Match recaps from Friday: WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play

The latest version of PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf extends a win-win at THE CJ CUP @ SUMMIT, and the gift will keep on giving in tournaments with no cut. The first component is obvious. Barring a mid-round withdrawal or disqualification, you’re going to post four scores in each of the four rounds. No zeroes, unlike last week’s carnage. The other half of the experience will be determined by the final result. Because end-of-tournament [EOT] bonus points have a much greater impact on overall scoring than its predecessor, there’s a directly proportional opportunity to make hay with a lesser-owned winner. In other words, and quite simply, the reduction in round-by-round scoring without a similar drop in EOT bonus points lifts the latter into a position of stronger leverage. As of Tuesday, Sean and I have matched five of our six charges at The Summit Club. (You’ll find our lineups linked in Expert Picks below.). The only difference is that he’s rostering Marc Leishman and I’m on Tony Finau. Should Finau prevail and if he’s among my Starters in the final round, he alone could be enough to slingshot me past Sean even though we’re poised to be a virtual push until the EOT bonus points. This kind of volatility wasn’t possible in the most recent version of the game. What’s more, if our guys play poorly and unique investments for Cam, Ben and Glass contend or even win, the top five in the overall standings quickly will evolve into a fantasy version of Pick-Up Sticks. As PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf continues to roll out enhancements, I’ve been detailing a few of them in this space weekly. Not all improvements and tweaks require attention, but the latest to share is of considerable importance. Note that the three circles have returned to the player cards on your ROSTER page. The total of blue circles equals your number of starts remaining for the Segment. The total of gray circles represents starts burned. When adding players as STARTERS to your ROSTER, a blue circle will turn gray, but it won’t count as a start burned until the deadline for the tournament falls. This “in-ROSTER” viewpoint always has been valuable in all versions of the game because it didn’t require a series of steps to attempt to learn how many starts you have remaining on guys for whom you may not want to burn a start after a deadline fell. However, now that EOT bonus points are worth much more relative to overall scoring, it’s not going to be as risky to plug in a guy only for the final round. Just like how THE CJ CUP @ SUMMIT should transpire in fantasy, the pendulum for general strategy has swung from addition-by-subtraction to addition-by-addition. PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf My roster for THE CJ CUP @ SUMMIT (in alphabetical order): Tony Finau Sungjae Im Dustin Johnson Collin Morikawa Xander Schauffele Justin Thomas You’ll find my starters in Expert Picks. POWER RANKINGS WILD CARD Jason Kokrak … It feels like it’s not often that a defending champion slides into this position – despite my OCD tendencies, I don’t keep records – but this is proper. He’s the total package, but he’s not on Shadow Creek this week, a track where his personal knowledge yielded a career-defining accomplishment last year. Given his long and successful career on the PGA TOUR, I’m not concerned that he’s experiencing a week as a defending champion for the first time. Quite simply, he’s groomed for it and the veteran will know how to reconnect with routine when his schedule can accommodate. As noted in Monday’s Power Rankings, he’s attempting to become the first since Jim Furyk at the 2007 RBC Canadian Open to successfully defend a victory in a non-major on a different course, but a top-20 finish would be acceptable in our world. DRAWS Jordan Spieth … You say you want to be a fantasy golf writer-analyst, huh? Well, then that would require survival of the daggers hurled from all directions during the week of the Ryder Cup. With Spieth slotted No. 1, my Twitter was lit up. Lit. Up. And you know what, I can’t blame anyone for the emotional reaction. (This is a perfect time to restate that the only real enemy is silence, not hate.) Loyal readers know that I’m an optimist and that I always make efforts to learn and improve. As a wise man said to me in my formative years of honing this craft, the moment you begin to defend is the moment you begin to lose. So, even though the Power Rankings for team competition always has included a disclaimer to cover for the differences versus an individual event, I have an idea