Adam Scott showing signs of ending slump at AT&T Byron Nelson

The PGA Tour is in Greensboro, NC this week for the Wyndham Championship. Here are our best bets for the event.

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LAS VEGAS - Cameron Champ smashed his drive on the par-5 ninth at TPC Summerlin, turned to Bryson DeChambeau and said, "there ... that's all I got Bryson," before giving him a fist bump. "Yeah that will roll," DeChambeau quipped as both had a chuckle. RELATED: Full leaderboard | How DeChambeau turned doubters into believers And roll it did. A further four yards past DeChambeau's 353-yard bomb. Between the two of them, and a third power hitter in Matthew Wolff, the trio displayed how to muscle your way around a golf course during the opening round of the Shriners Hospitals for Children Open. Between them they hit 28 drives of more than 300 yards. But DeChambeau also showed how to add finesse. The recent U.S. Open champion continued where he left off at Winged Foot with an eye-opening 9-under 62 to pace the morning wave. His round featured five occasions where he had a putter in his hand looking to make eagle - on all three par fives and two par fours. He didn't connect on any of them but kicked in those five birdies, plus four more. "That’s the advantage of power in this game now, that you can do those sorts of things … I didn’t make any of them, but it makes it easy. That’s five birdies right there and it makes the golf course a lot easier," DeChambeau said afterwards. "I would say that lowers the par to 67 out here, and that’s just the number for me. If I shoot 69 or 70 I feel like I shot a couple over." Technically DeChambeau hit 11 of 14 fairways and 16 of 18 greens while needing just 29 putts. He gained over two shots on the field on the greens and almost three shots off the tee. He also casually shot a 59 in the Pro-am on Wednesday. For the record, Champ shot 67 and Wolff 68. But Champ was focusing on the final drive when the two did media interviews within earshot of each other. "I was swinging the driver good all day, (and on nine) I was like, you know what, let’s just see (if I can get him), and just mess around and it was more of a joke afterwards," Champ grinned. "I got him but he would have flown me by probably 20 yards ... but I got him on the roll, so there’s a difference, there’s a difference." Two seasons ago Champ was number one on TOUR in driving distance but DeChambeau relegated him to number two last season after his hulking transformation. "I got it past him a couple times, he got it past me a couple times and I’m going to try and hit it harder tomorrow," DeChambeau joked right back. Champ plays a low bullet ball flight while DeChambeau plays a high ball, or "moon ball" game as he calls it. Whatever you call it, it is impressive. "It was fun, it was awesome to play with all of them ... amazing to see the power that’s out here now. I think that’s a testament to the new generation that’s coming up and what it’s going to be like in the future," DeChambeau said. As is habit for the seven-time TOUR winner DeChambeau was looking to get to the range post round after claiming he "heel thinned" a number of shots. But he had to make a few stops first. He was flagged for a random drug test and also had to find fellow competitor Chesson Hadley. Hadley was part of the group ahead and was standing over a three-foot putt on the par-4 seventh hole when DeChambeau's tee shot bounded out of the rough and on to the putting surface behind him. The green is obscured from the tee as a dogleg left but DeChambeau cut the corner. According to ShotLink records he is the first player to ever drive that green. "I felt incredibly bad about that, I had no idea that they were on the green. They were ahead of us all day and I felt like they were off the green because of the time that we took on a few of the holes before that," DeChambeau said. "So that was my mistake and I felt really bad. I think it was Chesson, I have got to go find him and apologize ... but it was fun to hit it to 15 feet." Hadley wasn't concerned by the incident. "The only thing that was hurt was my ego. I'm glad I made the putt though because if I missed it would have totally been his fault," Hadley laughed in jest. That kind of shoulder shrugging laugh is kind of all anyone can do right now as DeChambeau continues to crush the ball and make more than his fair share of putts. If he continues to do it over the next three rounds he will prove near impossible to beat. "When I’m playing great golf I feel like I’ve got a great chance to win every week," DeChambeau said. "I feel like I have my golf swing under control and am making a lot of putts. I feel like I can shoot low on a lot of golf courses and usually that wins tournaments." Yes. It usually does.

