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IRVING, Texas – Ian Poulter made it perfectly clear Wednesday at the AT&T Byron Nelson that he’s not interested in talking about the social media dust-up that followed his T-2 finish last week at The Players Championship. “Not talking about it. Not interested. Not interested,” he said. “I have no interest feeding the fire. Not interested.” Poulter wasn’t happy on Sunday when he read on Twitter that Golf Channel analyst Brandel Chamblee said the Englishman “Clearly did not play to win, and he didn’t!” “I play to win, end of story,” Poulter said on Wednesday. Poulter wasn’t able to catch Si Woo Kim at TPC Sawgrass, but the T-2 finish essentially locked up his card for next year. It’s been a stunning
LAS VEGAS - You got to hand it to Bryson DeChambeau. He put his money where his mouth is. One year ago, DeChambeau looked a small throng of journalists in the eye as he was getting set to leave the Shriners Hospitals for Children Open and vowed he would transform his body to a level not seen before. RELATED: Inside the big-hittinng group of DeChambeau, Champ & Wolff "I'm going to come back next year and look like a different person. You’re going to see some pretty big changes in my body, which is going to be a good thing. Going to be hitting it a lot further," DeChambeau said after finishing T4 in his title defense at TPC Summerlin. At the time the comments brought with it plenty of eyerolls. A sense of - here goes crazy Bryson again - was most certainly permeating through some of the golf world. But the doubters are - at least right now - eating their words. Because "hitting it a lot further" is an understatement. And he's combined raw power with some pretty impressive accuracy - at least enough to win the Rocket Mortgage Challenge by three and the U.S. Open by six. At the end of the 2018-19 season DeChambeau boasted a Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee mark of +0.421 and a driving distance average of 302.5 yards. A year later he put up a season where his SG: Off-the-Tee led the TOUR at +1.039 and led driving distance at 322.1 yards. Exactly one year to the day from his comments, on Tuesday evening at the TPC Summerlin range, DeChambeau had to move 40 yards behind his playing competitors on the range. He is now some 40 pounds heavier and noticeably bulked up. And he was hitting the ball into a residential area where thankfully some TOUR equipment trucks were parked to take the brunt instead of some houses. "I watched Happy Gilmore a little while ago and just re-inspired me to try and hit it as far as possible," he quipped Wednesday. Well even after moving back on the range DeChambeau was threatening those in the trucks. It immediately evoked thoughts of Adam Sandler's character hitting balls from his grandmothers lawn into the distance and smashing into a house some 400 yards away. When the movers don't believe what they saw he replicates it, knocking a person out of the second story window he just broke. DeChambeau thankfully wasn't injuring any innocent bystanders. But he was intimidating his fellow competitors who could see and hear the massive drives whistling over their heads. He's already won at this course but now he will attack it from all new places. He says he can potentially go after four of the par 4's off the tee and of course easily reach all of the par 5s in two. "There will be holes where I’m going to try and drive them, get it up as close to the green as possible," he confirmed right before heading out for his Pro-am on Wednesday. "It’s just fun having a 7-iron go 220. That’s unique. And 4-iron, 265. There will be holes where I had to hit 3-wood and now I’m hitting 4-iron off the tees. "At the same point in time it’s about putting, chipping, wedging. You still got to do everything else really well. So if I play well, ball strike it well, and putt well, I think I’ll have a good chance again. Love this golf course." DeChambeau was already a multiple time winner on the TOUR and a former U.S. Amateur champion. He didn't need to make change, certainly not drastic change, if he didn't want to. But his personality demands he chase perfection even though cerebrally he knows it's unattainable. Getting closer to it though is not. Prior to the transformation he hadn't contended well at majors. Now at just 27, he is a seven-time TOUR winner with a U.S. Open trophy in his house. The PGA Championship in August was his first top 10 in a major (T4) and his performance at Winged Foot last month to win by six was potentially a game-changer for the sport in general. It was there after his win he flouted the next move - using a 48-inch driver to bring even more distance into play. He immediately set to work on testing and while he is not ready to unveil it in his first event since the U.S. Open triumph, it is likely to come out at the Masters in November. "I won’t unveil that until Augusta," he confirmed. "(But) I’m looking forward to trying to put in a 48-inch driver and see what that can do for the golf course and what opportunities it will present for me. "It’s going well. I think there is a lot of, I don’t know, I guess you could say advantages to having a 48-inch driver and being able to put it in play and keep it in play. So working on that. Still need to get some things worked out, but so far it’s been pretty amazing." Indeed the entire year long transformation has been amazing. And with DeChambeau you can count on the fact there will always be more to come.