of how I’d format future PRs for team competitions. Until then, Spieth deserves our extended faith at The Summit Club. He’s not a wizard with the long sticks, but he supersedes the concern because of his short game and putting. He’s ideal as a contrarian in PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf. Hideki Matsuyama … Until he truly sputters, he hasn’t lost our trust. And now the tee-to-green monster gets a joint on which his skill set can shine. Pair him with Spieth in PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf and have no fear in DFS. Aaron Wise … He was the last cut from the Power Rankings in this deep field, so confidence remains high on the 25-year-old. In fact, given his youth and that he’s already a PGA TOUR winner, his trajectory of the last year portends a continuation for years. Love him in every format this week. Harold Varner III … This is his first start as a first-time father as HV4 was born a few days ago. HV3 already had been performing at an elevated level. How he handles the post-birth focus will be new and a big deal, but he’s built for it. It also won’t hurt being on the receiving end of numerous congratulatory handshakes and fist bumps from his peers, and shout-outs from fans throughout the week. Tommy Fleetwood … Begins his fifth season on the PGA TOUR with everything to gain. That’s the upshot after finishing outside the top 125 in the FedExCup. While he’s eligible for the Playoffs, he’s not subject to the membership minimum of 15 starts to retain voting privileges and be subject to a one-year restriction of membership, so there’s nothing but open road ahead. (Thus the relatively lofty position of No. 117 in my full-membership fantasy ranking. Even better right now, he’s fresh off a T2-T12-T7 surge on the European Tour and that spanned the Ryder Cup appearance. Paul Casey Harris English Talor Gooch Russell Henley Max Homa Mackenzie Hughes Ian Poulter Justin Rose Scottie Scheffler Adam Scott FADES Sergio Garcia … As fruitful as he’s been in the long-term, the Spaniard remains an enigma in bursts. The conservative investor in me won’t reach even without a cut. For DFSers who agree, this means that he’s quintessential chum for the sharks in that format. Patrick Reed … The Summit Club rewards the opposite skill set. While the counterargument (above) for why I like Jordan Spieth has merit for Spieth, Reed’s leash is much shorter on tracks like this. But he’s at the front of the line for fantasy wild cards, anyway. Cameron Tringale … As I’ve written before in this space, he’s a trap in deeper fields. Let your opposition go it alone. Charl Schwartzel … I’m keen on trusting him but that he’s missed the cut in his last three starts with a cut after three months of lurking on leaderboards is cause for pause. Lucas Glover … This track sets up well for his ball-striking, but the same was said about other sites since his win at the John Deere Classic three months ago. Yet, he’s just 3-for-7 and without a top-35 finish in the interim. Byeong Hun An … The promise of a payday is about all he gets out of this start, at least for now. Because he finished 164th in the FedExCup last season, the veteran of 139 PGA TOUR starts as a professional has no status in 2021-22. As remarkable is that he never had appeared in a Korn Ferry Tour event until going MC-MC-T20 in the 2021 Finals. Jason Day Rickie Fowler Brian Harman Matt Jones Kevin Kisner Patton Kizzire Sebastián Muñoz Hudson Swafford Gary Woodland RETURNING TO COMPETITION Kevin Na … The dance continues. After earning the No. 1 position in my Power Rankings for the Shriners Children’s Open, he withdrew the following day due to an injured rib. It was his third early WD since Memorial this summer (although his early exit from The Open Championship wasn’t related to injury) and his 15th early WD since the 2019 Sentry Tournament of Champions. It’s who we accept him to be, which is why he’s always been more valuable in long-term formats in which you can absorb the blows. After last week’s knockout, give him this week to put the rib back into play. He gets four rounds to see how it responds. NOTABLE WDs n/a RECAPS – SHRINERS CHILDREN’S OPEN POWER RANKINGS Power Ranking Golfer Result 1 Kevin Na DNP 2 Will Zalatoris MC 3 Sam Burns T14 4 Scottie Scheffler MC 5 Brooks Koepka T67 6 Webb Simpson MC 7 Abraham Ancer MC 8 Louis Oosthuizen T14 9 Joaquin Niemann T40 10 Sungjae Im Win 11 Viktor Hovland T44 12 Matthew Wolff 2nd 13 Si Woo Kim MC 14 Hideki Matsuyama T67 15 Corey Conners T40 Wild Card Harris English MC SLEEPERS Golfer (GolfBet prop) Result Talor Gooch (top 10) T11 Harry Hall (top 20) T8 Nate Lashley (top 20) T35 Scott Piercy (top 20) MC Alex Smalley (top 20) T47 GOLFBET Bet Result OUTRIGHT: Sungjae Im (+3200) Win PROP: Talor Gooch and Aaron Wise both to make the cut (+145) T11/T8 PROP: Patrick Reed to miss the cut (+190) MC BIRTHDAYS AMONG ACTIVE MEMBERS OF THE PGA TOUR October 12 … none October 13 … none October 14 … Tyrrell Hatton (30) October 15 … Richard S. Johnson (45) October 16 … Ryan Blaum (38) October 17 … none October 18 … none

