Andrew Landry’s putter heats up at John Deere Classic

ATLANTA – Patrick Cantlay will take a lead of anywhere between two (over Tony Finau) and 10 strokes (over five players) into the opening round of the season-ending TOUR Championship at East Lake, which will decide the winner of the FedExCup. All can agree on that. RELATED: How they’ll start at East Lake What is less clear is how significant that is. “I don’t know another format even remotely close to this,” said Cantlay, who in winning last week’s BMW Championship was +14.58 Strokes Gained: Putting, a PGA TOUR record. “I’m going to do my best to throw that out the window and try and treat it like any other golf tournament because the best chance for me succeeding is shooting the lowest score possible.” In other words, he’ll leave it to the rest of us to monitor his lead. How fast will he lose it? How much will he build it? Say this for the TOUR’s new Starting Strokes format, now in its third year: It elevates Thursday’s first round with a new kind of urgency and watchability. “I feel confident,” said Jon Rahm, who leads the TOUR with 14 top-10 finishes, including his win at the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines in June. “This is a ball-striker’s golf course, and my ball striking has been very, very good, and I’m only four shots back, so it’s only a one-shot difference each day, and we all know that four shots can be gone very, very quickly.” Justin Thomas went in as the top seed in 2019 and finished third. That was the year Rory McIlroy started five shots behind but won by four over Xander Schauffele. Dustin Johnson was the top seed last year and went on to win it all. Asked if he felt like he was sleeping on the lead from Monday through Wednesday, Johnson said he came to think of it as a five-round tournament. In other words, he told himself he built that lead the day before play started. Hey, whatever works; you can’t argue with $15 million. This year brings a new mental hurdle, as he starts seven behind. “It’s a great challenge,” he said. “Obviously over one day would be a lot to ask, but over four days it’s not as big of an ask.” Like McIlroy, Harris English, who will start six back, believes East Lake is an ideal course on which to make up ground fast. Hit the fairways and you have a green light to go low, but with stray tee shots, balls sink to the bottom of the rough and the bogeys can pile up fast. “I like the format,” English said. “I don’t mind coming from behind.” Neither does McIlroy, who finished solo fourth at the BMW. He said winning a third FedExCup title, even from eight behind, is not outside the realm of possibility. Whether or not Cantlay will open the door for players like him, English, Rahm, Johnson or 2017 TOUR Championship winner Xander Schauffele, who also will begin the tournament eight back, remains to be seen. “That’s the goal for the whole season is to have that lead,” said Schauffele, who had the lowest 72-hole total at East Lake last year (FedExCup T2). “And at East Lake it’s not a very big one.”

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HOUSTON – Later this month, Peter Malnati will become a father. His wife Alicia is due on Oct. 26, and whether their first child is a boy or a girl remains a surprise until the delivery. For the last couple of months, they’ve been making preparations to turn their new house into, as Peter says, a home. So it’s understandable that he’s been a little distracted lately inside the ropes. His results reflect it. He ended last season with a pair of missed cuts, then started the 2019-20 season with a Saturday WD due to a bad back, a T45 finish at the Sanderson Farms Championship, and consecutive missed cuts in his last two starts. Entering this week, he hadn’t broken 70 in his last eight rounds. Already planning to take the next five weeks off, Malnati wondered if he should even be playing the Houston Open. “The last couple weeks I’ve let it be a distraction in that I haven’t really prepared the way I normally would because my head’s back home. I want to be home,â€� Malnati said. “This week I was like, ‘dude, this is your last tournament before you become a dad, like do something with it.’ “The best thing you can do for your wife and your kid is to go out and play good.â€� So he did. Related: Leaderboard | Hammer roots on Astros after 67 | Beem’s ‘simply incredible’ first round Malnati shot a 3-under 69 on Thursday, followed by a bogey-free 7-under 65 on Friday morning at the Golf Club of Houston. That leaves him at 10 under. When he walked off the course, he was the clubhouse leader, with first-round co-leaders Austin Cook and Talor Gooch just starting their day. Given the windy conditions that kicked in in mid-morning after a 2-hour rain delay, the field average soared to nearly 73 for those with an early tee time. That means Malnati’s 65 was nearly 8 strokes better than the field. His caddie Chad Antus, who has been on the bag for about 2-1/2 seasons, called it the best round he had seen Malnati play. The only other round worthy of a comparison was the 10-under 62 that Malnati shot at the 2018 Korn Ferry Tour Championship, a round that included an eagle and 10 birdies. “Given the conditions of the course and everything else going on,â€� Antus said, “this round today was No. 1.“ While the next few weeks certainly will be exciting, Malnati is now in position to make the next two days exciting, too, as he chases his second career PGA TOUR win. He won the Sanderson Farms four years ago. “I practiced with a lot more focus this week and it’s nice to see that that does result in some better golf for me,â€� he said. “Yes, my head is definitely a little bit elsewhere, but again, the best thing even after the kid comes, when I do decide me and my wife decide it’s time for me to go play again — the best thing I can do when I’m at a tournament is focus on the tournament. “That’s what they need me to do, so that’s what I’m trying to do this week. It’s beyond words to say I’m 98% excited, 2% terrified, all of that is definitely at play right now. My wife’s the best and she’s going to be the best mother, so we’re going to handle things all right back home.â€� Perhaps Friday is an indication that he’s handling things inside the ropes too. Last season, Malnati’s only top-10 finish in 26 starts last season was in a team event, the Zurich Classic of New Orleans, when he and Billy Hurley III were T9. But he was steady enough to make the FedExCup Playoffs and keep his TOUR card, actually improving his status from the previous year when he missed the Playoffs. In some ways, though, it was a breakthrough season for Malnati. He cites two areas of improvement – improved iron play and increased distance off the tee. On Friday, he said he “drove the ball beautifullyâ€� and was excited to see where he ranked in the field in Strokes Gained: Off the Tee, a statistic in which he’s never ranked better than 150th in the previous four seasons and generally gives up strokes to the field. “I’m not a huge guy into stats,â€� he said. “At the end of the day, there’s only one that matters and that’s score and I had a good one of those today, but I do like to look at my driving stats and they’ve been really, really a weakness for me for a year.â€� What a story it would be if Malnati could pull off a win in Houston this weekend. What better way to enter fatherhood than with a shiny new trophy to show his child. “Most kids, when they kick it around at their home course growing up, they’re dreaming about that putt to win the Masters or that putt to win the U.S. Open or that putt to win THE PLAYERS Championship or something like that,â€� Malnati said. “I always took that dream one step farther. My dream, I used to as a little kid, I would watch and you would see these guys hole out to win the big tournaments and their wife and their little kids would just come running out on the green. That to me, that’s where the dream really is. That was the dream stuff. “I already won a Korn Ferry Tour event with my wife caddying for me, I won a big amateur event with my mom caddying for me, so I’ve gotten to have some of those kind of family moments at the end of a tournament. But the idea of actually being a father and then one day hopefully having my kids get to see me do what I love to do, which is this, and hopefully do it well is something that I kind of get emotional even just thinking about that. “That’s going to be so awesome for me.â€�

