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Here are nine tidbits from the third round of the FedEx St. Jude Classic that gamers can use tomorrow, this weekend or down the road. TPC Southwind, located just outside Memphis, has been the host since 1990 and plays 7,244 yards to a Par-70.   KNOW THY ENEMY These were the top-10 selected golfers in the PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf game presented by SERVPRO. Moving Day saw the leaders separate themselves after 54 holes. Dustin Johnson (65) and Andrew Putnam (64) are five shots clear of third after posting 15-under-par 195. TPC Southwind played the easiest it has in the last four editions on Saturday as the warm weather and lack of wind helped players stay out of trouble. THE FINAL PAIR On paper it looks to be a mismatch. Luckily for Andrew Putnam, golf is not played on paper but rather on a course with sand, water and out-of-bounds. The other good news is Dustin Johnson has everything to play for on Sunday and the pressure is squarely on his very broad shoulders. A win takes him back to No. 1 in OWGR and will see him become the seventh player on TOUR this year with multiple victories (Sentry TOC). Putnam has won twice on the Web.com Tour but his best finish this season in T5 at an opposite-field event in the Dominican Republic. He leads the field in GIR and is T1 in fairways and only has made one bogey on the week. His 64 was the co-low round of the day in Round 3. It won’t hurt if he one-putts the more greens again Sunday! The bad news for Putnam is Johnson’s final round scoring average here is 66.50 including 63 his last time in 2016. IN CINK After reading about his battle against skin cancer, I’ll be honest, Stewart Cink hasn’t been on my radar. He faded even further away after he didn’t fire last week at Memorial, an event where he cashed in 20 of 21 weekends. After a pair of 68’s to open, Cink had it to seven-under for the day through 16 before a late bogey saw him sign for the co-low round of the day (64). The highlight of his day was an ace on No. 8 and that helped him move up 11 spots to solo third. WEREN THE MONEY Richy Werenski (T4) is looking for his first top-10 finish since losing a playoff to Chris Stroud at the Barracuda Championship last August. I should note his best two finishes of the spring have been on courses that are not described as “easy”. He was T11 at the AT&T Oaks Course at the Valero Texas Open and T23 at TPC Sawgrass. The Georgia Tech alum will be paired comfortably with another, Cink, in the penultimate group.  LAST MAN WITH A CHANCE Joining Werenski at T4 is Wesley Bryan — and those fellas find themselves six shots off the lead. If TPC Southwind continues the trend of playing easier every day, it will truly take something historic to even push the leaders. Bryan hasn’t had a top 10 or top 25-finish this season but long-term investors will be anxiously watching tomorrow as that streak will surely end. AMATEUR HOUR For the second year in a row, Ole Miss golfer Braden Thornberry has turned heads at TPC Southwind. Last year the rising junior posted 67-65 on the weekend to claim T4. His bogey-free round on Sunday was one of two with winner Daniel Berger claiming the other. This year the rising senior entered the week off a tough NCAA tournament and opened with 73. He’s played his last 36 holes with 11 birdies against only two bogeys and his 65 Saturday moved him up 30 spots to T10.  MOVING DAY If Billy Horschel is going to extend his streak of top-10 finishes to five events in a row, he’ll need to use the same game plan in the final round as he did in Round 3. Horschel moved up 29 spots to T29 on the back of his 67. Gamers please note this is normal as he closed with 65 last year and 64 in 2015 in his last two visits.  There was no mystery as to why Henrik Stenson couldn’t get going as he lost over four strokes putting during the first two rounds. He painted as many fairways today as yesterday and hit the same amount of GIR but he gained just over two shots on the greens. His 66 moved him up 21 spots to T19. MOVING DAY: WRONG WAY This was just the first round above par (73) for Phil Mickelson in his last 15 attempts. He dropped 35 spots to T49 as he only made two birdies in Round 3, including one from off the green. I’m sticking Lefty on the bench tomorrow as his thoughts are probably drifting to Shinnecock as I type this.  Ryan Blaum dropped 17 places after playing in the final group with Johnson and shooting 74. He made only one birdie and now begins Sunday T19.  Man, when it goes south for Charl Schwartzel, it goes south. His 78 was the worst round of the day by four shots on the easiest day of the event. Bizarre. STUDY HALL Round 1 scored 70.769 (+0.796) and was the easiest opening round in the last four editions. Round 2 saw the scores continue to plummet as the weather cooperated at 70.526 (+0.526). Round 3 became just the second round in the last four years to check in under-par as the average was 69.472 (-0.528). There were four bogey-free rounds as Putnam and Horschel joined Trey Mullinax (65; T7) and Zac Blair (69; T39). The winner of U.S. Open has never won the week prior on TOUR.  Cink’s ace on No. 8 was the fifth of his career. 

