PGA Tour fall schedule provides an opportunity

SHEBOYGAN, Wis. – European lynchpin Rory McIlroy has been benched at the Ryder Cup for the first time in his career after a dreadful Friday at Whistling Straits. RELATED: Full pairings, preview for Saturday morning Foursomes | Recap from Day 1 McIlroy was left out of Saturday mornings Foursomes pairings by Captain Padraig Harrington after two heavy and demoralizing defeats on the opening day. The 32-year-old lost 5 and 3 with Ian Poulter in Friday Foursomes against Xander Schauffele and Patrick Cantlay before backing up in Four-ball with Shane Lowry – only to be dominated 4 and 3 against Tony Finau and Harris English. It was the first time in his Ryder Cup career McIlroy had lost twice in one day. But he wasn’t the only European player to find the going tough with the U.S. taking a commanding 6-2 lead as they look to win the Cup back for just the second time in the last six attempts. McIlroy has played every possible session in his Ryder Cup career since making his debut in 2010. He did miss the second Four-ball session at Celtic Manor in Wales that year but only due to bad weather affecting play. Captains were forced to adjust on the run leaving players with a maximum of four sessions as the schedule condensed before a Monday finish. Despite the shellacking Harrington claimed the two-time FedExCup champion would bounce back and he had no concerns with McIlroy’s leadership. “He’s already a leader. You saw him out there after a tough day, he was out following those matches and supporting his team,” Harrington said. “He is very much a leader amongst his peers and I couldn’t have asked more from him during the year, I couldn’t have asked more from him today. “The golf didn’t go as well as he would have liked, but I’m not second-guessing him for a second in terms of his leadership and what he does for my team.” McIlroy found himself behind the eight-ball from the get-go and never recovered. Ryder Cup rookies in recent FedExCup champion Cantlay and Olympic Gold medalist Schauffele won the first five holes in their Foursomes encounter and despite a small lull mid round, came home with a vengeance. They birdied their last four holes to close out the match on the 15th. “The start wasn’t great. I don’t know if anyone could have beat Xander and Patrick today. They played really good,” McIlroy lamented. “They were a great pairing today, and all you can do is praise them for the way they played.” In the afternoon session McIlroy looked primed to turn his day around when an eagle at the par-5 5th produced a 1 up lead but it went pear-shaped from there. He failed to find a birdie from that point on and made two bogeys. Lowry could only manage a string of pars while Finau fired up. After driving the par-4 6th green to secure a birdie Finau added more on nine, 10 and 13 while English chimed in with one on the par-4 8th to rout the Irish/Northern Irish connection. “The last two sessions, Xander, Patrick, played wonderful, and I haven’t seen Tony putt as good as that in a long time,” McIlroy said. “When you have got a couple of pairs like that on form, on a difficult golf course where it’s sort of hard to make birdies and they go on runs, if you’re not quite a hundred percent on top of your game, it’s tough.” Despite the poor start McIlroy was still of the opinion Europe could stage a comeback. That effort will have to start without him though. “We can come back from 6-2. If it’s 6-2, we can come back,” he stressed.

