Kim’s comfortability gets him another victory

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The kid from Japan with the tall hairdo and pause at the top announced himself as one to watch at the 2011 Masters, earning low amateur honors with his T27 finish. Hideki Matsuyama has been challenging the world’s best since then while becoming a golf icon to fans back in Japan. For those in the U.S. who stayed up late, and others around the world, Sunday was a special day as Matsuyama claimed his seventh PGA TOUR title at the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP. The Land of the Rising Sun could celebrate with its risen star. Matsuyama comes alive for home fans For most of the four days at Accordia Golf Narashino Country Club, it felt like destiny was on Matsuyama’s side. He opened the tournament with a 64 to trail countryman Hiroshi Iwata by one but seized a one-shot lead with back-to-back 68s in tough conditions Friday and Saturday. This season has had its highs and lows for Matsuyama, who won his first major at The Masters Tournament in April but missed the podium, losing the bronze-medal playoff, at the Tokyo Olympics in August. He came to the ZOZO playing poorly, he said, but found something. An eagle at the par-5 6th hole extended Matsuyama’s lead to two over Cameron Tringale, but then it got tight. Matsuyama bogeyed No. 8, Tringale birdied No. 9, and they were tied. Then Tringale birdied No. 10 to take the lead. That’s when everything changed, Matsuyama throwing down the hammer. With the home fans giving him a little extra push, he birdied Nos. 11, 13 and 15 to take a two-shot lead. He and Tringale bogeyed 17, but then Matsuyama left no doubt, sending his fans into a frenzy. From 241 yards out on the par-5 18th, Matsuyama hit a fairway wood to 12 feet. While Tringale bogeyed, Matsuyama slammed in his eagle putt for a statement-making five-shot win. The victory is Matsuyama’s seventh on the PGA TOUR, but first in Asia. He pulls within one of K.J. Choi’s record eight PGA TOUR titles by an Asian-born player. “I was the only Japanese player contending and was up on the leaderboard,” he said. “To be honest, there were some pressures to deal with, but I’m glad I was able to convert that to positives.” The last time the ZOZO was held in Japan, in 2019, Matsuyama finished second to Tiger Woods. But this was Matsuyama’s moment. Surprising, given that he said before the tournament, “If my game scored 10 out of 10 at the Masters, now, I would say it scores less than 1.” Afterward, he boosted his grade, but not by much. “I would rate my performance as 2 or 3,” he said. “From the results perspective, it went about to 8, but I think it’s because of all the energy that I was getting from the fans, and I was very surprised how much energy I was feeding off of them.” For sports-crazed Japan, which has been mostly without on-site fans during the pandemic, most notably for its own Olympic Games, it felt like a special moment in the country’s athletic history. Tringale: another close call Last May, Cameron Tringale put his name in the record books, for better or worse. He became the highest-earning PGA TOUR player without a win. After another runner-up finish, his fourth on TOUR, the 34-year-old Tringale retains his title, as much as he wants to get rid of it. For about an hour on Sunday, it looked like Tringale might foil Matsuyama’s victory march. Tringale’s birdie at the 10th gave him sole possession of the lead. He waved to the crowd and was met with pleasant claps, although it was no secret who the gallery was cheering for. Alas, he flatlined from there: pars on Holes 11-16, then a bogey-bogey finish to lose by five (T2). “I needed to kind of take a couple risks and unfortunately it didn’t pan out,” Tringale said, “but I played 16 really good holes and yeah, that was the day.” Of his eight top-3 finishes, four have come since the TOUR’s post-COVID restart in June of 2020. It feels like a victory is inevitable, but then it’s felt like that for a while. “At least I was in it to some degree on the back nine,” he said. “I felt comfortable. I feel like I keep getting more comfortable and I’m more excited about continuing to be in that position.” Still no first-time winners Five weeks into the 2021-22 PGA Tour season, all five winners have added to their trophy case, while none have started their collection. Max Homa won his third title, Sam Burns his second, Sungjae Im his second, Rory McIlroy his 20th and Hideki Matsuyama his seventh. All five champions are between ages 23-32 and all were in the top 50 in the world at the time of their wins. All five are expected to be consistent factors throughout this season, if not years to come. The 2019 fall season produced four new winners, while the 2020 falls season gave us two. Tringale, who tied for second with three-time TOUR winner Brendan Steele, joined Maverick McNealy and Cameron Young as 2021-22 runner-ups who were seeking their first wins. Japan shows depth While it was Japan’s most famous player hoisting the trophy, a handful of others also excelled. Takumi Kanaya, the 2018 Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship winner, who subsequently made the cut at the 2019 Masters, went 68-66 on the weekend to climb to T7 at 5 under. The 23-year-old Kanaya, who spent 55 weeks as the top-ranked amateur in the world before turning pro in 2020, has won three times on the Japan Golf Tour over the last three years. Kanaya, who in 2020 won the Mark. H. McCormack Medal as the world’s No. 1 amateur – other winners have included Patrick Cantlay, Jon Rahm and Joaquin Niemann – is a legit future star. Hiroshi Iwata, 40, who played on TOUR from 2016-2017, took the first-round lead with a 9-under 63. Although he cooled off (T18), he proved he can still go toe-to-toe with the best in the world. Shugo Imahira, who has reached world No. 30 and made the cut at the 2020 Masters and U.S. Open, also finished T18. The 29-year-old has five Japan Golf Tour wins and if he can get his world ranking back up – he’s No. 136 – could find his way back to a few majors in the next decade. Keita Nakajima, who followed