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Expert picks for the Tour Championship

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PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. – It’s been roughly a year since Jason Day first discussed the balloon therapy that helps keep his rib cage in place, strengthens his core and loosens his back. That means a year of 30-minute sessions blowing into balloons at the gym while others are pumping iron. “Mind you, you feel self-conscious because you’re in the gym blowing up balloons and no one else is blowing up balloons,â€� Day said. On the flip side, he’s become pretty adept at it. “Got really good at farm animals and … swords and stuff like that,â€� he said. “If you need a kids’ party, I can do it for you.â€� Related: Leaderboard | Pro-am leaderboard | TOUR Insider: Five wins and Phil’s lucky silver dollar Yes, he knows exactly how that comes across. But at this point, the 32-year-old Australian is trying anything he can to stay healthy and avoid the kind of back problems that have nagged at his career. The latest example came late in 2019 when he aggravated his back during a practice session and was forced to miss the Presidents Cup in his native land. Of course, when he’s healthy, the 12-time PGA TOUR winner is one of golf’s best players. He showed that again Friday at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am when he shot a bogey-free 8-under 64 at Pebble Beach – tying Chris Baker’s 64, also at Pebble Beach, for low round of the day – to move into solo second at 12 under, two shots behind leader Nick Taylor at the halfway point. Both Day and Taylor will be at Spyglass Hill on Saturday in the final day of the three-course rotation. It’s no surprise that Day is playing well in this event. He has six top-10 finishes in 10 career starts, including top-5s in the previous three years. “I would like to change having the top-5s,â€� Day said. “I would like to win.â€� It’s getting close to two years since Day’s last TOUR win at the 2018 Wells Fargo Championship. He was ranked seventh in the world after that win, but a tough 2019 campaign dropped him to 46th entering this week. The pain in his back became so bad – and the stress to deliver on those high expectations became so intense – that he wondered if he should continue playing. Frustrating and losing confidence, he told his wife at one point, “I think I’m nearly done here.â€� But those dark moments subsided. He persevered, hoping his health and his game would improve. Even if he’s not all the way back to where he once was – he ended 2016 as the game’s top-ranked player — he feels better about things. One area that seems to be coming around is his putting. He’s doing less of it during practice rounds – instead of 200 putts that might take more than two hours, he’s about at half that amount – and that’s allowed him to focus more on it. “Hoping that kind of lowering the reps and upping the concentration … will kind of even itself out,â€� he said. Oh, and yes, the balloon therapy helps, too. It was developed by the Postural Restoration Institute more than a decade ago. Day’s trainer Kevin Duffy introduced his client to it. After his round Friday, Day explained how it works. “If I stood with my shirt off, my rib cage always faces right,â€� he said. “So I’m trying — through balloons, blowing into them; I could do it without it – and I’m trying to hold a certain position and get my rib cage back into position. “But through blowing up a balloon, it actually pressurizes everything for you because if you don’t hold that breath and exhale out, it honestly feels like you’re suffocating. That’s the feeling that I’m trying to get.â€� He wants to make sure his thoracic is mobile and that he’s not turning from his lower back. “That’s really kind of why a lot of golfers have back problems because they get too tight in the thoracic and then they get tight hips and then they get their rotation through their lower back,â€� he said. So now, of course, you’re going to picture him blowing into balloons. Smile if you will. But also take another look at the second-round leaderboard. Jason Day is producing more than farm animals this week.

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