Day: August 13, 2020

Wyndham Championship Round 1 updates: FedExCup, Wyndham RewardsWyndham Championship Round 1 updates: FedExCup, Wyndham Rewards

GREENSBORO, N.C. – There’s a lot on the line at this week’s Wyndham Championship at Sedgefield Country Club. The top 125 in the FedExCup standings advance to the Playoffs next week and the Wyndham Rewards Top 10 competition will be decided. Here’s a quick look at each one after Thursday’s opening round, played under cloudy skies and halted at 6:08 p.m. by a thunderstorm with 33 players on the course. Players will return to complete the first round at 7 a.m. ET and the second round will begin as scheduled. RELATED: Full leaderboard | Simpson, Todd feed off friendly energy | Three share lead after Round 1 FedExCup Update At stake: The 125 spots in the upcoming FedExCup Playoffs. Players who finish outside the top 125 after this week will see their seasons end. Unlike in past seasons, though, all players who were exempt this year will retain their eligibility for the 2020-21 campaign due to the schedule reduction caused by COVID-19. Latest projections: Roger Sloan, Chesson Hadley and Hank Lebioda – who was playing the 17th hole when play was halted — are currently projected to move into the top 125 while Fabian Gomez, Russell Knox and bubble boy Charl Schwartzel are projected to drop out. … Of those, Roger Sloan, who is in a three-way tie for the lead, made the biggest move, jumping from No. 178 to 49th. … Hadley, who lives in nearby Raleigh and is tied for fifth after a 65, is projected to make a 26-spot jump to No. 110. … Leboida, who is also currently in the logjam at 5 under, had jumped 22 spots to No. 116 when play was halted … Gomez has fallen four spots to No. 126, Knox has dropped three to No. 127 and Schwartzel has dropped three to No. 128. … Seven of the last 10 players who came to Sedgefield ranked No. 125 have advanced to the Playoffs but the three who were eliminated have been in the last four years. … Sloan said he doesn’t feel as much pressure as he might have this week given that he has a card for next season – regardless of what happens. “Now, with that being said, you know, obviously I really want to be in the Playoffs next week, I want to make a good push,” he said after shooting 62. “We’re starting to play some really good golf so I think you can string together a few really good weeks at the right time of year and make a little bit of noise at the right time.” Stuck in neutral: Brooks Koepka was ranked 208th in the FedExCup when the PGA TOUR returned to action after the three-month layoff due to COVID-19. The Wyndham Championship is his eighth straight tournament. … His tie for second at the World Golf Championships-FedEx St. Jude Invitational moved him from No. 155 to 96th. Koepka came to Greensboro ranked No. 92 hoping to give himself a boost as he tries to make it to the finale in Atlanta for the fifth time in six years. … But he said he came out flat on Thursday, shooting a 2-over 72 to fall one spot. Even so, Koepka said he never thought about taking a week off. … “Not really, because I thought even if I gain one spot in the FedEx, it makes it that much easier for next week, so you’ve got to play, see where you’re at,” he said. “I mean, I don’t think I’ve ever played more than four in a row pretty much out here. It will be quite a long stretch, but I’ve got to do what I’ve got to do.” Wyndham Rewards Top 10 At stake: The top 10 spots in the FedExCup standings and its bonus pool money of $10 million. Justin Thomas already has wrapped up the top prize of $2 million. There was no movement in the top 10 on Thursday. Webb Simpson, who has two wins this season, remains in third after opening with a 66. Fifth-ranked Sungjae Im shot 1 under while No. 6 Patrick Reed, the 2013 Wyndham Championship winner, shot 65. Brendon Todd, who has also won twice this year, shot 68 and stays in the No. 9 spot.

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Webb Simpson, Brendon Todd feed off each other in first round of Wyndham ChampionshipWebb Simpson, Brendon Todd feed off each other in first round of Wyndham Championship

GREENSBORO, N.C. – Thursday’s first round of the Wyndham Championship was a back-to-the future kind of day for Webb Simpson and Brendon Todd. The two childhood friends, each with a pair of PGA TOUR victories this season, were paired together alongside Sungjae Im at Sedgefield Country Club, which is about 90 miles from the greater Raleigh area where the two grew up. RELATED: Full leaderboard | Simpson, Tesori form bond beyond the course Simpson had the edge on Thursday, shooting 66 on a course where he won in 2011 and has finished third or better each of the last three years. Todd signed for a 68 that would have been one better had he not missed the green and bogeyed his final hole. “I love playing with Brendon,” Simpson said. “… I feel like we feed off each other and it’s always a good day.” There have been many battles over the last two decades, albeit without stakes as high as the FedExCup points and Wyndham Rewards payout the two are vying for this week. The 35-year-old Simpson is looking for his eighth TOUR title while Todd seeks win No. 4. The dream was always to get to this point, but as we all know life offers no guarantees. So even Simpson, who overcame an early double bogey Thursday with six birdies in his next 10 holes, admits that competing head-to-head now at the game’s highest level each week is “pretty cool.” “I think we could have imagined it then, but you know, to go on to professional golf and have the success that we’ve had, especially his success, you know, we would have pinched ourselves and signed right up for that career, for sure,” Todd agreed. Todd moved to Cary, N.C., a Raleigh suburb, from Pittsburgh when he was 11 years old and almost immediately the two started squaring off in junior events around the state and the southeast. They became good friends, as well as rivals, and pushed each other to succeed. “I think golf’s one of those games where whether you have a best friend you play against in tournaments or whether you’re just out there competing, tournament golf makes you better,” Todd said. “Strong work ethic is really important in this game and that’s something that both of us had from an early age. “With or without each other, I think we could have gotten to this point. I think right now it just makes it more fun to have a childhood buddy out there you’re kind of competing against, pulling for.” Simpson, who has a U.S. Open and PLAYERS Championship on his resume, will candidly say that early on Todd, a three-time state high school champ who went on to play at Georgia, got the better of him more often than the reverse. Todd, on the other hand, was quick to point out the 1999 N.C. Junior where his buddy beat him in the championship match. In recent years, though, Simpson, the former Wake Forest All-American, watched as not once but twice his friend climbed back from golf’s abyss. The seeds of the comeback were sown during the 2018-19 season after Todd finally steadied himself after the full-swing yips had led to a stretch of 38 missed cuts in 42 starts. Todd won twice, consecutively, last fall and finished solo fourth in his quest for three straight victories. He’s continued his solid play since the restart after the COVID-19 break, too, holding the 54-hole lead at the World Golf Championships-FedEx St. Jude Invitational. Toss was the first-round pacesetter at last week’s PGA, as well. “I think it shows kind of what he’s made of,” Simpson said. “To be a great player and to go for quite a bit of time struggling and to come back and then, you know, get to the position he’s in now. Last fall having two victories, a chance to win the next week in Sea Island, it’s really admirable. “You take your hat off to these guys, these star players who are just really good and they’ve been good their whole career. I applaud them. But to see a guy go through what he went through, I feel like that’s a story that isn’t talked about enough out here or really in sports. “It’s hard to go from where he was to now on top of the world in the game of golf, or close to it. So, it’s really cool to see and I’m happy for him.” Todd appreciates his friend’s support – and his success. Simpson came into the week at the Wyndham Championship ranked third in the FedExCup and sixth in the world. He opened the season with top-10s in his first four starts, including a playoff victory at the Waste Management Phoenix Open and a playoff loss at The RSM Classic where Todd finished fourth. A win at the RBC Heritage in the second tournament after the COVID hiatus kept Simpson’s momentum on high. “We’re great friends and always have been,” Todd said. “He’s such a good player, you just kind of feed off his energy.

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