Kanaya as the McCormack Medal winner in 2021 and remains the No. 1 amateur in the world, put together at an impressive T28. In all, six Japanese players landed in the top 30, while just one – Matsuyama – did so in 2019. Morikawa quietly in form Just over two months ago, Collin Morikawa started the FedExCup Playoffs at No. 1 in the standings. Alas, he missed the cut at THE NORTHERN TRUST, finished T63 at the no-cut BMW Championship and had the 28th-best gross score at the TOUR Championship (of the 29 players who finished). As it turned out, he had hurt his back in the Olympics, but by the time he got to the Ryder Cup a month ago, he said he was fully healthy. His results have backed that up. After going 3-0-1 at Whistling Straits, Morikawa finished second at THE CJ CUP @ SUMMIT. He finished T7 at the ZOZO, and climbed to No. 2 in the world, his highest-ever ranking. In doing so, he passed Dustin Johnson, his partner in all three of his Ryder Cup wins. The ascendant Morikawa, 24, only has one man ahead of him now: Jon Rahm. 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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Throughout his professional career, Tiger Woods has always used prototype irons that have a different design than retail releases. That is about to change, however, because TaylorMade is releasing replicas of Tiger Woods’ P-7TW Milled Grind irons to the general public. “Consumers have never had the opportunity to play irons like mine…until now,â€� Tiger Woods said in a press release. The P-7TW prototype irons that Woods started using in 2019 are the second versions of TaylorMade irons that he’s used since becoming a company staffer in 2017. The first TaylorMade irons that Woods used were called “TW Phase1.â€� He used those prototype irons throughout 2018, and he used them to win the 2018 TOUR Championship. In 2019, however, Woods switched to the P-7TW prototype irons that had TaylorMade’s Milled Grind soles, showcased by the ridges in their soles. Much like with the Milled Grind wedges that Woods uses, the Milled-Grind-process allows TaylorMade to construct each iron to exact specifications without the need for hand grinding. This means that Woods can change irons more often, and know that he’s getting irons that are identical to his previous set. “The first step with Phase 1 was creating an iron for Tiger that met his needs and what he had been used to and was giving him exactly what he wanted,â€� Bovee explains. “Phase 2 is taking that foundation, the knowledge of the Phase 1, and improving upon it and adding in features like the Milled Grind sole, where we can repeat Tiger’s grind every single time he wants a new set of irons… we knew he was in love with the Milled Grind in his wedges and being able to get a new wedge every week if he wanted. That was something we wanted to bring to him in the irons, as well. He usually goes through two [iron] sets a year, and now there’s no hesitation.â€� The retail P-7TW irons made available to the public will match Woods’ prototype P-7TW irons “in every way that really matters,â€� according to TaylorMade’s manufacturing engineer Matt Bovee, which includes the head shapes, sole grinds, sole geometries, offset, bounce, grooves and stampings. Woods prefers a very specific look from his irons, a look that differs from TaylorMade’s other retail blade irons: the P-730. “His irons have a very distinct look and shape, and that’s what the P-7TWs really embody,â€� Bovee told PGATOUR.COM. “So if you were to look down at those and really compare them to the 730, you notice right away that they have a longer blade length than the 730, and they actually get longer as they transition into the shorter irons. So that’s different compared to a normal blade iron where the stay the same length. They have a shorter face height in the long irons, and a taller face height in the short irons, in a way that’s a bit more than you would typically see in a set as well. His offsets aren’t necessarily progressive… you don’t see a consistent trend for offset for his gamers. So it’s all very specific to Tiger and what he likes to see.â€� Woods’ irons, and the retail P-7TW irons, also have flatter sole radii, flatter lie angles, thinner toplines, more bounce, more grooves, narrower score-line widths, and grooves that go higher on the face, according to Bovee. The iron numbers stamped on the soles are also larger than the P-730 irons, at Woods’ request. Forged from 1025 steel – a different metal than the irons that Woods uses — the P-7TW retail irons have Tungsten plugs in the heads, just like Woods’ irons. The inclusion of Tungsten helps to get the CG (center of gravity) in every head exactly where Woods wants it, and it offers a feel Woods prefers. “The real golf gear heads, the Tiger fans, have speculated that he has Tungsten in his irons for some time, and that’s absolutely correct,â€� Bovee told PGATOUR.COM. “That’s really developed into a feel story for him, and we’re excited to be able to have that Tungsten in the production model.â€� The TaylorMade P-7TW irons will be available through custom order and in select retail stores. While Woods’ set is equipped with True Temper Dynamic Gold X100 Tour Issue shafts and Golf Pride Tour Velvet Cord grips, the production sets will come stock with True Temper Dynamic Gold S400 Tour Issue shafts, but additional shafts and grips will be available through custom. TaylorMade is also offering a special packaging experience along with purchase of a set, although the company is staying tight-lipped about exactly what that entails. “When you receive this box, when you receive your Tiger irons, and you open that box for the first time, I really think golfers are going to be blown away in terms of the overall packaging experience,â€� Bovee said. “I don’t want to give too much away because it is something special, but let’s just say it’s a premium packaging level that we’ve never offered, and I don’t think the industry has ever offered to be honest.â€� Available on May 1, the P-7TW irons (3-PW, right-hand only) for $1,999.99.

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