Live leaderboard: Round 3 of Valero Texas Open

Bryson DeChambeau implored the golfing world to not judge a book by its cover after he solidified himself as a player of the future with a thrilling playoff win at Muirfield Village. Welcome to the Monday Finish where DeChambeau claimed a second PGA TOUR win in front of an idol – taking out the Memorial Tournament Presented by Nationwide with Jack Nicklaus looking on. FIVE OBSERVATIONS 1. The saying goes – love him or hate him. And it has been attached to Bryson DeChambeau at times. But there is really no reason to hate the guy some call the mad scientist of golf. Yes, he has ideas and thoughts that are non-conventional. Yes, he advocates things you might think are silly. But he is ultimately likable and downright excellent at golf. His single length irons and one plane swing might not work for you, but they work for him. And the passion he shows for the game and its history is great to watch. This is one guy that actually gets it. “Whenever you look at somebody, don’t judge them by the cover, right? You got to judge them by the results and the work ethic and the dedication and the perseverance that the person has,â€� he said. Indeed. 2. DeChambeau showed some steel in the final round that will certainly help him going forward. As a confidence player he had possibly created some seeds of doubt after missing a few chances to close the deal in regulation and the opening playoff hole. But a stoic approach shot on the second playoff hole was followed by a great putt for the win. The putt came after Byeong An had hit a tremendous flop shot to possibly keep the tournament alive. Bottom line, it was clutch. It is something that Jim Furyk and Tiger Woods would have loved to see. As the upcoming Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup captains they know this guy will play with passion under the American flag. 3. Byeong An can’t be far away from becoming a more consistent performer and clinching a maiden win on the PGA TOUR. His playoff loss was his third top-10 this season and moved him to 46th in the FedExCup. When he is on he is certainly good enough to end up on top. Nerves may have played a factor on Sunday but those suggesting his putt on the 72nd hole was easy (he missed) are way off the mark. Multiple players miss-read that putt, expecting it to come back to the right a little more. Sure DeChambeau made it on a similar line to win a few holes later but An gave his chance a good run. And while some of his playoff shots he’d like back, the flop he hit to have a chance to stay in it was first class. Watch this space. 4. Tiger Woods still knows how to get the crowds rocking. But sadly at Muirfield Village he also took the wind out of our sails at times. And it was because of the putter – a club he used to be deadly with. The roars around the place on Friday when he holed out for an eagle on the par-5 11th and then hit the flag on the par-3 12th were vintage stuff. Hair on the back of your neck standing up stuff. Sadly a rain delay stopped his momentum. And then his putter stayed ice-cold. Woods ranked first in several ball-striking categories at Muirfield Village including Strokes Gained: Tee to Green (+14.157); Strokes Gained: Approach the Green (+11.164) and Proximity (23 feet, eight inches). But he was second last in Strokes Gained: Putting (-7.695). He missed seven putts inside five feet during the tournament, and 15 putts inside 10 feet. If he marries his game together then we might finally see that win we all crave. 5. Joaquin Niemann is another name you need to add to the youth brigade in golf if you haven’t already done so. The Chilean teenager, who is not long removed from being the world’s best amateur, has secured special temporary membership on the PGA TOUR in just his fifth start as a professional. Sunday was a chance to win but while he faded a little to be tied sixth it represented his third top-10. He will now be able to accept unlimited sponsor invites for the rest of the season as he looks to earn enough non-member points to earn a TOUR card for next season. The 95 FedExCup points earned at Muirfield Village takes him to 275 non-member points – the equivalent to around 115th in the standings. If he beats the mark of the man who finishes 125th at season’s end he will automatically get a TOUR card for next season. He has locked up a spot in the Web.com Finals as another potential avenue to the TOUR. FIVE INSIGHTS 1. DeChambeau moved from 22nd to fourth in the FedExCup and at 24 years, 8 months and 18 days, he is the fourth youngest winner in the Memorial Tournament history behind Hideki Matsuyama’s 2014 win (22 years, 3 months and 7 days) and Tiger Woods’ 1999 and 2000 victories. 2. DeChambeau became the 10th winner this season to rank inside the top 10 in Strokes Gained: Putting. He ranked sixth – outperforming the field by +1.366 strokes per round on the greens. A total of 44 percent of his total strokes gained for the week were a result of his performance on the greens at Muirfield Village. It was the third best Strokes Gained: Putting performance of his career. His best was when he won the John Deere Classic last season. 3. DeChambeau led the field in Scrambling, managing to salvage par 80 percent of the time (16 of 20) when missing the green in regulation. His scrambling performance marked the fourth-best by a winner at the Memorial Tournament since 1992. 4. DeChambeau attacked the front nine holes at Muirfield Village to get his victory. Through 72 holes he was 11-under par on the front nine and 4-under on the back nine. 5. Of note leading into the U.S. Open was Rory McIlroy’s weekend performance. After making the cut on the number at even-par, he recorded weekend rounds of 64-69 to move into a tie for eighth. It was his fourth top-10 (T8: 2018, T4: 2016, 5: 2011, T10: 2010) in his seventh career start at the Memorial Tournament. He led the field in Strokes Gained: Around-the-Green (+5.630) and his third-round 64 was the lowest round of the tournament.

