JR Smith stung by hornets at college golf tourney

It’s not often when the PGA TOUR descends on what is essentially a new golf course, but that’s the reality at this week’s AT&T Byron Nelson. Trinity Forest Golf Club in Dallas hosts the 156-man field headlined by local native and resident Jordan Spieth. It opened in the fall of 2016. For much more on it, what it should challenge, how it should score and other nuggets, scroll beneath the ranking. POWER RANKINGS: 2018 AT&T Byron Nelson RANK PLAYER COMMENT Given value of imagination and creativity the course demands, he’s the man to beat even as he continues to struggle with his putting. Among the handful with course knowledge, too. Co-led the B flight at TPC Sawgrass for his best finish since being diagnosed with Lyme disease. Since the Masters: T20-4th-T25-T2. The Texan remains a force with his putter. Always a threat in Texas thanks in part to his profile as one of the best in the wind. Recently T7 at Bay Hill and ninth at Augusta National. Eighth on TOUR in birdies or better. Second defending champion in three weeks on a different course (Brian Harman, Wells Fargo). Horschel’s switch in putters has resulted in a phenomenal month, including Zurich title. Spieth has compared Trinity Forest to Royal Birkdale where Kuchar finished second (to Spieth) in the 2017 Open Championship. He’s been consistently (and predictably) solid ever since. Trinity Forest is the home club for the first-time PGA TOUR member. Lives locally. Terrific short game pays off confident irons. Just a few weeks removed from Houston Open runner-up. The T11 at THE PLAYERS was his best finish anywhere in 11 months. Led the field in scrambling for the first time since the 2011 Open Championship, evidence for his comfort on links. The Scot has been peppering leaderboards since a T9 at the WM Phoenix Open in early February. It’s one of four top-11 finishes during a 7-for-8 burst. Highly underrated putter. Five top 25s in his last six starts, including a career-best T17 in his 16th appearance at THE PLAYERS. Balanced throughout his bag and 26th on TOUR in adjusted scoring. Local veteran comfortable in wind and coming off a T23 at THE PLAYERS where his putting was better than every start since the 2016 PLAYERS. Has a proven record of being streaky. Possesses the entire game needed to win at Trinity Forest but hasn’t been putting four rounds together despite a 10-for-10 season. Sits sixth in strokes gained: putting. Limited in playing time due to conditional status, he’s heated up quickly with a sixth (with Tony Finau) in New Orleans and a T8 in the Knoxville Open on the Web.com Tour. Had last week off after a T5 at the Wells Fargo Championship where he led the field in scrambling and spun a career-low 62 in the third round. Five top 20s on the season. Enters with a streak of five cuts made during which he thrived in the wind at Coralas (T5) and TPC San Antonio (T8). Ranks 30th on the PGA TOUR in greens in regulation. Might own the most confidence right now after capturing victory at the Knoxville Open on Sunday. It was a much-needed jolt after failing to log a top 40 in his first 12 starts of 2018. Sergio Garcia, Hideki Matsuyama and Brandt Snedeker will be among the notables reviewed in Tuesday’s Fantasy Insider. Trinity Forest is unlike every other host course on the PGA TOUR. The irony is that there isn’t a single tree on the 7,380-yard par 71. Situated inside the eponymous woodland south of downtown, it was designed and built by Bill Coore and Ben Crenshaw on a landfill consisting only of inorganic material. For numerous reasons — including environmental, which is counterintuitive — the agreement was that no trees were to be planted. There isn’t a water hazard, either. And like a piano featuring an identical number of keys, the 88 bunkers will strike major, minor, diminished and augmented chords in targeting for course management due to the virtual absence of distance cues. To the eye, it’s a links-style layout sans the traditional out-and-back characteristic. However, in a recent press conference, Spieth downplayed the ground game usually required on tests that host The Open Championship, for example. “It’s like an American links,” he said. “You’ve kind of got to play it from the air, not really a bounce-the-ball-up kind of links. … You get maybe four or five, six holes where you can bounce the ball up, but the way to get balls close is to come in with a higher shot.” Trinity Zoysia grass blankets everything but the greens and its length is universal at just shy of one-half of one inch, so there is no rough. The Champion bermudagrass putting surfaces will be prepped to run no faster than 11 feet on the Stimpmeter primarily so that the wind doesn’t blow balls around. Due to these facts, the unfamiliarity for most in the field and the expected speed of the turf overall, the basic thinking of hitting fairways is superseded by placement off the tee. This will help mitigate distance and swing open the door for any skill set to contend and prevail. In what was conducted in part as a test run for the AT&T Byron Nelson, Trinity Forest hosted the Texas State Open on the first four days of August of 2017. It played as a par 70 at 7,135 yards. With three 65s and a 67, Fort Worth’s Brax McCarthy posted an eye-opening 18-under 262 en route to an eight-shot victory in both favorable and inclement conditions. This week’s forecast begins and ends with risk of rain and the potential of storms, but drier air will command the rest of the tournament. That will yield the storyline to the heat as daytimes highs easily should eclipse 90 degrees. Customary Texas winds will defend the course especially in the middle rounds. The original nines were reversed for the AT&T Byron Nelson. It isn’t unprecedented for TOUR officials to revise routing, but it is unusual that membership at Trinity Forest has retained it. The 471-yard par-4 11th plays as a par 5 for members. It also shares a 36,000-square foot green with the 412-yard par-4 third. ROB BOLTON’S SCHEDULE PGATOUR.COM’s Fantasy Insider Rob Bolton reviews and previews every tournament from numerous angles. Look for his following contributions as scheduled. MONDAY: Rookie Ranking, Qualifiers, Reshuffle, Medical Extensions, Power Rankings TUESDAY*: Sleepers, Facebook Live, Fantasy Insider WEDNESDAY: One & Done THURSDAY: Expert Picks for PGA TOUR Champions One & Done * – Rob is a member of the panel for PGATOUR.COM’s Expert Picks for PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf presented by SERVPRO, which also publishes on Tuesdays.

