Bhatia optimistic after missed cut at Sanderson Farms

The ball is round, weather is variable, equipment occasionally breaks. And then there’s COVID. Still, it’s time to predict what’s in store for the year ahead. So, let’s get right to it. Here are 10 things that absolutely, positively will go down in 2022, because they simply must, or we want them to, or something like that. Full disclosure: If even nine of these come to pass it would be amazing, eight would be impressive, seven pretty darn good, six not bad at all, five a very solid effort, four … 1. Rickie and Xander win again A victory for Rickie Fowler and Xander Schauffele would break a three-year drought for each. Fowler’s last win came at the Waste Management Phoenix Open, while Schauffele’s last win on TOUR – which doesn’t include his Olympic gold — came at the 2019 Sentry Tournament of Champions. That Schauffele didn’t win last season owed to lousy timing, with poor final rounds at the Waste Management Phoenix Open (71, T2) and the Masters (72, T3). You know it’s in him: He got up and down on the last hole to win the Olympic gold medal. His final-round scoring average was 69.22, 15th on TOUR, but his Round 3 average was 70.28, 85th. He’ll fix it. As for Fowler, whose 11-year streak of making the FedExCup Playoffs ended with a thud, the tee-to-green game is solid, but not so his work on the greens. No. 1 in Strokes Gained: Putting as recently as 2017, he was 126th last season as he wound up 134th in the FedExCup. Now that his tee-to-green swing changes have solidified, Fowler must find a way to make the putts fall again. When he does, he’ll turn the close calls – T3 at THE CJ CUP @ SUMMIT in October (third-round 63) – into wins again. He’s still only 33. 2. Tiger returns at St. Andrews The Old Course at St. Andrews, where the Royal & Ancient folks and everyone else will toast the 150th playing of The Open in July, is flat as a pancake and thus relatively easy to walk. The tournament is not for another seven months, giving Woods plenty of time to get stronger. Oh, and he’s won two of his three claret jugs at St. Andrews. There’s always a chance Woods could surprise us and pop into Augusta for the Masters, but the guess here is the course is too hilly, and treacherous, for him to make that his first week back. Also, although it’s barely any sort of prediction, Woods and his son, Charlie, will tee it up again at the PNC Championship in December, only this time they’ll turn that runner-up into a W. 3. Scheffler and McNealy get first wins Look for the teammates from the United States’ historic 2017 Walker Cup team – the roster also included Collin Morikawa, Cameron Champ, Will Zalatoris, Doug Ghim and Doc Redman – to enter the winner’s circle in the same season. Stanford alum McNealy did a lot right at the Fortinet Championship at Silverado last fall, other than a stretch of four bogeys in seven holes in the third round. His 70-68 weekend just wasn’t enough as he got pipped by fellow Bay Area product Max Homa of Cal (65-65) by a shot. McNealy is only 26, he’s getting better every season, and he knows how to win. It’s coming. Don’t be surprised if that win comes in his native Northern California, as he’s also played well at Pebble Beach the past two years. Meanwhile, it hasn’t been that long since Scheffler beat Jon Rahm in singles at the Ryder Cup. If he can do that, he can win on TOUR; all it’s going to take is a hot putting week. He already has two top-5s this season, including a runner-up at the Hewlett Packard Enterprise Open, and is on the precipice of the top 10 in the Official World Golf Ranking despite his lack of a TOUR victory. That’s testament to how steady he is. He closed 2021 by finishing second in the unofficial Hero World Challenge. 4. Homa will win a major or THE PLAYERS True, Homa can sometimes be the last guy to believe in his own greatness, but of his three wins, two have come on major-quality venues (2021 Genesis Invitational at Riviera, 2019 Wells Fargo Championship at Quail Hollow). What’s more, there was something bloodless and clinical about his 65-65 weekend for his third and most recent victory, at the Fortinet Championship last fall. Of course, a win in one of these big events would help him return to the site of his maiden win for the 2022 Presidents Cup. Keep an eye on him this year. 5. Ancer and Smith lead Presidents Cup upset The International Team banked invaluable self-belief in its narrow loss in 2019. The U.S. stars routed