Live leaderboard: Lashley in driver’s seat

PLAYA DEL CARMEN, Mexico – The skies opened and the rain came to delay the OHL Classic at Mayakoba, but amid the umbrellas and the puddles the headliner hung tough. First-time participant Rickie Fowler, the highest ranked player in the field (10), is contending in his first start in five weeks and his first start of the new season. Fowler had three holes remaining and was just one shot off the lead, tied with first-round leader Patton Kizzire (70). They were chasing Patrick Rodgers, who birdied four straight holes to take the lead at 11 under but still had three holes left to play on the front nine when darkness fell over El Camaleon Golf Club. Heavy rain suspended afternoon play for two hours and 15 minutes.  “Today was tough,â€� said Kizzire, who double-bogeyed the first hole, his 10th of the day. “I had a few hiccups out there, but with the wind and the rain and with the wind and rain together, it was tough. And the stop and start was tough. But I hung in there, made a few birdies there towards the end of my round, and then survived that really tough rain that we had there at the end.â€� Fowler was on the 15th tee when he asked how much longer players would be expected to stay on the course as darkness fell. He made par on the hole before play was stopped and players were driven away in vans. Four players have won the OHL Classic in their first start in the event: Johnson Wagner (2011), John Huh (2012), Harris English (2013) and Fred Funk (2007).  OBSERVATIONS HARKINS HANGS TOUGH. The last six holes played by Brandon Harkins, 31, went birdie, bogey, birdie, bogey, birdie, bogey. “Wasn’t quite the finish I was looking for, trading birdies and bogeys like that,â€� said Harkins, who shot 68 to get to 9 under. “But you know, I really can’t complain in the wind like this.â€� Harkins has already shown plenty of bounce-back. He twice missed 72nd-hole putts to force playoffs on the Web.com Tour last year, but finished 21st on the Regular Season Money List to get his TOUR card. Now he’s looking to improve on a T9 at the Safeway Open and a T20 at the Shriners Hospitals for Children Open. GAY MAKES LIKE 2008. Four-time TOUR winner Brian Gay will turn 46 next month and is making his 522nd career start. He sure didn’t seem to have lost his edge Friday. Gay was five-for-five in scrambling and shot a bogey-free 65 that included an eagle at the par-5 13th hole. He got his first win at Mayakoba in 2008, but hasn’t won since the 2013 CareerBuilder Challenge. After getting to 9-under overall Gay said, “I’ve always loved it since we started coming here.â€� He began last season on a Major Medical Extension, needing to earn 309 FedExCup points or $461,851 in 14 starts to remain exempt for the rest of the season. He accomplished that with back-to-back T6 finishes at the RBC Heritage and Valero Texas Open.   RODGERS SEEKS FIRST WIN. The only player in the field so far without a bogey, Rodgers is beginning his third season on TOUR after a stellar college career. He won 11 times in three years at Stanford, tying Tiger Woods’ win total, accomplished in two years, and compiled a 70.32 scoring average, breaking Woods’ all-time school mark of 70.96. One of the TOUR’s biggest fitness fanatics, Rodgers finished 78th in the FedExCup last season, his best result a runner-up finish at the John Deere Classic, where he led through 36 holes. He is coming off a missed cut at the Shriners Hospitals for Children Open in his fourth start of the new season. CEJKA LOOKS FOR REDEMPTION. Alex Cejka (67, 6 under) is in contention again after losing a three-man playoff at the Shriners Hospitals for Children Open last week. The week before that, Cejka got caught up in an odd rules scenario. He was disqualified from the Sanderson Farms Championship for holing a tap-in putt on his final hole of the second round after the siren had sounded for a suspension of play due to a dangerous weather situation.   NOTABLES SI WOO KIM – Up and down year since becoming the youngest winner of THE PLAYERS Championship in May, but the two-time TOUR winner is lurking at 7 under after a 68. OSCAR FRAUSTRO – A wild start for the low Mexican so far as Fraustro went 5 under for his first four holes on the way to a 66. He’s 7 under at the halfway mark. Fraustro and Carlos Oritz tied for ninth here in 2014, the best-ever finish by a Mexican player in this tournament. RYAN ARMOUR – Just a few weeks removed from nabbing his first win at 41, Armour shot a second-round 69 to get to 5 under and is six back. ZAC BLAIR – Came to El Camaleon as an alternate and was last man in the field, but will play on the weekend after going 3 under for his last 11 holes to shoot 68 and make the cut at 2 under. ROBERTO DIAZ – The last player to graduate from the Web.com Tour, Diaz is making the most of it at Mayakoba. His second-round 65 left him at 6 under, five back. QUOTABLES “No comment.â€� – Cal State-Chico graduate Brandon Harkins (68, 9 under), when asked if his alma-mater lived up to its party-school reputation. SUPERLATIVES Shot of the day: Jonathan Byrd aced the 151-yard eighth hole, the fifth ace of his TOUR career. His most famous hole-in-one came in a playoff at the 2010 Shriners Hospitals for Children Open. CALL OF THE DAY SHOT OF THE DAY BEST OF SOCIAL MEDIA

