MetLife Teams with Bubba Watson to Support Small Businesses Impacted by COVID-19 on the PGA TOUR

MEMPHIS, Tenn. – Cameron Smith just needed a sense of urgency to hit him right in the face. Complacency can be a killer in all sports, and for the second season running, Smith had let a solid start to a season fade away with a quiet middle. Last year, Smith opened by making 10 of his first 11 cuts with five top-10 finishes. His next nine starts, however, yielded just four weekends, with a best finish of 23rd. But Smith thrives under the gun. With the FedExCup Playoffs approaching, Smith fired up and made his last four cuts of the year, including two top 10s. This season, Smith made his first nine cuts, with three top-10 results. He also defended his Australian PGA Championship title. But then, he missed five of his next 11 cuts, with a 29th place the high mark. The 25-year-old Australian then saw he’d slipped outside the automatic selection zone for the Presidents Cup at Royal Melbourne in December – where he hopes to make his International Team debut. He also noticed his FedExCup rank sliding ominously closer to the dreaded 125 mark. Cue the uptick in his performances. At The Open Championship Smith, finished 20th, but threatened the top 10 until wild weather hit Sunday. Proving it was no fluke, the former Zurich Classic of New Orleans winner opened the World Golf Championships – FedEx St. Jude Invitational on Thursday with a 5-under 65 to be tied second. He’s on pace to finish strong once more. “I like having a motive. Something to play for,â€� Smith admitted. “It has been a bit of a frustrating year. I’ve had a long middle of the season there, couldn’t really get much rolling. I was working hard and nothing was kind of going my way. “That’s just golf sometimes, you never really know what it’s going to throw at you. Keep grinding through it and the results will always be around the corner.â€� Smith’s finish a week ago moved him back to eighth in the Presidents Cup standings with just five weeks before the top eight secure spots for Melbourne. His destiny in his own hands. “My destiny has been in my own hands all year, but it is certainly a huge goal of mine to be on the Presidents Cup team,â€� Smith said. “I think I’ve played well enough to be on it. But now it’s up to me to make sure if it.â€� Sitting with Smith in a tie for second, three shots behind leader Jon Rahm, is Japan’s Shugo Imahira. Imahira sits 12th on the International team standings and also has desires to make it to Melbourne. The two-time Japan Tour winner has placed in the top 10 in his last five starts on his home Tour. “I haven’t been watching the standings too closely but I know a good performance this week could help my goal of making the team,â€� Imahira said through a translator. “It would be an honor to make it.â€�

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Mito Pereira enters the final round of the PGA Championship with the lead. But there are plenty of others in striking distance. Who has a chance and who doesn’t?

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The PGA of America on Monday afternoon released the field list for the 104th PGA Championship at Southern Hills in Tulsa, Oklahoma, next month. Tiger Woods and defending champion Phil Mickelson are on the list, along with 16 other PGA champions, although there’s no guarantee that Woods, especially, will play. Mickelson, 51, had one top-10 finish last season, but he made it count, winning the PGA Championship at Kiawah. He has 45 PGA TOUR victories, including six majors, and was last seen in action missing the cut at his hometown Farmers Insurance Open in late January. Woods, who nearly lost his right leg in a single-car accident in Los Angeles early last year, returned to competition at the Masters Tournament at hilly Augusta National last month. He opened with an encouraging, 1-under 71 but faded from there, his limp becoming ever more pronounced as he struggled to a 78-78 weekend. He finished 47th and committed to playing the 150th Open Championship at the notably flat Old Course at St. Andrews in July. “I don’t quite have the endurance that I would like to have had,” Woods said at the Masters, “but as of a few weeks ago, didn’t even know if I was going to play in this event. “To go from that to here,” he continued, “we’re excited about the prospects of the future, about training, about getting into that gym and doing some other stuff to get my leg stronger, which we haven’t been able to do because it needed more time to heal. I think it needs a couple more days to heal after this, but we’ll get back after it, and we’ll get into it.” He called his performance at Augusta National one of the most memorable of his career, thanked doctors for saving his leg, and praised physical therapists for helping him return to high-level competition. As for the PGA, he said he would have to wait and see how he feels, even though Southern Hills was the site of his fourth PGA Championship victory in 2007. It has since been updated by Gil Hanse, and will be hosting the PGA Championship for the fifth time, more than any other course. The full field won’t be set until May 9, after the final round of the Wells Fargo Championship, and will include anyone in the top 70 in PGA Championship points not already qualified.

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