Curiosity, hope and so many fans surround Tiger Woods in 2018

Go ahead and peruse Brooks Koepka’s bag setup from his win at THE CJ CUP @ NINE BRIDGES. If you’re a gearhead, you’ll notice something feels out of place — and it’s not the Nike Vapor Fly Pro 3-iron he’s had in the bag going to 2016 when the Swoosh was still in the equipment game. Next to a Scotty Cameron T10 Select Newport 2 putter, Koepka’s Titleist Vokey Design SM4 TVD lob wedge is arguably the oldest club in his bag at the moment, with a product release date that goes back to 2011. There’s a reason why Koepka loves the wedge so much, and it has to do with a custom low-bounce TVD M-Grind he’s placed on his 60-degree for every TOUR title, including three major championships. Bottom line, Koepka and his lob wedge have some good history — so much so that when he decided to move into the current SM7 version earlier this year, Vokey Tour rep Aaron Dill added the same SM4 TVD M-Grind to the updated head. Koepka had three Vokey SM7 wedges in play during his win at this year’s U.S. Open, but like most professionals, fresh sets are needed throughout the season to ensure the grooves have extra zip for the major championships. Given Koepka’s success with SM7, many wondered why the 28-year-old suddenly decided to revert back to SM4 in his lob wedge late in the year, but retain SM7 gap and sand wedges. Of course, there’s a story behind the older model wedge getting a spot in Koepka’s bag. The week prior to the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational, Koepka made a call to Aaron Dill, Vokey’s Tour rep, to have three new SM7 wedges built in preparation for the PGA Championship and FedExCup Playoffs. It was a simple ask that Dill was able to knock out — shipping the clubs to Koepka’s house prior to his departure for Firestone. But there was one problem when Koepka arrived on site in Ohio: He left the wedges at home. In need of a set at the last minute, Koepka’s caddie, Ricky Elliott, asked Dill if he could build something new in less than a day. Dill is a modern-day magician on the grinding wheel, but on short notice, even he wasn’t able to completely fulfill Koepka’s request. The issue came down to the grind on the lob wedge, which is highly complicated and takes roughly two days for Dill to add Koepka’s customized SM4 TVD M-Grind geometry on a special SM7 head. “I’d say about 10 to 15 percent of the guys I work with need something exotic on their wedge,” Dill said. “A few of those grinds just take time to get it exactly right, and that’s the case with his grind.” To help Koepka out in a pinch, Dill reached into his bag of tricks, pulling an old SM4 TVD M-Grind head from the Titleist truck. Due to the number of players who still use exotic offerings on TOUR, Dill keeps special stock — custom grinds and head offerings that may have been retired — on hand each week for unique requests. Dill would eventually build Koepka an SM7 with his preferred grind after the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational, but instead of putting it in play, the PGA TOUR Player of then Year chose to keep the older model SM4 in the bag for the remainder of the season and into the new 2018-19 campaign. What makes Koepka’s M-Grind so different from the standard version? According to Dill, it comes down to bounce characteristics that are lower than most golfers would prefer on the grind. Koepka’s lob wedge sits tight on the turf, due to the relief that’s added to the heel, toe and trailing edge, making it ideal for firm conditions — something he encountered for years in Europe before he earned his TOUR card. “When it comes to his lob wedge, the bounce on it is extremely low,” said Dill, who noted the bounce on a standard M-Grind is 8 degrees. “He’s got some terrific hands and delivers the wedge impeccably. He’s able to get away with just having very little bounce. “We talk about low bounce numbers, he’s about 8 to 9 degrees less forward angle than the original. It’s quite a bit. That’s just from him experimenting and finding what’s worked best for him. He’s been using that for years.” Koepka’s SM4 may be one of the oldest wedges on TOUR, but when it comes to the way it performs on the course, there’s a reason why he continues to use the same setup. The results speak for themselves. BUY EQUIPMENT HERE: PGA TOUR Superstore

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HONOLULU — Matt Kuchar overcame three early bogeys that cost him the lead with flawless golf and two key birdies on the back nine to close with a 4-under 66 and win the Sony Open in Hawaii for his second PGA TOUR title this season. It wasn’t as easy as his four-shot victory over Andrew Putnam might indicate. Having made only one bogey through 54 holes to build a two-shot lead, Kuchar had three bogeys in his opening five holes Sunday and fell one shot behind Putnam, and he had to make a 10-foot birdie putt at the turn to avoid falling two shots behind. Kuchar caught him with an aggressive pitch up the slope on the par-4 10th hole. They remained tied with five holes to play when Putnam made bogey from a deep bunker left of the 14th green, and Kuchar made a pair of 12-foot birdie putts on the next two holes to seize control. Just like that, his lead was three shots, making for a pleasant walk up the par-5 18th. Kuchar became the first multiple winner on the PGA TOUR this season, having ended a drought of more than