Day: June 22, 2020

Featured Groups: Travelers ChampionshipFeatured Groups: Travelers Championship

June 22, 2020June 22, 2020| 18:00

The PGA TOUR announced Monday the four Featured Groups for Thursday-Friday at the Travelers Championship, to be contested at TPC River Highlands in Cromwell, Connecticut. For the third consecutive week, the top-five players in the Official World Golf Ranking will be among the 12 players in the Featured Groups. Webb Simpson, winner of last week’s RBC Heritage, tied his career-best position in the OWGR (No. 5) and moved to No. 1 in the FedExCup standings. Full groupings and starting times for the first two rounds of the Travelers Championship will be released officially at approximately noon ET on Tuesday, June 23. HOW TO FOLLOW Television: Thursday-Friday, 3 p.m.-6 p.m. ET (Golf Channel). Saturday-Sunday, 1 p.m.-3 p.m. (Golf Channel), 3 p.m.-6 p.m. (CBS). PGA TOUR LIVE: Thursday-Friday 6:30 a.m.-6 p.m. (featured groups), Saturday-Sunday 7:45 a.m.-3 p.m. (featured groups). Saturday-Sunday 3 p.m.-6 p.m. (featured holes). Radio: Thursday-Friday, 12 p.m.-6 p.m. Saturday-Sunday 1 p.m.-6 p.m. (PGA TOUR Radio on SiriusXM and PGATOUR.com/liveaudio). FEATURED GROUPS Bryson DeChambeau, Rory McIlroy, Phil Mickelson • DeChambeau, who leads the TOUR in Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee, has recorded a top-10 in each of his last five starts, including a T8 at last week’s RBC Heritage • McIlroy has two wins when playing the first two rounds of an event with Mickelson (2011 U.S. Open, 2019 THE PLAYERS Championship) • Mickelson, a 44-time PGA TOUR winner, has won the Travelers Championship twice (2001, 2002) Brooks Koepka, Xander Schauffele, Justin Thomas • Koepka was the biggest mover in the FedExCup standings following the RBC Heritage, jumping 56 spots from 204th to No. 148 • Schauffele has two runner-up finishes on the season, with both coming in playoffs (World Golf Championships-HSBC Champions, Sentry Tournament of Champions) • Currently No. 2 in the FedExCup standings and No. 3 in the OWGR, Thomas finished T3 at the 2016 Travelers Championship, his best result in six starts at the event Jon Rahm, Chez Reavie, Webb Simpson • Rahm has four top-10s in seven starts on the season, highlighted by a runner-up result at the Farmers Insurance Open • Reavie earned his second PGA TOUR title at the 2019 Travelers Championship 3,983 days after winning his first (2008 RBC Canadian Open), the 11th-longest span between first and second TOUR wins since 1900 • Simpson moved to No. 1 in the FedExCup standings with his win at the RBC Heritage, holding the top spot for the fourth week in his career and first since the 2013-14 season Dustin Johnson, Collin Morikawa, Jordan Spieth • Johnson carded four scores in the 60s at last week’s RBC Heritage (T17), doing so in a PGA TOUR event for the first time since the 2019 WGC-FedEx St. Jude Invitational • Morikawa has made the cut in all 22 of his starts as a professional on TOUR, the second-longest streak to start a career on TOUR in the last 30 years (longest: 25/Tiger Woods) • Spieth’s 10th PGA TOUR victory came at the 2017 Travelers Championship after he holed a bunker shot to defeat Daniel Berger in a playoff

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AP source: Wizards’ Bertans sits out NBA restart to seasonAP source: Wizards’ Bertans sits out NBA restart to season

June 22, 2020June 22, 2020| 17:43

Washington Wizards forward Davis Bertans will skip the Disney-based resumption of the NBA season, making him the first known example of a healthy, eligible player sitting out. Bertans can become an unrestricted free agent this offseason and is expected to command a big contract as one of the league’s top 3-point shooters. Bertans’ decision was first reported Monday by ESPN and confirmed to Sports Betting News by a person familiar with his plans, speaking on condition of anonymity because neither the player nor team had made an announcement.

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PGA Championship to be played at TPC Harding Park without spectatorsPGA Championship to be played at TPC Harding Park without spectators

