Featured Groups: Memorial Tournament presented by Nationwide

It was a nail-biter, it pinned all the senses, and it was a lifetime experience for the local fans. How do you follow that?! Oh, and Super Bowl LVI was contested on Sunday, too. In case you missed it, the Los Angeles Rams prevailed in front of a home crowd. A day before, residents of the Valley of Sun will remember where they were when recalling Sam Ryder’s hole-in-one in the third round of the WM Phoenix Open, and it’ll forever be the site of Scottie Scheffler’s breakthrough victory on the PGA TOUR. Exhilaration for all. Both have made the trip west to The Genesis Invitational between L.A. and the coastline. Naturally, a star-studded field is poised to attempt to tame The Riviera Country Club. More on the event, the course and the perks beneath the ranking of projected contenders. Tuesday’s Draws and Fades will include reviews of 2020 champion Adam Scott, WM Phoenix Open winner Scottie Scheffler, Brooks Koepka, Jordan Spieth, Sam Burns and Sahith Theegala among the notables. Tiger Woods hosts The Genesis Invitational. The timing is fitting given that the Cincinnati Bengals lost the Super Bowl. No, Tiger isn’t Bengal Tiger, he’s just Tiger, but he hasn’t prevailed on the biggest stage in L.A., either. As the focus of sports nationwide soon will be pivoting to March Madness, the label of a mid-major will be populating our consciousness. In that vein, you could say that this week’s PGA TOUR stop is a mini-major. The field is just 120 deep, and the winner is rewarded with 550 FedExCup points (for the second straight year) and a three-year membership exemption (for the third consecutive edition). Of course, there’s also the not-so-insignificant component of a $12-million purse of which $2.16 million is reserved for the champion. Super, indeed. It’s no wonder that all inside the top 11 in the Official World Golf Ranking are committed. Scheffler rose to ninth with his win. His victim in the playoff at TPC Scottsdale, Patrick Cantlay, climbed a spot to third. The Riviera Country Club is everything this field remembers and wants, so it’s the ideal backdrop. With no impactful changes yet again, the par 71 tips at 7,322 yards. It has since 2016. Kikuyagrass blankets all areas except the putting surfaces, and it’s not overseeded. The only layer of rough is just an inch-and-a-half tall, but it still doesn’t prevent the 7,500-square foot greens from defending par. Targets are larger on average primarily due to the subtle (and, in places, not-so-subtle) undulations. The Poa annua greens also are dialed into 12½ feet on the Stimpmeter. With exceptional weather expected all week, Riviera will present its best self. Save the potential for a morning marine layer a mile or so inland, there will be zero complications from the elements. Daytime highs might touch 70 degrees for the finale of the West Coast Swing before a slight cooling for its final round. During the 2020-21 super season that included 51 courses, Riviera ranked inside the five-toughest in percentage of fairways hit (47.24), greens in regulation (54.17), proximity to the hole (42’7”), conversation percentage inside 10 feet (86.14) and average distance of putts holed (68’9”). Max Homa defends the title this week. Before he outlasted Tony Finau in a playoff for which the duo qualified at 12-under 272, Homa concluded regulation slotted inside the top five in fairways hit, GIR, Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee, SG: Tee-to-Green and putts per GIR. However, he paid off those prerequisites by co-leading the field in par-5 scoring. Riviera’s trio of par 5s is its weakness. Given the attention devoted to the par-4 10th hole, it might feel like it’s a beast. Quite the opposite, in fact, and that’s what makes it beautiful. The (in)famous 315-yarder was the easiest par 4 at Riviera in each of the last three years. It was inside the easiest 15 percent of 540 pars 4s in the super season. Go back to the previous full season of 2018-19 (pre-pandemic) and you’ll find it inside the easiest five percent. And no, it’s not a place to go eagle-watching. Exactly one eagle was converted in three of the last four editions. (There were four in 2020.) Last year’s field averaged 3.885 on the 10th, which means that anyone who played it in 1-under for four rounds at 3.75 picked up a fraction of a stroke. Homa did exactly that, with two birdies, one par and one bogey. The tournament can’t be won at No. 10, but it sure can make the difference. ROB BOLTON’S SCHEDULE PGATOUR.COM’s Rob Bolton recaps and previews every tournament from numerous perspectives. Look for his following contributions as scheduled. MONDAY: Power Rankings TUESDAY*: Sleepers, Draws and Fades SUNDAY: Qualifiers, Reshuffle, Medical Extensions, Rookie Ranking * – Rob is a member of the panel for PGATOUR.COM’s Expert Picks for PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf, which also publishes on Tuesday.

