How Dustin Johnson got his second major in a one-of-a-kind Masters

Unscheduled Monday finishes present a handful of challenges to everyone they touch, but if there’s a positive to the loss of one day between THE NORTHERN TRUST and this week’s scheduled Thursday start of the BMW Championship, it’s that the next host is as close to a neutral site as the field of 69 will tackle. (Patrick Reed, who is seeded 26th, withdrew due to a bout with pneumonia. For an introduction to Caves Valley Golf Club in Owings Mills, Maryland, the format and more, keep reading beyond the expanded ranking of projected contenders. POWER RANKINGS: BMW CHAMPIONSHIP Louis Oosthuizen, Hideki Matsuyama, Jordan Spieth, Alex Noren and Rory McIlroy will be among the notables reviewed in the Fantasy Insider. Situated in Baltimore County, Caves Valley GC is about a dozen miles to the northwest of downtown Baltimore as the oriole flies. It’s significant not only as the host of the top 70 in the updated FedExCup standings for the penultimate tournament of the 2020-21 season, but neither the City of Baltimore nor Baltimore Country has hosted the PGA TOUR since, well, before the PGA TOUR was the PGA TOUR. This marks the first visit to the region since 1962 when the final edition of the Eastern Open Invitational was contested at Mount Pleasant Golf Club in Baltimore proper. Doug Ford prevailed by one over Bob Goalby. Caves Valley has hosted a handful of competitions since it opened in 1991. For men only, in addition to a pair of events of note for seniors, the 2005 NCAA Division I Men’s Championship and the 2007 Palmer Cup were staged on site. Of those who participated in the more recent, Dustin Johnson (22nd seed), Billy Horschel (27th), Brian Harman (39th), Webb Simpson (52nd) and Chris Kirk (60th) are back this week. But again, it’s been 14 years since they were here and when they were amateurs. Suffice it to say that the statute of limitations for relevant course history has elapsed. At 7,542 yards, the stock par 72 designed by Tom Fazio is a bigger ballpark than most. The full complement of four par 5s serves as default scoring opportunities on unfamiliar greens that, in turn, will reward ball-strikers until the field finds the pulse for the bentgrass greens. Furthermore, because the targets average just 5,200 square feet, the approach game likely will determine the final leaderboard. The combination fescue-bluegrass rough has been allowed to grow to four inches on the perimeter, so with putting surfaces stretching to 12½ feet on the Stimpmeter, Caves Valley sets up as a first- and second-shot track. That, of course, brings us back to the ball-striker model. There’s so much more at stake at the BMW Championship than the official victory, the membership extension through at least 2022-23 for the winner and official earnings. Golfers inside the top 30 of the FedExCup standings at the conclusion of the tournament not only will advance to the TOUR Championship but each will receive an exemption into the 2022 editions of the Masters, the U.S. Open and The Open Championship. Consider that even winners of some tournaments rewarding the full allocation of FedExCup points don’t qualify automatically for the last two. With no cut at Caves Valley, it’ll be a 72-hole race for all the spoils. There will be physical sweating in addition to the mental variety. Daytime temperatures will eclipse 90 degrees on Thursday and Friday before a gradual cooling occurs, albeit with highs still ranging into the mid- to upper-80s on the weekend. Juicy air will promote the development of clouds, rain and possibly storms every day. Wind will not be a factor, which means that every bit of the elevated heating will be felt, but unlike the course, that’s something that all have experienced. ROB BOLTON’S SCHEDULE PGATOUR.COM’s Fantasy Insider Rob Bolton recaps and previews every tournament from numerous angles. Look for his following contributions as scheduled. TUESDAY*: Power Rankings; Sleepers; Fantasy Insider SUNDAY: Qualifiers, Reshuffle, Rookie Watch * – Rob is a member of the panel for PGATOUR.COM’s Expert Picks for PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf, which also publishes on Tuesday.