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WILMINGTON, N.C. – Notes and observations from Saturday’s third round of the Wells Fargo Championship at Eagle Point Golf Club, where Patrick Reed shot a 5-under 67 to take the solo lead at 8 under par. Europeans Alex Noren and Jon Rahm each shot 69 and were one back, while FedExCup leader Dusin Johnson also fired a 67 and was still in contention, four behind. For more coverage from Eagle Point, click here for the Daily Wrap-up. REED KEEPS IT SIMPLE Patrick Reed has five PGA TOUR victories at age 26, so it’s not like he’s been struggling. But he wasn’t seeing the ball go in the hole as much as he wanted this season. He made cuts but didn’t contend, and was an early casualty at the World Golf Championships-Dell Technologies Match Play. Then he started missing cuts, failing to make the weekend rounds three times in April alone. He decided to make a change. Rather than consulting with his caddie and his trusty green-reading book before every putt—a practice that may soon be outlawed, anyway—Reed decided to go back to the way he did it as a highly decorated amateur at Augusta State. See putt. Hit putt. “I decided just to be more of a kind of see and react guy rather than being so technical, and having Kessler [Karain, his caddie] in there and looking at the book and trying to get the perfect line,” said Reed, who is averaging 27 putts per round at Eagle Point this week. “Go back to how I putted in college, kind of just see the putt and go knock it in.” That simple plan paid dividends Saturday as Reed tied the low round of the day. The putter has been his friend as he tries to win for the first time since The Barclays last year, and has helped him get up and down 16 times in 19 chances, best in the field. He’ll need more of the same Sunday, what with 18 players within four of the lead—and the chase pack featuring the likes of Rahm, Johnson and Phil Mickelson (69, 4 under). WIND CHANGES YET AGAIN This week was always going to be about the wind at Eagle Point, which is serving as a one-year host while Quail Hollow preps for the PGA Championship in August. If it didn’t blow, Eagle Point would yield low scores, but boy, has it ever blown. “We’ve had three different wind directions now,” said Graeme McDowell, who shot a third-round 70 and is at 4 under par, just four off the lead. “It started a southeast, went to a southwest, and today was even a little northwest. On one, for example, I hit 3-iron to the green as opposed to wedge.” McDowell laughed. “That’s a pretty big difference.” The ninth hole no longer played into the teeth of the wind, and the green (or the adjacent pond) on 18 was easily reached in two shots. Still, while Eagle Point played the easiest it has all week, yielding 67s by Reed, Dustin Johnson and Seung-Yul Noh, it wasn’t easy. The best players in the world essentially fought the course to a draw, averaging 72.228 strokes in round three. “You come to a place like this that no one’s ever seen before, and you get three different wind directions in three days, I kind of like it when that happens,” McDowell said. “It makes everyone think; it makes strategy more important. Caddies are more important. Practice rounds are more important. This is refreshing, this week.”   SHOT OF THE DAY MICKELSON MAKES MOVE Phil Mickelson has flirted with winning in North Carolina plenty of times. He finished second to Payne Stewart at the 1999 U.S. Open at Pinehurst, and second to Rory McIlroy at the 2010 Wells Fargo at Quail Hollow. His Wells Fargo record since then: T9 in 2011, followed by T26, 3, T11, T4 and T4. But he’s winless in 19 previous starts in the Tar Heel State. He’s still knocking on the door. “I enjoyed it, I played well,” Mickelson said after shooting a third-round 69 to get to 4 under for the tournament and onto the first page of the leaderboard. “I had a lot of opportunities to take it even lower and really move up the leaderboard, but it was a good solid day.” After failing to birdie any of the par 5s in the second round, Mickelson birdied two of them, and birdied two par 3s as well, in the third. His round could have been even better but for a few gaffes, the last of which coming when he left his third shot in the bunker on 18. He got up and down to salvage par, but will need an extra-special round Sunday to break the streak. “It’s probably not what I needed to get right where I wanted,” Mickelson said, “but at least if I get it going tomorrow I have a good chance.” CALL OF THE DAY MOLINARI’S UNLIKELY INSPIRATION Francesco Molinari shot an even-par 72 to fall from the outright lead into a tie for fourth place. At 6 under par, he is still just two behind as he chases his first TOUR win in his 99th start. If he wins, he might give partial credit to a highly paid soccer player he doesn’t even particularly like. Molinari and pal Gonzalo Fernandez-Costano were eating at Whole Foods when talk turned to a Wednesday-night Champions League game between Monaco and Juventus, which features an Argentinian player named Gonzalo Higuain. “I said, ‘There’s no way Higuain will score a goal,’” Castano said, “and funny enough he scored two goals. So now I keep telling him, ‘Francesco, there’s no chance you’re going to win this week.’” Castano laughed. “So hopefully he’s going to win this week.” Molinari has made 11 cuts in 12 starts on TOUR this year, with three top-10s. The best of these was a T4 at the Shriners Hospitals for Children Open. If he wins the Wells Fargo at Eagle Point on Sunday, perhaps his winner’s speech will make mention of the two Gonzalos, Higuain and Fernandez-Castano, and an odd bit of reverse psychology.

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