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Tiger Woods is back in action at the Quicken Loans National.

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The 10th of 24 contributing events for PGA TOUR Champions One & Done presented by SERVPRO is this week’s Regions Tradition. It’s the first of five majors, all of which are contested over 72 holes and begin on Thursdays. Scroll for tournament notes, 22 notables and four wild cards from the field of 78 in Birmingham, Alabama. No matter what you think you know, you don’t, you know? With proper and deserved respect to open qualifier Ryan Baca and North Texas PGA Section representative Brian Norman, neither are likely to generate enthusiasm for even two-man gamers at the AT&T Byron Nelson. See, they are the only two in the field of 156 with competitive course experience at Trinity Forest Golf Club in Dallas. At the 2017 Texas State Open, Baca placed T10 and Norman finished T53. The 47th edition of the esteemed competition also included recognizable names like former PGA TOUR members Edward Loar (T15), Hunter Haas and Craig Kanada – the latter two of whom withdrew mid-tournament — among a handful of other blasts from the past for the truly hardcore (e.g. Brady Watt, Stuart Deane and “Mr. 57” Curtis Reed). Certainly, our own Sean Martin could have penned a Power Rankings for that event and made me blush. The moral of this story is that none of those guys are One & Done-worthy, but they’re the golfers with the muscle memory and some idea of where to miss on the collaboration by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw. At the head of the class among short-listers in PGA TOUR Fantasy One & Done presented by SERVPRO are locals Jordan Spieth and Beau Hossler, but only Hossler demands serious consideration. Sorry, Sean, but the massive unknown favors the field. Your advised strategy is to review how you’d arrange available golfers on your board for later stops. It’s the essence at the core of the existence of Future Possibilities below. However, you still need to leave yourself with a chip for the AT&T Byron Nelson. I’ve already burned Marc Leishman, but he’d be the most logical at Trinity Forest. Aside from his reputation in the wind, he’s proven comfortable and confident on links-style tracks. And with four top 10s in 2018 alone, he presents no reason to wait. Jimmy Walker is back on the rise and doesn’t line up exceptionally strong the rest of the way. The Texan is the epitome of striking while the irons are hot and while we’re essentially in the dark. Form over everything else, gang. Like Walker, Adam Scott is the kind of chalk to which we can turn just to sleep better. A top 20 would be a net-positive as the Aussie continues to grind through relative adversity. He could emerge as a candidate again later, but the blank canvas of this week serves as a sensible time to circle him now. Billy Horschel is the defending champion on a different course. His recent uptick after finding magic with a familiar putter furnishes all the confidence we need to latch on, but his record at the FedEx St. Jude Classic is phenomenal and should be embraced. Holster. Because I view Matt Kuchar as a wild card who fits in almost everywhere but often doesn’t win tiebreakers, he’s my pick. As I wrote in the Power Rankings, he placed second at the 2017 Open Championship at Royal Birkdale, which Jordan Spieth used as a comp to Trinity Forest. Sold. Martin Laird and Branden Grace are seriously tempting. Laird is a beast at the Barracuda Championship contested the same week as the World Golf Championships-Bridgestone Invitational where fellow Barracuda go-to’s Gary Woodland and Brendan Steele will be competing. Grace makes more sense at Trinity Forest and easily could have slotted higher than No. 11 in my Power Rankings. Since two-man gamers won’t be flipping a coin between Baca and Norman, saddle Hossler into the back seat. FUTURE POSSIBILITIES NOTE: Select golfers committed to the tournament are listed alphabetically. Future tournaments are sorted chronologically and reflect previous success on the courses on which the tournaments will be held in 2017-18. The numerical values in parentheses represent the order of relative confidence of where to use each golfer if multiple sites are listed (e.g. 1 for strongest, 2 for next-strongest and so on). To present weighted confidence in real time, numerical values will not change all season no matter how many tournament remain listed for each golfer. All are pending golfer commitment. Sergio Garcia … Open Championship (1); TOUR Championship (4) Branden Grace … U.S. Open (4); WGC-Bridgestone (3) Bill Haas … Wyndham (2) J.B. Holmes … Greenbrier (5) Billy Horschel … St. Jude (1); TOUR Championship (4) Russell Knox … Dell Technologies (7) Matt Kuchar … Fort Worth (6); Memorial (2); Canadian (3); WGC-Bridgestone (7); THE NORTHERN TRUST (9) Martin Laird … Barracuda (1) Marc Leishman … Fort Worth (7); Memorial (5); Travelers (2); Open Championship (1) Hideki Matsuyama … Memorial (10); U.S. Open (6); WGC-Bridgestone (8; defending) Graeme McDowell … WGC-Bridgestone (3) Kevin Na … Memorial (10); John Deere (9); Wyndham (3); THE NORTHERN TRUST (11) Ryan Palmer … Fort Worth (2); St. Jude (6) Scott Piercy … John Deere (6) Adam Scott … U.S. Open (10); Open Championship (8); WGC-Bridgestone (3); Dell Technologies (9); TOUR Championship (6) Brandt Snedeker … Fort Worth (11); U.S. Open (5); Travelers (6); Canadian (3); Wyndham (4) Jordan Spieth … Fort Worth (2); Travelers (6; defending); John Deere (7); Open Championship (9; defending); WGC-Bridgestone (10); TOUR Championship (4) Jimmy Walker … Greenbrier (8); Dell Technologies (7) CHAMPIONS ONE & DONE Regions Tradition Greystone Golf & Country Club in Birmingham, Alabama, hosts for the third consecutive year. It’s an unusual par 72 in that there are five par 3s and five par 5s. It’ll tip at 7,277 yards. Like all majors on the PGA TOUR Champions, it begins on Thursday. However, it’s one of only two majors (Constellation SENIOR PLAYERS Championship) for which there is no cut. Bernhard Langer is the two-time defending champion. He’s also the PGA TOUR Champions’ most recent winner at the Insperity Invitational, which came on the heels of consecutive playoff losses in the previous two tournaments. As a result, the 60-year-old sits atop the Schwab Cup money list. Total prize money for the Regions Tradition is $2.4 million. The champion will pocket $360,000. This is the most lucrative event of the season thus far. It’s fourth-most overall behind the U.S. Senior Open Championship ($4 million), the KitchenAid Senior PGA Championship (estimated $2.8-$3.0 million) and Constellation SENIOR PLAYERS Championship ($2.8 million). FUTURE POSSIBILITIES NOTE: Select golfers committed to the tournament are listed alphabetically. Future tournaments are sorted chronologically and reflect previous success on the courses on which the tournaments will be held in 2018. The numerical values in parentheses represent the order of relative confidence of where to use each golfer if multiple sites are listed (e.g. 1 for strongest, 2 for next-strongest and so on). To present weighted confidence in real time, numerical values will not change all season no matter how many tournament remain listed for each golfer. All are pending golfer commitment. Stephen Ames … Principal (8); U.S. Senior Open (6); Boeing (2); Shaw (7) Joe Durant … Principal (2); American Family (8); U.S. Senior Open (7); SENIOR PLAYERS (1); 3M (6); DICK’S (12); Boeing (10); Shaw (11); PURE (3); SAS (13) David Frost … U.S. Senior Open (4); 3M (7); Boeing (5); Shaw (8); PURE (1) Fred Funk … Regions Tradition (3); Boeing (6); PURE (5) Doug Garwood … SAS (1) Paul Goydos … 3M (1; defending); DICK’S (3); SAS (5) Lee Janzen … U.S. Senior Open (2) Miguel Angel Jiménez … Senior PGA (6); Principal (10); U.S. Senior Open (5); SENIOR PLAYERS (3); Senior Open Championship (4); 3M (9); Shaw (7); SAS (12) Brandt Jobe … Senior PGA (2); Principal (3; defending); U.S. Senior Open (4); SENIOR PLAYERS (1); 3M (5); Boeing (8) Jerry Kelly … Boeing (1; defending); Shaw (5); PURE (2); SAS (4) Bernhard Langer … Usable everywhere. Defending five titles. Tom Lehman … Regions Tradition (5); Principal (1); U.S. Senior Open (3); SAS (9) Jeff Maggert … American Family (3); Shaw (5) Scott McCarron … Regions Tradition (2); Senior PGA (11); Principal (1); SENIOR PLAYERS (3; defending); Senior Open Championship (10); DICK’S (4; defending); Shaw (5; defending); PURE (8) Colin Montgomerie … Senior PGA (1); U.S. Senior Open (6); SENIOR PLAYERS (2); Senior Open Championship (10); Shaw (4); PURE (7); SAS (3; defending) Tom Pernice, Jr. … Principal Charity (2); Shaw (3); SAS (5) Kenny Perry … Regions Tradition (5); Senior PGA (6); 3M (1); DICK’S (10); SAS (2) Gene Sauers … Regions Tradition (3); U.S. Senior Open (5); SENIOR PLAYERS (6); Boeing (1) Vijay Singh … Senior PGA (3); U.S. Senior Open (2); Shaw (5); SAS (1) Kevin Sutherland … Usable everywhere. David Toms … Regions Tradition (3); Boeing (2); SAS (4) Duffy Waldorf … Principal (6); Shaw (5) WILD CARDS (short list of golfers not included above but on the rise or still building portfolios after recently turning 50): Bob Estes; Steve Flesch; Scott Parel; Steve Stricker

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