Fantasy Insider: Masters Tournament

Judging by the questions I’ve received since the start of the season, this is a good time to plug my full-membership fantasy rankings. See, the extended introduction serves as a reference board of sorts. Built in are all kinds of bits and pieces regarding membership, tournaments, provisions, exemptions and, whoa, even fantasy-specific information. Included in the latter is an adjustment made to PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf presented by SERVPRO. Beginning in 2017-18, golfers who lose in playoffs are awarded bonus points based on actual finish. Marc Leishman was the first golfer impacted when he was defeated by Justin Thomas at THE CJ CUP @ NINE BRIDGES on Sunday. The Aussie’s fantasy bonus was 150 points, which is equal to one-half his actual haul in FedExCup points (since the tournament didn’t utilize ShotLink data). Until now, playoff losers were under the same bonus structure as the winners who beat them. The only wrinkle is that Leishman’s bonus points weren’t manually adjusted in the platform until Monday. It occurred at the usual time that all non-members who contributed to fantasy teams were credited with their equivalent bonuses. Please relay this to others if you’re a commissioner or if you know of anyone who isn’t yet aware. PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf presented by SERVPRO My roster for the World Golf Championships-HSBC Champions (in alphabetical order): Dustin Johnson Brooks Koepka Marc Leishman Hideki Matsuyama Jon Rahm Justin Rose You’ll find my starters in Expert Picks. Others to consider for each category (in alphabetical order): Scoring: Daniel Berger; Jason Day; Tony Finau; Brian Harman; Phil Mickelson; Pat Perez; Patrick Reed Driving: n/a Approach: n/a Short: n/a Power Rankings Wild Card Alex Noren … Turning points are visible only with hindsight, so it remains to be seen if the WGC-HSBC Champions is a launch pad or a flat tire for the Swede. It’s not often when a 35-year-old from anywhere debuts as a PGA TOUR member, but that’s his reality this week. Thanks to four wins in 2016 and a statement victory at the BMW PGA Championship five months ago, he’s secured a spot on all of the planet’s biggest stages for the recent past and near future. He descended for his fifth appearance at Sheshan International with just one top 25 in his last five starts, but he has a pair here, including a T12 last year. Strongest for his aerial approaches and greenside game, he occupies the inside lane for a mammoth 2017-18. Draws Tommy Fleetwood (all) Branden Grace (DFS) Bill Haas (all) Brian Harman (DFS) Matt Kuchar (all) Michael Lorenzo-Vera (DFS) Thomas Pieters (all) Haydn Porteous (DFS) Hyun-woo Ryu (DFS) Peter Uihlein (DFS) Bernd Wiesberger (DFS) Fades Wesley Bryan Adam Hadwin Russell Henley Charles Howell III Charl Schwartzel Jhonattan Vegas Returning to Competition Brandon Hagy … A sore wrist thwarted a start at the Safeway Open where he had committed. Last year’s T14 at the Country Club of Jackson was his second-best finish of 2016-17. Roberto Diaz … Had to call it quits during his second round in his rookie debut at the Safeway Open with a back injury. A T20 at the Web.com Tour Championship the week prior was his first top 25 in 15 starts dating back to June. George McNeill … Eked into the field of the Sanderson Farms Championship as the fifth alternate. Hasn’t pegged it since withdrawing during the final round of the Barbasol Championship. An explanation wasn’t released. The 42-year-old is embarking on his second straight season in the Past Champions category. He made only seven PGA TOUR starts in 2016-17 and hasn’t cashed since last year’s SFC. Notables WDs Louis Oosthuizen … Unexpected withdrawal from the WGC-HSBC Champions because he tweeted last Saturday that he was eager to resume playing. Mackenzie Hughes … Second consecutive early withdrawal (this time in China) due to the imminent birth of his first child. Luke Donald … Withdrew from the Sanderson Farms Championship with a sore rib. It would have been his first appearance in 14 years. It was in that event in 2002 when he broke through for his first of five PGA TOUR victories. Power Rankings Recap – THE CJ CUP @ NINE BRIDGES Power Ranking  Golfer  Result 1 Tony Finau T26 2 Justin Thomas Win 3 Paul Casey T19 4 Pat Perez T5 5 Xander Schauffele T72 6 Russell Henley T33 7 Rafa Cabrera Bello T11 8 Marc Leishman P2 9 Jason Day T11 10 Keegan Bradley T47 11 Cameron Smith 3rd 12 Chez Reavie T15 13 Anirban Lahiri T5 14 Sung Kang T54 15 Kyle Stanley T19 Wild Card Patrick Reed T11 Sleepers Recap – CIMB Classic Golfer  Result Scott Brown T5 Jinho Choi T36 Luke List T5 Ollie Schniederjans T19 Young-han Song T58 Birthdays among active golfers on the PGA TOUR October 24 … Marc Leishman (34) October 25 … Troy Merritt (32); Xander Schauffele (24) October 26 … none October 27 … Fabián Gómez (39) October 28 … none October 29 … none October 30 … none

