and #17, Paul Casey.

With ranking points available in the event determined by the strength of the field, and Pebble’s points running down in the low 30s, the tournament was starting to look like an opposite-field event—one of those also-ran tournaments like the Puerto Rico Open or Puntacana that are put on against a WGC event to give the “other” players something to do that weekend.

The dearth of higher-ranked players can be partially attributed to the absence of the CEOs and other high-rolling hotshots that make this tournament a top-tier networking event. Pebble has always been a draw for Tour players who are on the lookout for corporate sponsorships to carry them over those hard times when the top-ten finishes aren’t coming thick and fast. The fact that Pebble is followed in short order by the Genesis Invitational at Riviera Country Club, an event sponsored by Tiger Woods; and a WGC event in Florida is another excuse—oh, I mean reason—that has been cited by some of the higher-ranking players for taking this week off.

And then the somewhat weak field at this year’s event got even weaker with the withdrawal of Dustin Johnson, who cited jet-lag and a need to rest after winning a European Tour event in Saudi Arabia the previous weekend. Johnson’s withdrawal dropped the OWGR points for Pebble to 30—an all-time low.

Still, there are a number of players in the field that have drawing power for even the casual golf fan. Phil Mickelson, who shares the record for most wins in the event, at five, with Mark O’Meara, will be there. Jordan Spieth, who last week in Phoenix showed some of the fire that powered him to 11 wins in his first four years on Tour, including three majors: the Masters and U.S. Open in 2015, and the Open Championship in 2017, is in the field. Former World # 1 Jason Day, who has placed T5 or better in five of his last six starts in this tournament, is back, along with 2018 Open Championship winner Francesco Molinari. Both are looking to break long-running winless streaks. Perennial fan favorite Rickie Fowler is making his first appearance in the AT&T Pro-Am since 2012.

For Bay Area golf fans the chance to see some locally familiar names is also a draw. Former Stanford Men’s Golf standouts Patrick Rodgers, Maverick McNealy, and Joseph Bramlett are in the field, along with former Cal players Max Homa, and James Hahn, and San Jose State Men’s Golf alum Mark Hubbard.

It’s been a tough year since the previous AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, but I trust that the event that has weathered World War II, hail storms, tornados, and even a snow delay in 1962, will still put on a great show for golf fans this week.

Mixed results for NorCal golfers on opening day of 2020 U.S. Open

There are half a dozen NorCal-associated golfers in the field at the 2020 U.S. Open at Winged Foot Golf Club, and at the end of the first round the results they posted range from a respectable 1-under to a worrisome 8-over.

Collin Morikawa plays a shot from the greenside rough on the third hole during the first round at the 2020 U.S. Open at Winged Foot Golf Club (West Course) in Mamaroneck, N.Y. on Thursday, Sept. 17, 2020. (Darren Carroll/USGA)

Happily for we natives of NCGA territory, the two top scorers among the group are Northern California-born—Clovis’ Bryson DeChambeau, and Sacramento native Cameron Champ.  This pair of long-ball hitters from the Central Valley carded rounds of 1-over (DeChambeau) and 3-over (Champ) on the venerable Winged Foot GC layout.

The group of four remaining players of special interest to NorCal golfers comprises two SoCal golfers and two out-of-staters, all with college golf connections to the Bay Area.

Cal Men’s Golf is represented by Southern California natives Collin Morikawa and Max Homa; former Stanford golfer Brando Wu, of Scarsdale, NY, and Colorado-born 2011 San Jose State grad Mark Hubbard are also in the field.

Wu, a 2019 Stanford grad, is playing in his second U.S. Open—his first as a professional—after topping the points list of the developmental-level Korn Ferry Tour series in 2019. He claimed the “best of the rest” title among NorCal affiliated players with a 4-over 74. Opening with a 2-under 33 on the front nine, Wu fell prey to the Winged Foot rough on the homeward nine after hitting only four of eight fairways.

Wu may be remembered for receiving his Stanford diploma on the 18th green of Pebble Beach Golf Links at last year’s U.S. Open—nice compensation for having to miss his graduation ceremony at the Palo Alto campus.