four years when he captured the Mayakoba Classic in Mexico last November. It was only the second time in his career Kuchar has won twice in the same season. He won the Match Play Championship and the Memorial in 2013. Now, he has the meat of the season in front of him. “I want to see how great this year can be,” Kuchar said. He finished at 22-under 258, the third-lowest total in Waialae history behind the PGA TOUR record of 253 by Justin Thomas in 2017 and Jimmy Walker’s 72-hole score of 257 when he won in 2015. Putnam, who won his first PGA TOUR title last summer at the Barracuda Championship, didn’t blink until that approach into the bunker that led to his lone bogey, and he couldn’t make enough putts to stay close to Kuchar the rest of the way. He closed with a 68 and moved into the top 50 in the world for the first time in his career. Corey Conners of Canada, who got into the field through a Monday qualifier, had a 64-64 weekend and was among four players who tied for third, though none had a serious chance of challenging what amounted to a two-player race at the top. Even so, the performance was big for Conner, who narrowly missed a full PGA TOUR card last year. Along with his runner-up finish in the Sanderson Farms Championship last fall, he has nearly as many FedExCup points as last year when he finished at No. 130. Marc Leishman (64), Hudson Swafford (64) and Chez Reavie (67) also finished in a tie for third. Davis Love III, who first played the Sony Open in 1986, missed by one shot matching the lowest 72-hole score of his career. His 64-65 weekend gave him a tie for seventh, and he now heads off to Singapore with hopes of earning a spot in The Open Championship. But this day ultimately belonged to Kuchar, who won for the ninth time in his career. He ended the 2018 season earlier than he wanted, failing to reach the TOUR Championship for the first time since 2009 and ending his streak of playing on eight straight teams in the Ryder Cup or Presidents Cup. He won again in Mexico in a Sunday much tighter than he would have preferred, and had a few nervous moments at the start at Waialae. He went long of the second green, leading to bogey. The other two were sloppy — a three-putt across the back of the fourth green, and a wedge into No. 5 that he was begging to get down as soon as it left his club. It hopped into the back bunker, and he missed an 8-foot par putt to lose the lead. From there, however, Kuchar had a birdie chance on the final 13 holes. Kuchar and Putnam were in a bunker short of the green on the par-5 ninth. Putnam went first and it rolled out to 2 inches for birdie. Kuchar came out weakly, but made the 10-foot birdie putt. They traded birdies on the 12th and 13th, and Kuchar took over from there. “It was so uncharacteristic of me,” Kuchar said, referring to his three-putt and bad wedge on No. 5. “But I kept plugging along, and I knew good things were going to happen. … To win two out of three is crazy to comprehend.”

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One of the PGA TOUR’s most famed and historic tracks, The Riviera Country Club has been providing Hollywood-caliber drama for almost a century. With an iconic bunker in the middle of a green, a natural amphitheater and one of the world’s most recognizable short par-4s, Riviera demands a variety of shots to conquer its terrain. Coming off Max Homa’s playoff win over Tony Finau in 2021, this year’s edition will have its hands full to live up to the hype. But with one of the strongest fields on the PGA TOUR so far this season, a new star can join Riviera’s Walk of Fame (and win at a course that has befuddled the two greatest players in the game’s history). 1. WHAT A START The first hole at Riviera is an early feast opportunity for PGA TOUR players. The par 5 plays roughly 495 yards from a tee box that sits 75 foot above the fairway. While there’s out-of-bounds on the left and trees on the right, a straight drive should offer an eagle opportunity all four days. Only four par-5s played to a lower scoring average (4.28) last season, and it was the easiest opening hole on TOUR in 2021. It traditionally plays as the easiest hole at Riviera, as well. The difficulty dramatically shifts right after. The second hole, the No. 1 handicap hole, presents a 488-yard par 4 that heads back uphill, again with out-of-bounds on the left and trees on the right. A long, narrow green is just 25 feet wide and protected by bunkers on the left and front. Despite having different pars, the scoring averages for the two holes are usually separated by just a fraction of a stroke. They played to an average of 4.28 and 4.15, respectively, in 2021. While Riviera’s greens are the same Poa annua that players face throughout the West Coast, the Kikuyu fairways and rough offer a unique challenge. The sticky Kikuyu grass grabs balls like Velcro and makes it hard to execute bump-and-run shots around Riviera. 