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FARMINGDALE, N.Y. – Brooks Koepka has long said he’s inspired by a lack of respect. That’s why he wasn’t bothered when the rowdy New York fans turned on the man who’d been on a virtual victory parade for the past two days.  Koepka started both Saturday and Sunday with a seven-shot lead, but he was just one ahead after he bogeyed Bethpage Black’s shortest hole. The New York fans, who’d been enamored with Brooks and his muscle-bound bravado, now started chanting for the man who’d been his big brother on TOUR. Koepka was steeled by their lack of loyalty. “When they started chanting, “DJ,â€� it actually kind of helped,â€� he said. “I think that was the best thing that could have happened.â€� He responded by piping his drive on the 15th hole, where less than half the field had found the fairway. Making his par, his first since the ninth hole, righted his course. He played the final four holes in 1 over, a finish that was emblematic of his entire round. It wasn’t pretty but it was enough to get the job done. And that’s all that matters. History will record his two-shot victory at Bethpage Black and fourth victory in his past eight majors, something that hasn’t been accomplished since the prime of Tiger Woods. Koepka  finished at 8-under 272, two shots better than Johnson. He has now won the past two PGA Championships and U.S. Opens. “Four out of eight,â€� he said. “I like the way that sounds.â€� Koepka once drew inspiration from being golf’s underappreciated champion, but he can’t play that role any longer. Not after what he just did to Bethpage Black. He is golf’s alpha and it’s not even close. There’s no longer any room for debate. Koepka returned to the top of the world ranking with this win and moved to second in the FedExCup. He’ll no longer be overlooked. He still could make that claim this week, even though he was the defending champion and winner of three majors in little more than a year. Tiger Woods was the talk of the town after winning the Masters and returning to the site of a previous triumph. They played together in the first two rounds, and all that Koepka did was beat him by 17 shots. Now Koepka will be the favorite at majors for years to come, no matter what golf’s myriad metrics may say at the time. He said he’ll have no problem finding new sources of inspiration. Like Michael Jordan, he won’t have any trouble finding ways to fire himself up.   “I think every great athlete has a chip,â€� he said. “It works for me. Why would I stray from that? It’s one of those things that doesn’t need to come from anybody. It can come from me. I can make something up in my own head.â€� Koepka can actually gain confidence by staving off a crushing loss. He would have been the first player in PGA TOUR history to lose a seven-shot lead. “He learned a lot about himself,â€� said Koepka’s instructor, Claude Harmon III. “He’ll get a lot more out of this than if he had won by 15.â€� The scream that he released after holing his final putt showed the stress that he’d been feeling over the final holes. This was the largest celebration that we’ve seen from the stoic Koepka. “Today was definitely the most satisfying out of all of (the major wins) for how stressful that round was,â€� Koepka said. “I know for a fact that was the most excited I’ve ever been in my life, there on 18.â€� High winds blew Sunday afternoon, making this beefy layout play even longer. The field averaged nearly 2.5 strokes over par on the back nine alone. “There are two par-5s out here. Today, there were six,â€� said Koepka’s caddie, Ricky Elliott. The wind blew up to 25 mph and wreaked havoc. It made club selection difficult and blew even short putts off-line. Now Koepka has a new experience to draw on when he finds himself in contention at another major. He made back-nine birdies to pull away from the field at Erin Hills. Then he had to grind out pars after Tommy Fleetwood posted the target score at Shinnecock Hills. Koepka had to hold off the game’s greatest player at Bellerive. Koepka is just the 11th player to win four majors before age 30, and the fifth American (Walter Hagen, Bobby Jones, Jack Nicklaus and Woods). Koepka was one swing away from adding a green jacket to his collection of oversized silver trophies, as well. His power game plays well on the game’s toughest layouts. He drives it far and (reasonably) straight. He can gouge iron shots out of the rough and onto the green, an asset that separated Woods from his competition during his best days. This week, Koepka finished first in both Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee and Strokes Gained: Approach. “He’s just really in control,â€� said Rory McIlroy. “He’s got the golf ball under control with all aspects of his game, and I think more important than that is his mind is where it needs to be.â€� He said his ability to quickly move past mistakes is key to his major success. That skill was helpful in the midst of his struggles late Sunday. Koepka said he wasn’t stressed after making four straight bogeys. “I never thought about failing,â€� he said. Elliott kept reminding his boss that, no matter how bad it got, he never lost the lead. “He’s won another major in different circumstances,â€� Elliott said. “That’s a tight course off the tee, those were really trying conditions and the best player in the world is one shot behind you after living in the lead all week. He knew what was on the line today.â€� And he responded when it mattered most.

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