Europe in the Ryder Cup and almost NEVER lose the Presidents Cup. Yep, conditions are ripe for an upset. Ancer was the surprise of the 2019 Presidents Cup, going 3-1-1 to tie Sungjae Im as the top point-earner for the Internationals. Smith, who just edged Jon Rahm to capture the Sentry Tournament of Champions, beat Justin Thomas in Singles to go 1-1-1 last time around in Oz. Those two rising stars give Trevor Immelman’s International Team a toughness they’ve rarely if ever had, and when you add veterans Marc Leishman, Hideki Matsuyama, Adam Scott and Louis Oosthuizen; ultra-steady Im; resurgent Branden Grace; plus Joaquin Niemann, Mito Pereira, and perhaps Garrick Higgo, this team looks poised to shock the world at Quail Hollow. 6. Spieth wins the Masters – or The Open Spieth and the Masters are the perfect marriage of man and major. The good times, of course, included his maiden green jacket in 2015, when he basically won everything that wasn’t nailed down. He was cruising for a successful title defense in ’16 until a water ball on 12 sunk his chances (T2). He was T11 in ’17 (final-round 75), solo third in ’18, and T3 last season, after breaking his win drought a week earlier at the Valero Texas Open. With his game back in full force, Spieth is primed to collect his second green jacket. And don’t forget about The Open at St. Andrews, where he finished a shot out of a playoff in 2015 while pursuing the Grand Slam. 7. Mickelson wins the Schwab Cup In November, Lefty joined Jack Nicklaus as the only players to win four of their first six starts on PGA TOUR Champions at the Charles Schwab Cup Championship. But Mickelson didn’t play in enough tournaments amongst the 50-and-over set to win the season-long Schwab Cup points race, which was won once again by Bernhard Langer. This time, Mickelson will win the marathon and the sprint. Of course, predicting anything Mickelson-related is risky, and after his moonshot victory at the PGA Championship last year he’s at liberty to keep teeing it up with the big boys at big events like the U.S. Open (his white whale). And he will. But now he also has a taste for Champions competition, too; he’s realized he enjoys playing with (and beating) guys his own age. The guess here is Mickelson will find time to hang with the young guys and beat the old guys, too, at least enough times to take home the trophy for the season-long competition. 8. Two others besides Rahm will touch No. 1 It’s tempting to say Rahm can’t be caught at world No. 1, what with his birdie-filled performance at the Sentry Tournament of Champions at Kapalua, where he finished a shot behind winner Cameron Smith. And given what we’ve seen since Rahm regained the top spot with a T3 at The Open last summer, he deserves to be there. He’s the best player. And yet … Rahm is human, he can’t play every week, and the level of talent at the top in 2022 is staggering. Given the neck-snapping trajectories of Collin Morikawa, Patrick Cantlay and Viktor Hovland, surely one or two will reach the top spot at least briefly. Morikawa already would have done so absent his freakish bad final round at the Hero World Challenge. And what about a comeback for former No. 1s Brooks Koepka, Rory McIlroy, and/or Justin Thomas? Yes, Rahm is the best player, but it’s just too crowded at the top. 9. Burns and Mitchell make the U.S. Presidents Cup Team Burns is a no-brainer, what with his recent exploits. The only surprise, perhaps, is he wasn’t on the super-stacked U.S. Team that dusted Europe at the Ryder Cup at Whistling Straits. Mitchell has fought inconsistency but is trending in the right direction with a T3 (THE CJ CUP @ SUMMIT) and T12 (The RSM Classic) last fall. Also encouraging: his three straight birdies to top-10 at THE NORTHERN TRUST and play his way into the BMW Championship. Oh, and Rory McIlroy praised his game last year after they duked it out at the Wells Fargo Championship at Quail Hollow, which as fate would have it hosts the Presidents Cup this year. 10. DeChambeau will get even longer With moonshots that topped out at around 400 yards, DeChambeau, the two-time reigning PGA TOUR driving distance champion, finished in the elite eight in his first crack at the Professional Long Drivers World Championship in Mesquite, Nevada, last fall. He loved the event’s smash-and-flex vibe and promised to return. He’ll do even better this time, his commitment to speed and innovation wowing fans as he powers his way to a final-four finish on the grid.