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Here are nine tidbits from the first round of the World Golf Championship-Mexico Championship at the Club de Golf Chapultepec outside Mexico City that gamers can use tomorrow, this weekend or down the road. Be looking for the Emergency 9 shortly after the close of play of each round of the tournament. Know Thy Enemy These were the top-10 picked golfers in the PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf presented by SERVPRO. As expected with a deep field there is plenty of separation throughout the top 10. There was more separation out of the top 10 as pick No. 11 was Thomas Pieters. He garnered only 15.6 percent of the action, another large gap between gamers’ choices. As always in this format, substitutions are allowed, so you better guess who’s going to turn it up tomorrow! People’s Choice Playing at Par-71 and stretching 7,345 yards, Club de Golf Chapultepec was kind to Tommy Fleetwood last year as he finished second to Dustin Johnson by one shot. Fleetwood was a massive selection this week as his ball-striking is fantastic and he picked up T4 last week at The Honda Classic. Gamers will need to remind themselves that his opening round 72 (+1) is just that, his opening round. With no cut this week he has plenty of time to find his iron game that let him down today as he found only 11 of 18 GIR. That will be corrected tomorrow so he stays in my lineup. Leader Louis South African Louis Oosthuizen blitzed the field with a bogey-free 64, his lowest round ever in a WGC event.  Buoyed by nine fairways and 15 GIR, Oosthuizen only needed 24 putts to set the target for Friday. After sitting just five off the lead entering Sunday at The Honda Classic, his final round 75 didn’t inspire (T24). He mentioned on television after his round today that he’s glad there’s not a Bear Trap this week! 21 and Up Shubhankar Sharma kicked the door open in December as he won the Joburg Open. The spotlight found the 21-year old Indian player again in February as he won the second time in three months at the Maybank Championship in Malaysia. He closed out that win posting 62 in the final round so there was nothing fluky about that. Playing in his first WGC event and first PGA TOUR event hasn’t seemed to bother him, yet. His opening round saw him lead the field in strokes-gained: tee-to-green and T1 in scrambling (six up-and-downs). He added a bogey-free card with an eagle and four birdies for 65 (-6) for T2. Chris Cross Englishman Chris Paisley drew attention to gamers before the week because of his form all over the world in 2018. He opened 2018 by winning the BMW Open in South Africa for his first on the European Tour. He backed up that performance in the Middle East desert with a T5 in Abu Dhabi and a fifth-place check in Dubai. There was no chance T27 in Malaysia was going to slow this train down! After taking three weeks off he showed he was sharp and fresh today as he circled seven birdies against one par (65) to sit T2. Defending Champ Dustin Johnson missed 16 putts inside 10 feet last year and won by a shot. Round 1 saw him rank sixth in strokes-gained: putting but he hit it all over the map. He found a way to circle six birdies as he overpowered the course as usual but a pair of bogeys and a sloppy double stalled out his round at 69 and T13. I’ll lean on his ball-striking to return tomorrow and for him to make a dash up the leaderboard. Montana Rusa A quick Google search for roller coaster in Spanish turned up “montana rusa”. Bubba Watson stuck gamers on some ride in the opening round.  The champion at the Genesis Open in his last time out started seven-under-par thru his first 11 holes. He followed that with a three-hole stretch of bogey, double bogey and bogey to suck the air out of his round. He added one more bogey before signing for 69 (-2) and T13.  Worry? Who Me? After Gary Woodland’s playoff win in Scottsdale many gamers thought he would be ready for THE season. Since his win he’s posted MC at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am and MC last week at The Honda Classic. His opening round of 74 saw him beat just five players. … Paul Casey closed 67-66 last year to rally for T16. His opening round 73 is one better than his 74 from last year so I’m going to be patient, again. Study Hall The field was reduced to 64 people as American Chan Kim WD before teeing it up, citing a wrist injury. He must be really injured to pass up a no-cut event with a guaranteed payday! Adjust your lineup accordingly. … Pat Perez turned 42 today and gave himself a present as he signed for 68 (-3). … The four bogey-free rounds recorded in Round 1 all ended up T5 or better: Oosthuizen (1st), Shubhankar Sharma (T2), Xander Schauffele (T2) and Rafael Cabrera-Bello (T5). … Watson (T13), Paisley (T2) and Sergio Garcia (T8) led the field with seven birdies each.

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Poulter looking to cash in on second chance

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