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WHITE SULPHUR SPRINGS, W.Va. — Joaquin Niemann was an 18-year-old amateur when he arrived in West Virginia two years ago and tied for 29th in the only PGA TOUR event he played outside of the U.S. Open. In 2018, he improved to a tie for fifth at the tournament. Now he has a chance to become the first player from Chile to win on TOUR. Niemann shot a 2-under 68 on Saturday to take a two-stroke lead in A Military Tribute at The Greenbrier. The 20-year-old Niemann was 15 under with a round left in the season-opening event at the Old White TPC. “I just feel like I’m almost a member here,” Niemann said. “I just like being out here. Always when you play on a course that you know already it helps a lot. I think this is the course I have played more on tour.” Niemann had a bogey and three birdies, including a 4-foot putt on the par-5 17th. “I’m just really happy the way I’ve been playing,” Niemann said. “This course is really good for me.” No third-round leader has gone on to win the tournament. Nate Lashley, Richy Werenski and Robby Shelton were tied for second at 13 under. Lashley and Werenski shot 65, and Shelton had a 70. Adam Long and Scotty Scheffler were 12 under. Long shot 70, and Scheffler had a 71. Lashley’s story is well known by now. In 2004 his parents and girlfriend were killed in a plane crash in Wyoming. After resuming his career in the PGA TOUR’s minor leagues, he won his first tour title at the inaugural Rocket Mortgage Classic in Detroit in June after slipping into the field as an alternate. “My mentality is I’m definitely a lot more relaxed,” Lashley said. “I’m just playing, just trying to take that as experience, the way I played in Detroit. You know, I really just kind of kept to myself that week and really just focused and tried to block everything else out. I feel like I’ve done a good job of that so far.” Lashley made bogeys after finding the rough on the par-4 11th and the greenside bunker on the par-3 15th. He chipped in for eagle from 36 feet at No. 17. His tee shot on the 179-yard 18th came as thunderstorms arrived in the area and play was suspended for about 50 minutes. Upon returning, Lashley three-putted from 70 feet. Werensky finished No. 126 in the FedExCup standings last season, one spot from qualifying for the Playoffs. He got his PGA TOUR card back for this season in the Korn Ferry Tour Finals. Werensky said that he didn’t get discouraged after missing the Playoffs. Heading into the Korn Ferry Finals, “I had like a, I don’t want to say an epiphany, but just like, `Hey, man just chill out. Relax. I know I’m good enough.” Shelton was tied for the lead with Niemann and Scheffler after the second round. Shelton was 2 over for the day until making birdies at the par-5 12th and par-4 14th. He hopes to use his two wins on the Korn Ferry Tour last season to help stay calm Sunday. “You got to be super patient,” he said. “I mean, it’s hard to do, but hopefully I can manage my nerves tomorrow.” Kevin Chappell couldn’t capitalize on the 11-under 59 he shot Friday, the 11th sub-60 round in tour history. He had a 73 on Saturday and was eight strokes behind Niemann.

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