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Welcome to the Monday Finish, where Si Woo Kim is dancing Gangnam Style in celebration around Ponte Vedra Beach after becoming the youngest champion of THE PLAYERS. Here’s five observations from THE PLAYERS at TPC Sawgrass where Kim was sublime on the way to a decisive, three-shot victory over Louis Oosthuizen and Ian Poulter. FIVE OBSERVATIONS 1. Si Woo Kim is just 21 years of age and, as such, becomes the youngest winner of the PLAYERS Championship, beating out Adam Scott’s old mark by nearly two years. On Sunday at TPC Sawgrass, as others faulted around him, Kim put together a bogey-free 3-under 69 in an incredibly mature performance. Despite hitting just 8 of 18 greens in regulation, Kim managed to scramble his way to a relatively dominant victory. It is rare to see this sort of composure without the benefit of experience, especially on a course as penal as Pete Dye’s masterpiece. His win will likely see him join Nick Price’s International team at The Presidents Cup as new young blood as they try to win the biennial competition for the first time since 1998. Having already won the 2016 Wyndham Championship, Kim is the fourth-youngest player in the last 25 years to win twice on TOUR – behind Tiger Woods, Sergio Garcia and Jordan Spieth. Pretty heady company. Now we just have to see if he can continue the trends like those before him. 2. Ian Poulter might have fallen short of victory. And he might have hit a shank with a chance to win on the line. But it was still great to see some of the old fire in the Englishman’s belly as he went about snatching his best finish (T2) since the 2013 World Golf Championships – HSBC Champions. Just weeks ago, Poulter believed he had missed the terms of his medical and would be scratching around for starts. But he received a reprieve after a recalculation. The change in his status gifted him a spot in the PLAYERS and boy did he make it count. On Sunday, he charged into a share of the lead on the front nine, and when he made a lengthy par putt on the par-5 ninth, we saw some of his trademark passion with an intense fist pump. To be fair, his last seven holes failed to apply any heat on the leader, but he still showed poise to secure a huge jump in the FedExCup standings. He moved from 136th to 58th, and should be in great shape to make the FedExCup Playoffs and secure a TOUR card for next season. Love him or not, he certainly makes life interesting. 3. Speaking of passion and flair – how much fun was it to ride the rollercoaster with the Spanish connection this week at TPC Sawgrass?! Recently-crowned Masters champion Sergio Garcia gave us a poor start, opening in 40, but then a spirited fightback began, including a hole-in-one on the iconic 17th not long after. He then surged into contention through 54 holes only to post his final round 78 to fall well back. We saw similar stuff from PLAYERS first-timer Jon Rahm, who sat well-poised through 36 holes before shooting 82 on Saturday to MDF. And of course then there was Rafa Cabrera Bello who surged to a T4 finish thanks in part to the first-ever albatross on the par-5 16th hole. His celebrations were fun to watch – check it out below. 4. It was certainly strange to not have one of the big guns surging on Sunday at the PLAYERS. Spoiled with some of the most popular players on TOUR in recent years in Tiger Woods, Matt Kuchar, Martin Kaymer, Rickie Fowler and Jason Day as winners of the tournament the large crowds were just waiting for the inevitable rush. Day was paired with Rory McIlroy as the two started eight back but never made a run. The defending champion shot 80 while Rory heads off for his MRI on his back following a 75. Sergio Garcia shot 78 Sunday. Dustin Johnson carded a lovely 68 but was still well off the pace. Fowler signed for a 79 … It was a week for others to shine. It makes this week’s AT&T Byron Nelson very exciting as the likes of Day, Johnson, Garcia and Jordan Spieth (who missed the cut at Sawgrass) join the field. 5. The changes at TPC Sawgrass were for the most part a success. The new green surfaces rolled pure and true and the drivable par-4 12th created a new dynamic to the back nine. A total of 41 players went for the green (hit 3-wood or driver) in the final round compared to 26 in Round 1, 39 in Round 2 and 46 in Round 3. Some players also attempted to hit the green using irons off the tee. While the majority laid back, worried about the risk, the hole did its job – i.e. it made them think. The course is one of the most exciting on the planet where a great score (ace, albatross) or even double digits (Anirban Lahiri had a 10 on the 18th) can be just around the corner.  FIVE INSIGHTS 1. Kim ranked second this week in Strokes Gained: off-the-tee and Strokes Gained: tee-to-green. For the season, Kim had ranked 195th and 194th on TOUR, respectively, producing a stunning turnaround. Kim led the field in Scrambling (22 of 27). 2. Kim’s winning 278 tournament total is the highest at THE PLAYERS since Sergio Garcia won in 2008 (283). 3. With 600 FedExCup points, Kim moves to No. 21 in the FedExCup, while Dustin Johnson (T12) maintained the lead. Last season, Kim was one of two PGA TOUR rookies to qualify for the FedExCup Playoffs finale, the TOUR Championship. He ended the season at No. 17. 4. Kim becomes the first player from Asia to win twice on the PGA TOUR before the age of 22. He is one of eight Korean-born players to win on the PGA TOUR and becomes the fifth with multiple victories: K.J. Choi (8), Y.E. Yang (2), Sangmoon Bae (2), James Hahn (2), Si Woo Kim (2), Kevin Na (1), Seung-Yul Noh (1), Danny Lee (1). 5. There was a total of 69 balls in the water on the par-3 17th island green for the week: 19 in Round 1, 29 in Round 2, 10 in Round 3 and 11 in the final round. It was the most water balls since there were 93 back in 2007 and the second-most since the stat was kept from 2003. TOP THREE VIDEOS 1. Take a bow Rafa Cabrera Bello… or a run through the high five gauntlet… after this history making albatross 2. A hole-in-one from a former PLAYERS champ fresh off winning a green jacket. Nice.  3. If at first you have a near air swing … try again. Jordan Spieth shows us how. 

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