Cal Men’s golf standout and 2020 PGA Championship winner Collin Morikawa found the venerable Westchester County golf course heavier sledding than TPC Harding Park, where he hoisted the PGA’s Wanamaker Trophy six weeks ago after taking the 2020 PGA Chmpionship. The SoCal native seemed never to entirely get his feet underneath him on Winged Foot’s turf, going 36-40–76 largely due to a fall-off in his usual masterful iron work (-1.08 SG:Approach), around the greens (-2.37 SG) and weak putting (-0.83 SG:Putting). 

Mark Hubbard, a former San Jose State golfer, found himself in a similar position to Morikawa at the conclusion of his first round, with a 6-over 76 on one birdie and seven bogeys. Hubbard had his own 18th-green moment at Pebble Beach Golf Links in 2015, when he proposed to his girlfriend, Meghan, after completing the first round of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am.

Of course someone has to be last, and in this accounting of NorCal-affiliated golfers, that dubious honor falls to former Cal Men’s Golf stalwart Max Homa. A decently strong performance off the tee (+1.12 SG – 9 of 14 fairways) wasn’t enough to carry his round in the face of numbers like -2.17 SG:Approach, -2.38 SG:Around the Green, and -2.03 SG:Putting. 

Homa can take heart (I suppose) from the fact that he closed out his first round one stroke better than fellow SoCal native Phil Mickelson, and saw a lot more of Winged Foot’s fairways than the veteran southpaw, who only found two of 14 in the first round.

PGA Tour season opens in the Napa Valley under orange-tinted skies

 Advocates of a PGA Tour off-season got no satisfaction this week as the 2020–2021 season opener got underway at Napa’s Silverado Resort and Spa on Thursday – hard on the heels of the Labor Day Monday finish of the 2019–2020 Fedex Cup final.

Ominous orange-tinted skies brought back memories of the 2018 event, which closed out its final day in blustery conditions that, later in the evening, played a part in igniting wildfires in the nearby hills that swept across the tournament venue destroying at least one grandstand complex. Though not directly threatened by any of the wildfires currently raging across the state of California, the Napa area, like much of Northern California, is suffering the worst air-quality conditions the region has ever experienced.

This year’s field for the event is a disparate collection of young guns and established stars, with a healthy dose of major winners—Sergio Garcia, Jordan Spieth, Jim Furyk, Shane Lowry, Charl Schwartzel, Keegan Bradley, Jason Dufner, and the ubiquitous Phil Mickelson (whose representing agency, Lagardère Sports, is the event organizer), and one former World Number One, Luke Donald.

You had to look a ways down the leaderboard after the first round to see any of those names, however, as Schwartzel, the 2014 Master champion, Shane Lowry, 2019 Open champion, and Keegan Bradley, the 2013 PGA champion, had the best first rounds of their major-winning peers, all opening at T11 with 4-under 68s.

Dufner and Mickelson were next among the major winners in the field at 2-under and 1-under, respectively, while none of the rest managed to break par: Garcia and Furyk at even par; and Jordan Spieth, whose struggles continue into the new season, at 1-over. Luke Donald, whose tenure as World #1 lasted for a mere four weeks in 2012, struggled to 6-over 78.

The leader after Round One was Scotsman Russell Knox, who opened with a clean-card 9-under 63 on the 7,203-yard North Course at Silverado, followed by Sam Burns, Bo Hoag, and Cameron Percy, all one shot back at 8-under. Two-time Safeway Open champ Brendan Steele opened with what for him was a typical opening round on the wine-country course, a 7-under 65. The 2017 and 2018 champion in the event carded opening rounds of 67 and 65 in his recent back-to-back victories here.

Saturday at the AT&T Pro-Am is two days in one

The unique format of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, which is played on three golf courses, dictates a major difference between this event and your standard, week-to-week Tour event: Saturday becomes cut day and moving day in one. Factor in the differences in level of difficulty between the courses – weather being equal, hardest to easiest: Spyglass Hill, Pebble, MPCC; and throw in the fact that Pebble is more likely to get windy, and is more affected by the wind, and Saturday becomes a real crap-shoot when it comes to predicting how the field will shake out at the end of the day on Saturday.