2. IN THE MIDDLE You do this if you are creating a golf course in a video game, but not usually if you are an architect building a PGA TOUR-caliber track. Long before video games existed, George C. Thomas Jr. and William P. Bell had a unique vision for Riviera’s par-3 sixth hole, putting what is now one of the world’s most famous bunkers smack in the middle of the green. If having a sand trap in the middle of the green is not enough, the putting surface is also two-tiered with a lower level mostly in front of the bunker and an upper level mostly behind the bunker. An errant tee shot, even just a few feet off-line, could find a player scrambling to putt around or pitch over the trap, even needing to pull out a wedge from the putting surface. There is no true safe shot on the green, as all four quadrants bring the center bunker into play. And that is before mentioning there are other bunkers in the back, left and front portions of the green. Birdie is manageable when on the correct tier of the green, but the landing spot can determine the difference between a two or a four quickly. 3. MUST-SEE TV Drivable par 4s are en vogue these days and perhaps No. 10 at Riviera sets the standards for those holes. Measuring anywhere from 282 to 315 yards, most players can hit the green if the conditions are right. However, such a tee shot challenges even the best shot-shapers in the world, with bunkers protecting the green on its right, left and back. The combination of deep bunkers and a skinny putting surface make getting up-and-down difficult, especially from the sand. Right-handed players will try to launch a power-fade, while left-handed players need to sweep a draw to the front-left portion of the green. The lay-up shot isn’t forgiving. A bunker running across the left portion of the fairway forces players to lay up to a full wedge shot if not going for the green. A handful of trees also run along the fairway left of the green. Homa famously found his ball lying next to one of those trees during the first playoff hole against Finau last year, but Homa was able to skip a shot out and match Finau with a par. Unlike No. 17 at TPC Scottsdale, where a water hazard provides penalty trouble for those taking a shot at the green (as Sahith Theegala found out last week), trees and bunkers are the issue on this drivable par 4. A miscue left or right off the tee and a player can go from envisioning eagle to scrambling for par, even without a penalty stroke. 4. HOLLYWOOD DRAMA Riviera is truly one of the OG staples of the Los Angeles social scene. The Hollywood sign – then Hollywoodland – was erected in 1923. Riviera opened its doors in 1926. At the time, with a cost of $243,827, Riviera was labeled as one of the most expensive golf courses in the world. The club has long-attracted famous members, with such Hollywood names as Humphrey Bogart, Walt Disney and Dean Martin making the course their home (“Bogey’s Tree,” a trimmed Eucalyptus on the 12th hole is allegedly where Bogart used to sit to heckle pros). In the 1950s, golf films “Pat and Mike” – starring Katharine Hepburn and Babe Zaharias – and “The Caddy” – starring Martin and Jerry Lewis – were both filmed at Riviera. “Follow the Sun,” a 1951 biographical film about Ben Hogan, was also taped at Riviera. And in more modern times, Seinfeld co-creater and Curb Your Enthusiasm star Larry David helped raise money for the club’s caddies during the pandemic. The Genesis Invitational has been held at Riviera dating all the way back to 1929, hosting the event all but two years since 1973. The exceptions were in 1983, when the club hosted the PGA Championship, and in 1998, when it hosted the U.S. Senior Open. Riviera also has been the venue for the 1948 U.S. Open, 1995 PGA Championship, and 2017 U.S. Amateur. It is scheduled to host the 2026 U.S. Women’s Open, as well. The club will add Olympic golf to its history at the 2028 Los Angeles Games, although this won’t be the Olympics’ first foray on the grounds. Dressage equestrian and modern pentathlon were held at Riviera in 1932. Living up to its Hollywood pedigree, the 18th hole green is surrounded by a natural amphitheater, creating golf’s version of the Hollywood Bowl. As players stare down the 18th green, with Riviera’s iconic clubhouse in the background, the gallery seated on the hillside is staring directly down at them. 5. HOGAN’S ALLEY, BUT NO TIGER OR JACK Ben Hogan was one of Riviera’s early heroes, winning the Genesis Invitational at Riviera in 1947 and 1948 and the U.S. Open there in 1948. His dominance during that two-year stretch gave the course the nickname, “Hogan’s Alley,” a moniker it shares with Colonial Country Club for a similar reason. Hogan also finished runner-up in 1950, losing a playoff to Sam Snead in his return to the TOUR after his near-fatal car accident. Snead, Tom Watson, Fred Couples, Phil Mickelson and Bubba Watson all also notched multiple wins at Riviera over the next few decades. Nick Faldo, Ernie Els, Mike Weir, Adam Scott, and Dustin Johnson are among other modern winners. But the two jarring names you will not find on the champions’ plaque: Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods. Nicklaus made his professional debut at Riviera in 1962, tying for 50th place as a 21-year-old, earning $33.33 in prize money. He notched his best finish in 1978, grabbing runner-up honors two strokes behind Gil Morgan. Woods made his PGA TOUR debut at Riviera in 1992, driving up from Orange County as a 16-year-old high school sophomore (and amateur). He missed the cut. Woods’ best finish at Riviera was second in 1999, behind Els by two strokes. Since 2016, Woods has been the host of the Genesis Invitational with his TGR Foundation being the benefiting charity. But despite his connection to the course, Riviera is a place Woods has still never been able to lift a PGA TOUR trophy.

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