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The early narrative at the Valspar Championship has been rooted in the quality of the 144-man field. In other words, it’s the best conglomeration of talent ever gathered in Palm Harbor, Florida. Whether that’s true, anecdotally or even empirically, those committed are guaranteed to be challenged in every facet of the game. And that’s the point. Innisbrook Resort and Golf Club’s Copperhead Course presents a marvelously un-Florida-like test northwest of Tampa Bay. Replete with tree-lined fairways and elevation change, this is the third edition post-renovation, so how it stacks up against this field at this time should be logged as a benchmark in course and tournament history. It’s his first look at the redesign, but he’s fared well everywhere. T37 at Chapultepec ended top-25 streak, but he closed with 67. He went 8-for-8 at Copperhead with five top 20s from 2004-2014.   T14 at WGC-Mexico was fifth top 20 of 2018, but he lost strokes to the field in putting for the fourth time in six starts. Won the Valspar in 2015 and placed T18 in 2016.   Finau closed out his fifth-place finish here last year with a 64, lowest by anyone post-cut. Led field in fairways hit, strokes gained: off-the-tee and strokes gained: tee-to-green; T2 in GIR. Sergio hasn’t played Copperhead since a personal-best T7 in 2013, but he’s 5-for-5 overall. He regained traction with a T7 at Chapultepec where he was firing on all cylinders.   Rested since a forgettable T60 in Malaysia a month ago. He opened 2018 with a solo eighth in Abu Dhabi and a T6 in Dubai. Since his Copperhead debut, he’s gone 4th-T11-T7. There’s always a learning curve for first-time defending champions, but he strides in with consistently strong form on which he can rely: T6 at Riviera and T9 at Chapultepec. Casey returns to Copperhead after a three-year hiatus. His well-balanced attack should thrive once again. T12 at Chapultepec was his 16th top-15 finish in his last 21 starts worldwide.   The horse for many courses built that reputation in part at Copperhead. Five top 20s in 11 appearances, including in each of the last three (5th-3rd-T18). He finished T9 at Riviera three weeks ago. He led WGC-Mexico with an opening 64, but faded to T30 after failing to break par the rest of the way. Still, his propensity to stripe it has value at Copperhead (T7 in 2016). Kuchar is in a relative rut but loves himself tough, tight tracks like Copperhead. Since 2009, he’s 7-for-7 with four top 15s, a T22 (2017) and a scoring average of 70.32. He is built for Copperhead. The winner on the first edition of the redesign finished in sixth place in last year’s title defense. He’s averaged 69.00 during his eight rounds on it. Nine top 20s in his last 10 starts worldwide, including a T6 in his last at Riviera. He ranks 17th in adjusted scoring, fourth in scrambling and sixth in the all-around.   No surprise that he’s now a winner on the PGA TOUR Champions, but his poise and temperament has played well at Copperhead, too. He tied for seventh here in 2016.   The renown ball-striper is perfect in the last nine editions of the Valspar. Seven trips resulted in a top 25, including each of last six. His putting is coming back to Earth. Playoff victim at PGA National possesses the substance that his strength complements. He has five top 20s already this season, and finished T27 at Copperhead last year with three red numbers. RANK PLAYER COMMENT POWER RANKINGS: VALSPAR CHAMPIONSHIP Tuesday’s Fantasy Insider will include Tiger Woods, Rory McIlroy, Adam Scott, Bill Haas and other notables. In the two editions since the tight fairways were transitioned to Celebration bermudagrass and the 6,100-square-foot greens to TifEagle bermuda, landing areas at Copperhead have been harder to find. After years of yielding splits north of 60 percent, both driving accuracy (13th on TOUR in 2016 and 20th in 2017) and greens in regulation (third and eighth, respectively) have fallen below that threshold. If there’s a tradeoff, it’s that average distance of all drives is up marginally, but last year’s clip of 273.6 yards was still the fourth-shortest of 38 measured courses all season. Still, entrants won’t find fairer targets anywhere else, but even when last year’s field recorded a par breaker in 26.45 percent of chances created. That still ranked 11th-lowest of the season. The par 36-35=71 can stretch to 7,340 yards and it still boasts four par 5s — there are five par 3s — so capitalizing on the quartet is key, but Copperhead also is significantly about managing misses. Because converting on limited scoring opportunities carries lower expectations, salvaging par to sustain solid rounds is the connective tissue to contend. En route to his breakthrough victory last year, Adam Hadwin didn’t crack the top 25 in either distance off the tee or fairways hit, but he ranked T5 in greens in regulation, fifth in proximity to the hole and led the field in birdies-or-better percentage while putting. Despite that high level of consistency, the difference baked into his one-stroke margin was ranking seventh in scrambling and T3 in bogey avoidance. In fact, it’s no coincidence that six of the top 10 on the leaderboard finished inside the top 10 in bogey avoidance for the tournament. Of the same sample size, half landed inside the top 10 in scrambling. With rough as long as three inches and greens threatening 12 feet on the Stimpmeter, feel is paramount. Hanging on is the objective late what with Nos. 16, 17 and 18 comprising The Snake Pit. The par 4-3-4 is more slog than sprint home. Each of the three holes has averaged over par in every edition in tournament history. Last year, they combined for an average of +0.472 strokes. Hadwin navigated the stretch in even-par last year. Weather is going to play a role that will likely recur this week. The tournament will open with winds gusting more than 20 mph. Friday’s elements are forecasted to be the best, and easily at that. Saturday could be a mixed bag as winds will freshen and the threat of rain is introduced. The final round includes all of these factors and with an increase in the chance for storms with what might be the windiest day of the event. ROB BOLTON’S SCHEDULE PGATOUR.COM’s Fantasy Insider Rob Bolton will be filing his usual staples leading up to this week’s event. Look for the following columns this week. MONDAY: Rookie Ranking, Qualifiers, Reshuffle, Medical Extensions, Power Rankings TUESDAY*: Sleepers, Fantasy Insider, Facebook Live WEDNESDAY: One & Done THURSDAY: Expert Picks for PGA TOUR Champions One & Done * – Rob is a member of the panel for PGATOUR.COM’s Expert Picks for PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf presented by SERVPRO, which also publishes on Tuesdays.  

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