One could have been excused, then, for being only cautiously optimistic about 36-hole leader Nick Taylor’s chances of retaining the lead after 54 holes, with similar caution applied to Jason Day’s second-place position – each played MPCC and Pebble over the first two days in pristine conditions, and Spyglass Hill on Saturday. Phil Mickelson, who closed out 36 holes in solo third place, got there by way of Spyglass and MPCC, in that order, landing that sweet pick that puts him on Pebble for back-to-back rounds on Saturday and Sunday.

A third round at Spyglass has quashed more than one player’s chances over the years, but neither Day nor Taylor showed any signs of being slowed down by the Robert Trent Jones course about which Jack Nicklaus famously said, “…it makes you want to go fishing.”

Starting on the par-4 tenth hole at Spyglass, Taylor faltered early with an opening bogey and another at #13, a 460-yard par 4 that is the #1 handicap hole on the course, but recovered quickly with birdies at the 17th, second, and fifth holes, then put a little distance between himself and his big-name pursuers with an eagle-3 on the 549-yard par-five seventh hole. The Winnipeg native brought it to the house with a 3-under third round for a 17-under 54-hole total, which turned out to be good enough to retain his lead going into the final round.

Jason Day slipped back slightly while finishing at Spyglass Hill, carding a two-under 70, offsetting four birdies with two bogeys. He finished his Saturday in solo third at 14-under after having held a share of the lead earlier in the day.

Meanwhile, over at Pebble Beach, Phil Mickelson was being Phil, opening his round with a pair of birdies at holes one and two, then notching another bird at the par-5 sixth hole. Despite its daunting aspect, with a second shot that has to negotiate a looming cliff for a blind approach shot, has played easier than any other hole on the course in this year’s tournament.

The real “Phil-the Thrill” fireworks began at the next hole, the world-famous seventh, a jewel-like par-3 perched out on the tip of Arrowhead Point. His frankly mediocre tee shot caromed off the more-than-usually-firm putting surface into a fried-egg lie in the back bunker. Squaring up with a wedge, Mickelson hit a low pitch shot that would have run well past the flag if it hadn’t checked in the rough short of the green; instead, it pulled up at kick-in range for a par save that people will be talking about for quite a while.

After three pars to close out the front nine at 33, Mickelson continued with pars at 10 and 11 before making a slight misstep at the par-3 twelfth, landing in the front bunker, wedging out and two-putting for bogey.

At 13, the recently renovated 407-yard par-4, his tee shot went wide left, his second landed in the left-front bunker, followed by a highlight-reel chip-in for birdie. Similar drama followed at the next hole, the intimidating 582-yard par-5 fourteenth. Wide left off the tee – again, Mickelson’s second found the fairway some 90 yards short of the green. Coming up short when his approach checked up short of the flag and rolled back to below the false front of the green, his fourth, a back-foot chip-and-run drew a beeline for the hole, rattling the flagstick to drop in for his second consecutive birdie.

After par out of a left-of-the-fairway bunker on the fifteenth hole, a routine par at the sixteenth and a disappointing two-putt par from nine feet at the second most famous par-three on the course, #17, Phil found trouble right (for a change) with his second shot at the eighteenth hole.

After getting relief from an obstruction in the wood chips right of the green, he fired a skyhook flop shot that rolled past the hole by inches; he then drained the 4-1/2-foot putt for another birdie. After hitting nine of fourteen fairways, nine of eighteen greens and only 22 putts, Mickelson closed with a 5-under 67 to finish in solo second at 16 under.

Today’s round puts Mickelson in great shape to renew his oldest-winner title, and to share the back-to-back winner title with Sam Snead (1937, 1938), Jack Nicklaus (1972, 1973), Tom Watson (19777, 1978), Mark O’Meara (1989, 1990), and Dustin Johnson (2009, 2010). Most significantly, a win on Sunday will put Mickelson in sole possession of the “Most Wins in the AT&T Pro-am” title.

Mickelson and his amateur partner, former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Steve Young, are second in the Pro-Am contest going into the final round, behind Kevin Streelman and his amateur partner, Arizona Cardinals wide receiver Larry Fitzgerald. They will tee off with third-round leader Nick Taylor and amateur partner Jerry Tarde, editor-in-chief of Golf Digest magazine, Sunday morning at Pebble Beach.