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Matt Kuchar bogeys the 14th and 15th holes but makes three clutch pars coming in for a final-round 69 and a one-shot victory over Danny Lee (65) at the Mayakoba Golf Classic. Welcome to the Monday Finish, where Kuchar, trying to break a win drought of 4 1/2 years, made a crucial two-putt par at the 18th hole to pick up his eighth PGA TOUR victory and go to fifth in the FedExCup. He also broke the tournament record at 22 under. FIVE OBSERVATIONS 1. Kuchar’s seasoning paid off. It would have been easy to get psyched out by his four-shot lead, but after competing all around the world, making Presidents Cup and Ryder Cup teams, earning a bronze medal in the 2016 Olympics, and winning THE PLAYERS Championship among his seven previous TOUR titles, Kuchar was under no illusions. “I know the deal,â€� he said Saturday night. “I can’t just stop making birdies and expect to win.â€� He was right. Had he shot an even-par 71 he would have lost to Lee by one. 2. It was the Year of the Comeback in 2018. Kuchar broke a win drought that went back 4 1/2 years and 116 starts to the 2014 RBC Heritage, and was only the latest player to revive his career. Phil Mickelson, Jason Day, Rory McIlroy, Gary Woodland, Kevin Na and Tiger Woods were among those who had gone winless for a year or in some cases much longer before hoisting a trophy again in the 2018 calendar year. “It’s an amazing feeling to win a PGA TOUR event,â€� Kuchar said, echoing an oft-repeated refrain this year. “It’s a hard thing to do.â€� 3. Mayakoba illustrated “horses for coursesâ€� axiom. Past champions Pat Perez (T6), Brian Gay (T41) and Patton Kizzire (T55) all spent time up around the lead before 2008 winner Gay and defending champion Kizzire fell back on the weekend. Perez, who won in 2017, never wavered as he shot 66-67-67-67 to move from 41st to 25th in the FedExCup. 4. Cameron Champ looks like a superstar. The long-hitting Champ didn’t win, thanks largely to unusually poor finishes in his weekend rounds, but at 16-under he still finished T10. And after winning the Sanderson Farms Championship and contending again at the Shriners Hospitals for Children Open before falling back with a final-round 73, he looks capable of contending every time he tees it up. “He’s hugely impressive,â€� Kuchar said after playing with Champ in the third round, which Champ ended with a double-bogey to go from four to six back. “It looks like effortless power. He looks like a really consistent, good swinger of the golf club. He’s going to do damage out here. I think he’s going to be kind of the future of the game of golf.â€� 5. Mayakoba could still be punishing. Although there were multiple 62s (Cameron Champ, Round 2; Scott Piercy, Round 4) and plenty of low scores, El Camaleon could still be a beast for those who suffered an off-day or even one bad hole. Freddie Jacobson, coming back from an injury, made a 10 on the way to a 76 in the first round. Jonas Blixt went 63-76 in the second and third rounds, respectively. And last year’s runner-up Rickie Fowler (T16) made plenty of birdies but simply couldn’t keep the bogeys off his card. FIVE INSIGHTS 1. Kuchar was ultra-reliable off the tee, the most critical stat at Mayakoba, to pick up his 99th top-10 finish on the PGA TOUR. He was 45/56 in fairways hit, third best in the field. He was also 57/72 in Greens in Regulation (T9); and averaged 27.8 putts per round (T21). 2. The winner made 26 birdies and four bogeys, and became the fourth player in his 40s to win this calendar year, following Phil Mickelson (World Golf Championships-Mexico Championship, 47), Ian Poulter (Houston Open, 42) and Tiger Woods (TOUR Championship, 42). 3. In his 428th TOUR start, Kuchar set 36-, 54- and 72-hole tournament records, ultimately finishing 22 under. That was also the best four-round total of his career. The victory came in his 116th start since his last TOUR win (2014 RBC Heritage). 4. This was runner-up Danny Lee’s best result since he won the 2015 A Military Tribute at the Greenbrier. It was his second runner-up (T2/2015 TOUR Championship). He hit 39/56 fairways (T16), was 52/72 in Greens in Regulation (T27), and took 26.5 putts per round (T4). 5. J.J. Spaun (66, T3) posted his third straight top-15 finish after a T10 (THE CJ CUP @ NINE BRIDGES) and T15 (Shriners Hospitals for Children Open). His solo second at the 2017 The RSM Classic remains his best finish. Richy Werenski (67, T3) enjoyed his best finish in four starts this season, and best since a T2 finish at the Barbasol Championship last season. A playoff loss at the 2017 Barracuda Championship remains his best finish in 63 starts on TOUR.