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Tiger Woods begins his quest Thursday for a PGA TOUR record-tying 82nd win, as well as his 16th major, at this week’s U.S. Open at Pebble Beach. He won his first U.S. Open here 19 years ago by a record-breaking 15-stroke margin. How will he fare this week? We’ll have hole-by-hole coverage when his first round begins at 5:09 p.m. ET. RELATED: Leaderboard | Tee times | Tiger ‘trending in right direction’ | Chase for 82 continues | Tiger’s Jedi mind tricks in 2000 TIGER NOTES TIGER’S GAMEPLAN: Although he’s not as dominant as he was in 2000, Tiger does know what it takes to win a U.S. Open at Pebble Beach. “You look at all my angles,â€� Tiger said when asked how he could apply his 2000 win to this week. “I did not hit every green. I did not hit every fairway, but I always had the proper angle. And gave me the best chance to get up-and-down. I poured everything in. Hopefully I can have one of those weeks on the greens again.â€� PEBBLE BEACH THEN AND NOW: Woods was asked to compare the differences at Pebble Beach this year compared to 2000. “Right now I would have to say that it’s more clumpy than it was in 2000,â€� he said. “In 2000 it was pretty uniform all the way through. Right now they’ve got some spots where you can draw a good lie. You can get a ball to the green with no problem. And then there’s spots where it’s just a wedge, hack it out in the fairway and try to get up-and-down from the middle of the fairway. That’s probably the biggest difference between uniform and clumpy, between the two years.â€� TIGER ON PEBBLE BEACH: Besides his U.S. Open win, Tiger also has won the 2000 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am in February. And in his first pro start at Pebble Beach, he shot 63-64 on the weekend to finish T-2; that ties his lowest weekend score ever on TOUR (along with the 1999 Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines). While his success on the historic course can’t quite match another California track a little farther south – the aforementioned Torrey Pines in San Diego – Woods understands how special it is to play a major here. “There’s nothing like playing a U.S. Open setup here in the Pebble Beach,â€� he said. “The golf course is not overly long. It’s not big in that regard, but man, it’s tricky. The greens are all slanted, very small targets. And if they ever firm up, then we have a totally different ballgame.â€� PLAYING PARTNERS: Woods’ playing partners for the first two rounds are Jordan Spieth and Justin Rose. This will be the eighth different tournament that Spieth and Woods have been paired, including last year’s THE PLAYERS Championship. The only other major was the 2014 Open Championship. This will be the 12th different tournament that Rose and Woods have been paired, including just two weeks ago for the first two rounds of the Memorial Tournament presented by Nationwide. They’ve also been paired three different years of the Open. Follow along for a hole-by-hole breakdown of Woods’ opening round at the U.S. Open. No. 1 (par 4, 380 yards) No. 2 (par 4, 516 yards) No. 3 (par 4, 404 yards) No. 4 (par 4, 331 yards) No. 5 (par 3, 195 yards) No. 6 (par 5, 523 yards) No. 7 (par 3, 109 yards) No. 8 (par 4, 428 yards) No. 9 (par 4, 526 yards) No. 10 (par 4, 495 yards) No. 11 (par 4, 390 yards) No. 12 (par 3, 202 yards) No. 13 (par 4, 445 yards) No. 14 (par 5, 580 yards) No. 15 (par 4, 397 yards) No. 16 (par 4, 403 yards) No. 17 (par 3, 208 yards) No. 18 (par 5, 543 yards)

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KAPALUA, Hawaii — Collin Morikawa seized control on the stretch of scoring holes on the back nine at Kapalua to pull away from the elite field, making four birdies over his final five holes for an 8-under 65 and a six-shot lead in the Sentry Tournament of Champions. No one could keep up with Morikawa, a two-time major champion who went to a putting coach late last year and is seeing it start to pay off. It makes for a frightening complement to his supreme iron play. Morikawa has yet to make a bogey over 54 holes on the Plantation Course at Kapalua, and he has rarely come close. He made a 10-footer for par on the fourth hole to avoid a long three-putt, making that as pure as so many of his birdies. Morikawa was at 24-under 195, six shots clear of U.S. Open champion Matt Fitzpatrick, Masters champion Scottie Scheffler and J.J. Spaun. Morikawa is among 10 players at Kapalua who failed to win this year. Now it’s an elevated event with a $15 million purse, and the PGA TOUR chose to expand the field to include anyone reaching the FedExCup finale at East Lake. One more round like this and Morikawa can be assured of a tee time for next year. Scheffler, who along with Spaun started two shots behind, tried to keep up with Morikawa. The birdies dried up on the back nine, however, and Scheffler missed a 4-foot birdie putt on the par-5 18th that at least could have put him in the final group. He had to settle for a 69. Fitzpatrick had five birdies over his last seven holes in his round of 66 and will be in the final group for his first trip to Hawaii. Spaun dropped two shots on the back nine, one when his ball spun off the 13th green and rolled 50 yards down the fairway, the other when his second shot to the par-5 15th sailed left and into the native grass. He had a 69. Max Homa had no trouble with Kapalua, making a career-high 10 birdies for a 63 and wondering exactly how he did it. That only got him to within eight shots of the lead. “It didn’t feel like I played four shots better than my last two days combined, but I did,” he said. “It’s just not a very good game for your mind. But it was nice to shoot 10 under.” Jordan Spieth was three shots behind to start the third round and lost ground with three bogeys in his round of 71. Everyone is chasing Morikawa, and it looks to be hopeless. Morikawa began his scoring with a 12-foot eagle putt on the par-5 fifth hole, made a tough 20-footer for birdie on the next and did everything right by doing so little wrong.

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