June 22, 2020June 22, 2020| 16:21

The City of San Francisco and the PGA of America today announced that the 2020 PGA Championship, in which two-time defending champion Brooks Koepka aims for a historic three-peat, will be contested without spectators on-site, August 3-9 at TPC Harding Park in San Francisco. The decision to play golf’s first men’s major championship of 2020 without spectators was made in coordination with the state of California and city and county of San Francisco, with the health and well-being of all involved as the top priority. “We are thrilled to welcome the PGA Championship to San Francisco,” said San Francisco Mayor London N. Breed. “We are able to safely take this step toward reopening because of the ongoing sacrifices of our citizens, the continued committed work of our healthcare workers and the early action we took to battle COVID-19.” The PGA of America will continue to monitor COVID-19 developments and work in concert with the state of California and San Francisco city and county public health authorities and the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention through Championship Week. “We are both inspired and honored to ‘play on,’” said PGA of America CEO Seth Waugh. “In doing so, we will spotlight not only the beauty of TPC Harding Park, but the fortitude of San Francisco and its remarkable people. We’d like to thank the state of California and the city and county of San Francisco for being terrific partners in helping us get to this place. While the local community cannot be with us physically on-site, we will certainly carry their spirit of resilience and unity with us as we stage our major championship, on their behalf, for all the world to see and enjoy.” Many of golf’s greatest champions, from Walter Hagen, Gene Sarazen, Sam Snead, Byron Nelson and Ben Hogan, to Lee Trevino, Jack Nicklaus, Tiger Woods, Rory McIlroy and Brooks Koepka, have had their names inscribed on the famed Wanamaker Trophy. “It has been gratifying for our PGA Professionals to play a meaningful role in helping people find healthy, outdoor recreation during the various phases of reopening golf,” noted PGA of America President Suzy Whaley. “It’s been encouraging to see our entire country and such a wide diversity of people embrace golf as a responsible, yet fun, activity to share with family and friends. We also look forward to returning to San Francisco and The Olympic Club for the PGA Championship in 2028 and the Ryder Cup in 2032, when we will again share this great game with the people of the Bay Area.” In the coming days, those who purchased tickets directly from the PGA of America will be contacted to facilitate refunds. Updates will be posted at pgachampionship.com and on social media @PGAChampionship. Those who purchased tickets from a secondary market platform other than pgachampionship.com should contact that site directly. The PGA of America will be unable to process refunds for those tickets. The 2020 PGA Championship – the first in the PGA of America’s landmark 11-year media rights agreement with CBS and ESPN – will feature CBS Sports, ESPN and ESPN+ combining to deliver an unprecedented amount of broadcast and digital coverage. Globally, the PGA Championship will be broadcast in 164 countries and territories reaching more than a half-billion households. “Welcoming the PGA Championship to San Francisco is the high point of a very unusual year. We are looking forward to sharing the beauty of TPC Harding Park and San Francisco with the players, the media and viewers all over the world,” said Joe D’Alessandro, president and CEO of the San Francisco Travel Association, the official destination marketing organization. TPC Harding Park, which is managed by the City’s Recreation and Park Department, is the fourth municipal golf course to host the PGA Championship. Seven of the past 10 winners of the PGA Championship went on to become No. 1 in the Official World Golf Ranking, including Koepka, who won his second consecutive PGA Championship in May 2019 at Bethpage Black in Farmingdale, New York. The two-time defending PGA Champion will use the season’s initial men’s major championship to bid for history, as he’ll seek to become the first player to win the same major three consecutive times since Australia’s Peter Thomson claimed three straight Open Championships from 1954-56. The field also will once again include the top 20 PGA Club Professionals, who will qualify during the PGA Professional Championship to be played in late July at Omni Barton Creek Resort in Austin, Texas. Prior to its postponement on March 17, the PGA Championship was originally scheduled for play May 14-17.

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Numbers to know: RBC HeritageNumbers to know: RBC Heritage

June 22, 2020June 22, 2020| 15:30

Welcome to the Numbers to Know, where we’ll take a closer look at Webb Simpson’s victory at the RBC Heritage. It was Simpson’s second win of the season and moved him to No. 1 in the FedExCup. Let’s dive right in. 1. RUN TO REMEMBER: This win, the seventh of Simpson’s career, was the latest in an impressive run over the past year. Since last June, Simpson has two wins, four runners-up and one third-place finish. That’s the most top-three finishes TOUR in that span. He has finished in the top-3 in half of his six starts this season alone. 2. GOIN’ LOW: Good iron play and strong putting are a recipe for low scores, so it should be no surprise that no one has been going lower more often than Simpson recently. He ranks seventh in Strokes Gained: Approach-the-Green and 13th in Strokes Gained: Putting this season. He was eighth and second in those two categories at the RBC Heritage, respectively. Simpson shot 65-65-68-64 to win Sunday by a shot. Simpson has the most rounds on TOUR of 65 or lower since June 1 of last year (15), and he shoots those numbers much more often than anyone else on TOUR. 3. FINISHING KICK: Simpson’s second round was one of the best putting performances of his career (more on that later). He may have experienced a little regression to the mean after gaining more than six strokes on the greens Friday, though. He lost 2.6 strokes on the greens over his next 27 holes before finding his stroke again in the nick of time. He holed four putts from outside 10 feet on the final nine holes, gaining 2.7 strokes on the greens in that span. He holed birdie putts of 10, 22, 15 and 18 as part of his back-nine 30 on Sunday (he also two-putted for birdie on the par-5 15th). It was the low score by a winner on Sunday’s back nine in more than a year. Corey Conners also shot 30 to win last year’s Valero Texas Open. Simpson was the first player since Rod Pampling at the 2016 Shriners Hospitals for Children Open to hole four putts of 10 or more feet on the final nine hole of a tournament. It also matched the most over the last five seasons. Jordan Spieth and Smylie Kaufman also did it. 4. SECOND TO NONE: Simpson’s second round at the RBC Heritage may have been the best putting round of his career. He gained +6.01 strokes on the greens, which was just a hair behind the personal record he set at last year’s U.S. Open (6.03). He also set or tied several career-highs in Friday’s round. Almost all of Simpson’s Strokes Gained: Putting for the week came in the second round. He gained just +0.6 strokes on the greens for the remainder of the week. 5. PICKING HIS SPOTS: Simpson admits that scheduling is key since he isn’t one of the TOUR’s longest hitters. And, as a father of five, he tries to limit his time away from his family and play only at the courses where he has the highest chance of success. Entering this season, there were three events where Simpson had six top-25s but no wins. Those were his most top-25s without a victory at full-field events. He finally got the victory at two of those events this year – the Waste Management Phoenix Open and RBC Heritage – and finished one shot out of a playoff at the other (Sony Open in Hawaii). The Sony and TOUR Championship are now tied for events where he’s had most top-25s without a win (7).

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