MEDINAH, Ill. – FedExCup No. 12 Justin Rose was just outside the back of the majestic clubhouse at Medinah Country Club when he stopped and pointed. “I think that was our team room,â€� he said. Graeme McDowell, 64th in the FedExCup, sat on the back patio and remembered taking his only singles loss in the Ryder Cup, to Zach Johnson, but going back out to cheer on his teammates. “So mixed memories around here,â€� McDowell said. And Rory McIlroy, FedExCup No. 3, joked about needing a police escort. “Hopefully I won’t need it,â€� he said, “and we’re staying a little closer to the course this time.â€� RELATED: Featured Groups, tee times | Seven things to know about Medinah | Scenarios Tiger Woods won the 1999 and 2006 PGA Championships here, but fewer than half of the 69 players at the BMW Championship, week two of the FedExCup Playoffs, have played Medinah No. 3. Of those, perhaps only Woods has better memories than Rose, McDowell, McIlroy, Francesco Molinari and Ian Poulter. Those five were here the last time Medinah was on the world stage, as Europe won 8 ½ points (of 12) on the last day to win the 2012 Ryder Cup. And they did it with the silhouette of Seve Ballesteros, who had died the previous year, on their sleeves.  “That was a powerful feeling on Sunday,â€� said Rose, who is trying to become the first player to successfully defend his FedExCup title. “Like there was that eerie sort of feeling like we’re doing it for him, for sure.â€� Eight players in the BMW field were on the losing U.S. side – Matt Kuchar (FedExCup No. 4), Dustin Johnson (10), Webb Simpson (11), Brandt Snedeker (22), Woods (38), Phil Mickelson (46), Jim Furyk (48) and Keegan Bradley (66) – and for them, the memories are less special. But not terrible. “That was still one of my favorite weeks on the golf course,â€� said a wistful Bradley, who went 3-0-0 with partner Mickelson before McIlroy cooled him off in the singles. It’s been nearly seven years, and while the Ryder echoes remain, good or bad mojo from 2012 may not translate into BMW Championship success or lack thereof. It’s a different tournament, with different stakes, chief among them a berth in next week’s TOUR Championship in Atlanta, where up for grabs will be unrivaled perks (access to pretty much any tournament you could ever want to play) and money (an unprecedented $15 million to the winner). Still, the spotlight at the BMW shines brightest on those five Europeans. “I played a few holes out there (Tuesday),â€� McIlroy said. “The course is in great shape. A little different than the setup was at the Ryder Cup a few years ago. There’s a lot more rough, the fairways are probably a little narrower. But overall, yeah, it’s good to be back, and hopefully some of those good vibes that I have here can stay with me and I can produce some good golf.â€� McIlroy has put together his most consistent season, with 13 top-10 finishes in 17 starts. Two of those, at THE PLAYERS Championship and RBC Canadian Open, were victories. Now he’s back at a place where he went 3-2-0 in Europe’s winning effort in 2012. Should he win the FedExCup again (2016), he would be the only player other than Woods to win it twice. Rose, who at 12th in the FedExCup is well-positioned for what would be a historic title defense, also went 3-2-0 in 2012, making putts of 12, 35 and 12 feet to beat Mickelson in a pivotal singles match. “I was just driving in (Monday) night,â€� Rose said. “I came in here for a dinner, and came in the side of 18 there. Definitely brought back those good memories.â€� At last year’s BMW outside Philadelphia, Rose lost a playoff to Bradley, but his 2-P2-T4 in his last three starts was good enough to win the FedExCup. McDowell, whose victory at the Corales Puntacana Resort & Club Championship in March broke a drought of over three years, has made it to the BMW Championship four times, but never advanced all the way to the TOUR Championship at East Lake. At 64th in the FedExCup coming into this week, he faces a monumental task to do so this time. Amid so much talk of the 2012 Europeans, the most dangerous player at the BMW may be a guy who didn’t play in that Ryder Cup, as he was just 17: Jon Rahm of Spain. But with 11 top-10 finishes in 18 starts this season, including four in his last four starts, the FedExCup No. 5 is coming to Medinah hotter than anyone this side of – well, Captain America Patrick Reed. If Rahm gets it done this week to go to East Lake as the No. 1 seed, rest assured it won’t be long before someone invokes the ghost of Seve again, and Europe’s miracle comeback in 2012.