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DETROIT – It would seemingly qualify as minutia, a detail about Charles Howell’s remarkably consistent playing career on the PGA TOUR. Only when the man himself knows about it, is it really minutia? “I’m aware of it. I am,� he said after shooting a 5-under 67 in Friday’s second round of the Rocket Mortgage Classic. It pushed Howell to 12-under 132, two off Nate Lashley’s 67 – 130, with Cameron Champ (65 – 131) sandwiched between. That would certainly qualify as Howell being in contention for his second TOUR win of the year and yet another top 10, which is where the minutia enters the picture. Since 2012, Howell has piled up a whopping 34 top 10s – but only one of them has come in the summer months. And since we’ve been roasting with sultry weather here at Detroit Golf Club on this first full week of summer, it was asked of Howell to explain that quirky piece of information. But he merely shook his head after a round in which he made three straight birdies on the front, then two in a row on the back to vault into third. “I really don’t know why that is, but you know one thing great about turning 40?� said Howell, who reached that number on his recent birthday (June 20). “You stop worrying about things like that. It used to keep me up at night, I would grind over stuff like that.� He had a sly smile on his face, apparently having some fun with the minutia, but it was all good. “I tried it all. I took more weeks off in the summer, I played more in the summer. One (summer) I actually tried having neck surgery.� To no avail. His only summer top 10 since 2012 came two years ago when he lost in a playoff to Kyle Stanley at the Quicken Loans National. Should things progress as they have the last two days, Howell knows he’s in position to derail that summer drought line of thinking. But he suggested he and the rest of the 71 players who made the cut at 5-under 139 will be greeted by a tougher test on the weekend. “The scores are lower than I thought they would be from playing the practice days,� he said. “(But) the greens started to firm up a little bit (and if it doesn’t rain), I think you’ll see the balls bouncing on the greens tomorrow, especially in the afternoon.� The field average for the first two days has been 70.161 and Lashley, who got in as an alternate, continued his torrid play with three birdies on each side, the only miscue coming at the par-3 11th when he came up just short with his 228-yard shot and couldn’t get it up-and-down. He pretty much did everything else, though, even though he conceded he was nervous trying to back-up the first-round 63. The nerves stem from sitting 132nd on the FedExCup points list. “I need a good week to move up into the Top 125,� he said. “To do it this week comfortably would be great. To be able to kind of relax the last few events of the season would be really nice.� Lashley knew Champ’s 13-under was the lead when he teed off late and he got within one with a 33 on the front. His bogey at 11 negated the birdie he had made at 10, but a birdie at the par-3 15th got him tied, then he made his fifth birdie of the tournament at a par-5, the 17th. “If you hit fairways here, you can really score,� said Lashley, echoing a sentiment that has been shared by most of the competitors. It was felt going into the competition that Detroit GC could be attacked, but the lack of wind and excessively warm temperatures have made it even more of a shoot-out. Howell, however, is playing in his 546th TOUR tournament (in comparison, this is Lashley’s 33rd and Champ’s 28th) and he’s what they say is “qualified� to offer perspective. “(If it doesn’t rain), I think it’s going to change quite a lot,� said Howell. “The greens will start to get a little bit of that light-gray tint to them when the ball’s bouncing a bit. I think tomorrow afternoon it will be pretty firm.� Summer weather, which could be Howell’s time of year this week.

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Zach Johnson and Andrew Landry share the lead at -13 heading into Sunday’s final round of the Valero Texas Open. After shooting a course-record 62 in Round 3, Trey Mullinax is one shot back of the lead.  Here is what you need to know ahead of Round 4 of the Valero Texas Open: Round 4 leaderboard Round 4 tee times NOTABLE PAIRINGS (ALL TIMES ARE ET) 11:55 a.m. Grayson Murray, Joaquin Niemann, Andrew Putnam 12:05 p.m. Chris Kirk, Martin Laird, Richy Werenski 12:15 p.m. Ryan Moore, Sean O’Hair, Jimmy Walker 12:25 p.m. Zach Johnson, Andrew Landry, Trey Mullinax HOW TO WATCH/LISTEN TELEVISION: 1:00 p.m. – 2:45 p.m. (GC) (Golf Channel / NBC Sports LiveExtra simulcast stream) TELEVISION: 3:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m. (CBS) RADIO: 1:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m. (PGA TOUR Radio on SiriusXM and PGATOUR.com) MUST READS Making the most of his opportunities, Mullinax sets course record

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