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KIAWAH ISLAND, S.C. (AP) — Among the congratulations that poured in for Phil Mickelson becoming the oldest major champion in golf was a video tweet from Jack Nicklaus, who is still good at math. “You know, something sort of strikes me that 50 years old is older than 46,” Nicklaus said with a grin. “Well done, my friend. Many more.” Many more? At age 50? Mickelson plays a game with which Nicklaus might not be familiar, even though the most iconic of his 18 majors was Nicklaus winning the Masters at age 46. During an interview at the end of 2016, Nicklaus said that sixth Green Jacket “was an accident in many ways.” He started to scale back his schedule after winning two majors in 1980. He won twice more before the 1986 Masters, but he really wasn’t playing much golf. “It’s really difficult when you’ve had as much success as I had over a long period of time to charge your batteries, day after day, and go back out and say, ‘Man, I want to do this again,’” Nicklaus said. That’s where Mickelson stands alone. The list of 24 players who have reached No. 1 since the world ranking began in 1986 does not include Mickelson, who is more accomplished than all but one of them. He has never won a PGA TOUR money title. He has never been PGA TOUR Player of the Year. He is not among the most elite group in golf with the career Grand Slam. Only one of those can change. And even in the glow of his two-shot victory at Kiawah Island to win the PGA Championship, adding the U.S. Open still seems like a long shot. That would stand as his greatest major. It might even top Tiger Woods winning the Masters after overcoming four back surgeries that left him wondering if he could ever play again. What won’t change regardless of what Lefty does next is his legacy of longevity. It doesn’t sound all that sensational. But it is. Never mind Mickelson becoming the oldest player to win a major, breaking a record that had stood for 53 years. Mickelson set another record Sunday as the first player in PGA TOUR history to go 30 years between victories. He won his first when he was a junior at Arizona State. He won his 45th when his daughter was a senior at Brown. “He’s been on TOUR as long as I’ve been alive,” Jon Rahm said. “For him to keep that willingness to play and compete and practice, even when it hasn’t been working, it’s truly admirable.” From his first full season on the PGA TOUR, Mickelson never finished lower than 60th on the money list. That was last year, at age 49, during a season disrupted by the pandemic. He made the TOUR Championship 19 of his first 20 full seasons, the exception in 2003 when his wife went through a scary and troublesome pregnancy that ended well with their third child. As for team competitions, Mickelson played his first Presidents Cup in 1994 and was part of every U.S. team until the last one in 2019 at Royal Melbourne. He hasn’t missed a Ryder Cup since his 3-0 debut at Oak Hill in 1995. Whether he’s at Whistling Straits in September is to be determined. The last American to win a major and be left off the Ryder Cup team was Todd Hamilton, the British Open winner in 2004. The last American major winner left off any team was Keegan Bradley, who won the PGA Championship as a rookie in 2011. The final pick for the Presidents Cup went to Bill Haas, the FedExCup champion. Neither was named Phil Mickelson. Most remarkable about his longevity is that he kept working harder even as progress was difficult to see. Mickelson had gone more than two years without winning — except for two times he played on the 50-and-over PGA TOUR Champions — and nine months without finishing in the top 20. He fell out of the top 100 in the world in March. The last time he was outside the top 100 was August 1993, three weeks after Jordan Spieth was born. And still he pressed on without any secret sauce except to keep trying. “My desire to play is the same,” he said. “I’ve never been driven by exterior things. I’ve always been intrinsically motivated because I love to compete, I love playing the game. I love having opportunities to play against the best at the highest level. That’s what drives me, and the belief that I could still do it inspired me to work harder. “I just didn’t see why it couldn’t be done,” he said. “It just took a little bit more effort.” Winning is why he plays, and winning can be exhausting. That’s 48 victories worldwide to go along with 39 runner-up finishes and as much heartache as joy in some of the majors, particularly the U.S. Open. Mickelson is still finding ways to get better. The topic in that Nicklaus interview was Woods, who had just returned from 15 months off after a third of what would be four back surgeries. Nicklaus ended his thoughts on motivation by adding as aside, “Phil is not done yet, either.” That was five years ago. Nicklaus could say the same thing today.

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