Horses for Courses: AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am

Sungjae Im plays a lot of golf, which meant he played a ton of tournaments in 2020-21 without a PGA TOUR title. He played in 35 events, to be exact, tied for the most on TOUR with Brian Stuard. Im only had to wait until his second tournament this season to get his first victory of the year and second of his career. At the Shriners Children’s Open, a final-round 62 got him to 24-under, four shots clear of back-to-back runner-up Matthew Wolff. Im’s score of 260 was the best at TPC at Summerlin since Webb Simpson’s winning 260 in 2013. 1. Sungjae Im storms back for second PGA TOUR title Sungjae Im opened with rounds of 63 and 65 to co-lead with Chad Ramey at 14-under on Friday, but a third-round 70 left Im three shots back of Adam Schenk. Playing in the third-to-last-group on Sunday, Im opened with four birdies on his first seven holes. He proceeded to launch himself into the lead with five straight birdies on Nos. 9-13. As others near the top of the leaderboard stumbled, Im stretched his advantage to as many as five strokes. At 9-under through 13 holes, Im was on legitimate 59 watch, but with the tournament well within his grasp, he made pars on his final five holes. His 62 was still the low score of the day. “The big difference between yesterday and today was today, there was no wind compared to Round 3 and that made it easier,” Im says. “Tee-to-green, driver, irons, putting game, it worked as I wanted to and it gave me a good result.” Im committed four bogeys on Saturday, but no bogeys in his other three rounds. At 24-under, he beat runner-up Matthew Wolff by four shots. Schenk, Marc Leishman and Rory Sabbatini all finished five shots back. Leishman shot a final-round 63 and Sabbatini a final-round 64. Sabbatini’s day included birdies on his first four holes and a 28 on the front nine, but an even-par 36 on his back nine kept the Olympic silver medalist out of serious contention. Im’s second career win came in his 100th career PGA TOUR start. His first victory came at The Honda Classic in 2020, a one-shot win over Mackenzie Hughes. Im won that tournament at 6-under in much different scoring conditions at PGA National than at TPC at Summerlin. Im also now has 79 made cuts and 20 top-10 finishes in his 100 career starts. 2. Matthew Wolff repeats as runner-up A year ago, Matthew Wolff arrived at TPC at Summerlin three weeks after earning runner-up honors at the U.S. Open behind Bryson DeChambeau. Wolff fired a third-round 61 and qualified for a three-man playoff with Martin Laird and Austin Cook. Laird won the playoff, but Wolff lifted his world ranking to a career-best No. 12. In the year since, Wolff finished no better than T15 in any tournament. His world ranking dropped to as low as No. 49. He spent two months away from the PGA TOUR last spring, focusing on his mental health. He has since been open about this time, noting there were moments he did not even want to get out of bed in the morning. Back at the Shriners Children’s Open this week, Wolff buried the ghosts of last season. He posted four rounds of 68 or better, finishing at 20-under, good for a runner-up finish once again, this time by himself. Wolff opened Sunday in the final group with Schenk, one shot behind the leader, and after going 3-under on the front, he was within striking distance of Im. However, bogeys on No. 10 and No. 13 ultimately took Wolff out of contention. Birdies on Nos. 15 and 16 got him back into second place. “If I keep on putting myself in these positions I know that eventually it’s going to be in my favor and I’m going to win,” Wolff says. “But I really like the way my game’s trending, especially from the beginning — or the end of last year. If you would have told me I would be in this position right now, I would be really happy.” When Wolff finished as the Shriners Children’s Open runner-up in 2020, it felt like he left something on the table. This time around, it felt like he proved to people he can be the player they thought he could be. You know that guy, the one who won in his fourth event on the PGA TOUR and claimed top-5s in his first two major starts. This new version of Matthew Wolff has those old skills, but also, a new mindset. “Obviously, I know I had the game, I think just, maturity-wise and mentally, I’m just a much stronger and more all-around, just a more complete person,” Wolff says. “I’m able to put things in perspective more when stuff isn’t going my way, I’m able to bounce back.” Wolff will continue to be a threat to win at the Shriners Children’s Open in the future. He now has 12 rounds in the 60s in 12 rounds at the event. But in the year between starts at TPC at Summerlin, it appears he will be a force on the PGA TOUR once again. 3. Sam Burns cools down Everything was going right for Sam Burns. He won last week’s Sanderson Farms Championship, earning his second career PGA TOUR title. He opened at the Shriners Children’s Open with rounds of 66 and 63. After a birdie on his 47th hole of the tournament, he reached 17-under and held a 2-shot lead. But the wheels fell off on the back nine Saturday, as Burns missed a 6-foot birdie putt on 13 and a 9-foot birdie try on 15. Burns had just 171 yards in for his second shot on the par-5 16th, but put that shot in the water, bogeying the hole. The struggles continued Sunday, as Burns bogeyed two holes on the front nine and committed a double-bogey on 18, dropping him to T14, out of the top 10. Burns’ final-round 72 ended a run of nine straight PGA TOUR rounds in the 60s. Despite all this, Burns’ result moved him into sole possession of the top spot in the current FedExCup Standings. He will get an immediate chance to put the weekend behind him this coming week when he tees it back up in Las Vegas at THE CJ CUP @ SUMMIT. 4. Adam Schenk trending upward In his first 110 starts on the PGA TOUR, Adam Schenk landed four top-10 finishes. In his last nine events, he’s added three more top 10s. In fact, all three of those tops 10s are also top-5s. After a birdie on 18 on Saturday, Schenk held the overnight lead at TPC at Summerlin by himself. He opened with a birdie on No. 1 on Sunday, but the momentum slowed, as he went 3-over on his next nine holes. Three back-nine birdies got Schenk’s round to 1-under and a total of 19-under for the tournament, five back of Im. Schenk’s T3 finish at the Shriners Children’s Open is his best finish ever on TOUR, edging his T4 at the John Deere Classic and 4th place at the Barracuda Championship last season. “Everyone’s good enough to win out here, you just have to believe in yourself and not beat yourself, in a sense,” Schenk said after his 66 on Saturday. “I started to believe a lot more in the last couple months.” Make fun of Schenk’s last name all you want. He is flushing the ball right now and is going to have more chances to win in 2021-22. 5. Hayden Buckley is a rookie to watch After missing the cut at the Fortinet Championship, Hayden Buckley notched his first career PGA TOUR top 10 at the Sanderson Farms Championship, finishing T4 after a final-round 66. The 25-year-old followed that up by starting his Shriners Children’s Open with a first-round hole-in-one at the par 3 17th. He finished his tournament with an 8-under 63, tied for the second-best score on Sunday, to finish 17-under in T8. Buckley, a first-team All-SEC selection and four-time collegiate winner at Missouri, won on the Korn Ferry Tour last season at the LECOM Suncoast Classic. He finished 10th in the 2021 Korn Ferry Tour Finals thanks to a T7 at the Boise Open and a T4 at the Korn Ferry Tour Championship. Three events into his PGA TOUR career, Buckley is at No. 10 in the FedExCup Standings. COMCAST BUSINESS TOUR TOP 10 The Comcast Business TOUR TOP 10 highlights and rewards the extraordinary level of play required to earn a spot in the TOP 10 at the conclusion of the FedExCup Regular Season as determined by the FedExCup standings. The competition recognizes and awards the most elite in golf.