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This week, a pair of highly ranked, inextricably linked Texans will tee it up in the event where they each debuted on the PGA TOUR, years before they became household names. In 2010, Jordan Spieth, then 16 and the reigning U.S. Junior Amateur champ, gave the hometown crowd in Dallas a glimpse of what awaited in the years to come. Not only did Spieth make the cut at the AT&T Byron Nelson, but he also stood inside the top 10 through 54 holes before ultimately finishing T16. Four years later, another reigning U.S. Junior Amateur champion from the Dallas area, Scottie Scheffler, made his first PGA TOUR start at the AT&T Byron Nelson. Not only did Scheffler, then 17, make the cut, but he also made a hole-in-one in the third round and finished T22. Both players would be named All-Americans at the University of Texas. In 2012, Spieth led the Longhorns to an NCAA team championship. Scheffler led Texas to a runner-up finish four years later. Spieth won a Green Jacket in his second Masters appearance. Scheffler did so in his third. Spieth ascended to world No. 1 in just 79 PGA TOUR starts – Scheffler got there in his 75th start, with a win in their old college town of Austin. Both players arrive this week having won their last stroke-play start – Scheffler at Augusta National, Spieth the following week at the RBC Heritage. Both will be among the favorites at next week’s PGA Championship at Southern Hills, where Spieth will try to complete the career Grand Slam, and Scheffler can become the first to win the season’s first two majors since – who else – Spieth in 2015. Let’s take stock of both players’ games entering their hometown event, the AT&T Byron Nelson. Scheffler’s breakout On the morning of Feb. 13, Scottie Scheffler was arguably the best American without a PGA TOUR win. He was locked in a four-way tie for third place entering the final round of the WM Phoenix Open, two shots behind 54-hole leader Sahith Theegala. Less than two months later, he had not only rattled off four PGA TOUR wins, he had become the emphatic No. 1 in the world – and a Masters champion on top of that. Scheffler is the first player to leave Augusta National with a Green Jacket and four wins already in that PGA TOUR season since Arnold Palmer in 1960. While Scheffler’s switch to veteran caddie Ted Scott deserves its due credit, analytically there have been some marked improvements that helped lead to his massive success this season. Scheffler was an above-average iron player last season, ranking a respectable 83rd on the PGA TOUR in Strokes Gained: Approach and 45th in greens in regulation. His performance has skyrocketed in both of those statistics this season: Scheffler is up to fourth in greens-in-regulation and 27th in Strokes Gained: Approach. The world No. 1 is gaining more than three times as many strokes with his approach play per round than last season – up from 0.15 to 0.50. A good amount of that can be credited to increased precision with his scoring clubs. From 50 to 125 yards away this season, Scheffler is averaging 3 feet closer than he did in 2020-21. That adds up to a 130-spot jump in that statistic, from 157th into the top-30. On the greens, the improvement has been even more drastic. Scheffler was ranked 107th on TOUR last season in Strokes Gained: Putting – just about breaking even with the field in that statistic. This season, he’s gaining 0.59 strokes per round on the greens, ranking 20th on the PGA TOUR. From 10-15 feet, Scheffler has jumped from 160th in the rankings to 10th. Scheffler’s performance with the driver this season has actually diminished some – a drop in accuracy has led to a significant decrease in Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee. But his enormous leaps with his irons and putting have completely masked that numerical dip, giving Scheffler ample fuel for one of the best runs in recent PGA TOUR memory. Improvement off tee driving Spieth Over the last several seasons, Jordan Spieth has struggled with bouts of wildness off the tee. But improved accuracy and perhaps a more aggressive strategy are leading to gains in that part of Spieth’s week-to-week game. Spieth ranked well outside the top 100 in Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee in both 2019-20 and 2020-21. While a good portion of that was due to his wildness off the tee (he ranked 181st and 180th those seasons in fairways hit), one could surmise that a hesitancy to pull driver as often also contributed to those lower Strokes Gained numbers. This season, Spieth is averaging a stout 310.5 yards on all tee shots on par 4s and par 5s, 10th-best on the PGA TOUR. That’s an increase of more than 15 yards (295.1) and 35 ranking spots (45th) over last season. This, despite clocking in with identical clubhead speeds each season, 114.59 mph in both 2020-21 and 2021-22. This would suggest that Spieth is choosing to hit driver more frequently, taking a more aggressive approach off the tee. Spieth’s moderate improvement in driving accuracy – from 54% to 58% of fairways hit – is not nearly as big a leap as he has taken in Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee numbers. Spieth is ranked 39th in that stat this season, after sitting between 135th and 176th from 2018-19 to 2020-21. After the RBC Heritage last month, Spieth memorably said, “I won this golf tournament without a putter.” He wasn’t that far from the truth: Spieth ranked 60th in the field for the week in Strokes Gained: Putting at Harbour Town, the worst rank by a PGA TOUR winner in six years. For him to unlock his best self this summer, that facet of his game will undoubtedly need to get better: Spieth currently ranks 186th out of 210 qualified players in strokes gained on the greens per round. Both stars should be compelling viewing this week in their home state of Texas.

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The world’s most feared sports bettor waits: on his insider trading conviction appeal, to learn whether good behavior will cut his prison term, and whether the U.S. Supreme Court will do what once seemed unthinkable — legalize sports gambling.

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