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PALM HARBOR, Fla. – Justin Thomas struggled with his putter at the Valspar Championship, but the ball-striking was strong enough for a top-15 finish that put him atop the FedExCup standings. Thomas, who won the FedExCup in 2017, now has a 30-point lead over Bryson DeChambeau. Thomas is trying to join Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy as the only two-time winners of the FedExCup. Thomas also took the lead in the Comcast Business TOUR TOP 10. The Valspar was his 11th top-25 in 13 starts this season, including a win at THE PLAYERS Championship. He finished T13 this week after shooting four consecutive rounds of par or better (69-71-67-70). RELATED: Final leaderboard | What’s in Burns’ bag? “I’m playing some really good golf and I’m really, really close to, I feel like, getting it going here pretty good,” Thomas said. “(Moving to No. 1) is a good kind of bonus for a so-so week.” Thomas led the field in Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee, Approach-the-Green and Tee-to-Green. It’s the first time he’s led a tournament in all three categories. He’s the first player to accomplish that since Rory McIlroy at the 2018 BMW Championship. “When I feel like I can kind of lay it off at the top and try to hit pull cuts — that’s what really was my thought at THE PLAYERS — I’ve had a lot of good ball striking rounds doing that,” Thomas said after shooting 70 on Sunday. “My miss, I’m still getting a little stuck underneath it, but it’s close. My good shots are really, really good right now and the consistency is there. I just need to see a couple putts fall.” Thomas also led the field with three eagles this week. He started the final round with his second eagle of the week on the first hole, hitting a 206-yard approach to 7 feet. He was third-to-last in Strokes Gained: Putting among the players who made the cut, however. He lost 6.5 strokes on the greens, the second-worst putting performance of his career. He saw some improvement over the weekend, however. “I just was trying to focus a little bit more on speed and how far I was trying to hit it as opposed to how hard,” Thomas said. “Sometimes I get a little wrapped up in trying to maybe hit it harder instead of farther and when I do that I kind of drag the handle and that’s when I hit that one to the right. That’s just a tendency in my stroke. I really was just trying to focus on speed and speed I was trying to hit the putt and stay stable.” Thomas is playing next week Wells Fargo Championship at Quail Hollow, where he won the 2017 PGA Championship, and then playing the PGA at Kiawah Island.

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If the PGA Tour comes back as planned in early June, the Charles Schwab Challenge will be one of the first events as American sports makes a return. That means name recognition, and some pressure given so much uncertainty.

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