Phil and Tiger named to U.S. Ryder Cup team

Phil Mickelson, after taking “a few days to calm down,” said he’s “embarrassed and disappointed” after hitting a moving ball on the green during the U.S. Open.

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Everyone wants to be the front-runner, but the Masters lays out so many sensational choices that this is the most dangerous week of the season pre-FedExCup Playoffs to be the target. Concluding the season’s first major in the same position often feels more like an escape than the achievement that it is.  With that confidence-building pep talk for the rest of us setting the framework for our decision at Augusta National, this is also the time of the season when you should first take stock of who’s left on your board for the long haul.  My process is simple. I literally print out the top 50 of the latest Official World Golf Ranking, and then cross off everyone I’ve burned. In theory, only those inside this bubble will build my short list to carry me through an entire season of 48 tournaments. Of course, it never works out that way due to field construction and a handful of PGA TOUR non-members on it. Through the first 22 events, I’ve used only 16 of the current top 50.  From here, and especially for PGA TOUR Fantasy One & Done presented by SERVPRO gamers, you’re going to want to set aside at least three notables for the Playoffs since FedExCup/fantasy points are quadrupled for that series.  What you read next is a little bit of evidence with a mixture of good and bad luck, so take it for what it’s worth.  En route to my league title in 2015-16, I reserved Justin Rose, Rory McIlroy and Jordan Spieth for the first, third and fourth events of the Playoffs, respectively, and still won despite a T31, T42 and T17 from those cornerstone investments. (Emiliano Grillo’s T33 at TPC Boston didn’t help much, either.) So, despite that patience, including the planned stymie with Spieth as the anchor, and no top 30s in the seven tournaments immediately preceding the TOUR Championship, I crawled to the finish line. It was a painfully ugly win, but it was also a lesson learned – build for now and later.  Once you’ve determined who’s still available from the top 50, highlight the notables who you can’t imagine going an entire season without using. Once you’ve done that, assign locked-in locations for the obvious. I’ve always advised setting Sergio Garcia aside for THE PLAYERS or The Open Championship because no one owns a more consistently strong record at both crapshoots than the defending champion of this week’s Masters. Weave in his continuously superb play just about everywhere and you’ll appreciate that confidence entering either tournament.  In this space a week ago, I proclaimed the probability that Rose would be my pick for the Masters. After going through the aforementioned process, I’ve changed my mind. Given my position (of power) in pursuit, I’m going with the modern-age horse for the course – Spieth. Rose could fill in the blank that Garcia doesn’t later.  I’m left with McIlroy, Jason Day and Henrik Stenson atop my list of probables for the Playoffs (with the backburner thought of the Ryder Cup tugging at the Euros), while Rickie Fowler still figures to size up as a strong contender in the majors. And I’ll still have the likes of Matt Kuchar, Patrick Reed, Louis Oosthuizen, Bubba Watson, Tommy Fleetwood, Branden Grace and Kevin Chappell at my disposal. And who knows, there’s plenty of time for Brooks Koepka to crash the conversation.  So as not to swerve around the focus of the Masters entirely, it’s one of those weeks when you really don’t even need my approval. It’s chalk city straight from the Power Rankings. In fact, the more valuable analysis is to fire away with brief parenthetical phrases to describe my concern on some you might be considering and shouldn’t. All can be found in QUESTION MARKS in the Power Rankings:  • Jason Dufner (track record)  • Tommy Fleetwood (inexperience)  • Martin Kaymer (track record and right wrist)  • Francesco Molinari (track record)  For two-man gamers eyeing Fred Couples, shop elsewhere. After opening the PGA TOUR Champions season with a T6 at Hualalai, his chronically sore back prevented him from defending his title at the Chubb Classic and teeing it up at the Toshiba Classic down the street from his residence in Newport Beach, California. I slotted him 20th in last year’s Power Rankings and got railed for it. He then finished T18. You know I wasn’t surprised, but I will be if he’s a factor this year FUTURE POSSIBILITIES  NOTE: Select golfers committed to the tournament are listed alphabetically. Future tournaments are sorted chronologically and reflect previous success on the courses on which the tournaments will be held in 2017-18. The numerical values in parentheses represent the order of relative confidence of where to use each golfer if multiple sites are listed (e.g. 1 for strongest, 2 for next-strongest and so on). To present weighted confidence in real time, numerical values will not change all season no matter how many tournament remain listed for each golfer. All are pending golfer commitment.  Daniel Berger … St. Jude (1; two-time defending); Travelers (2)  Paul Casey … Masters (1); Travelers (4); WGC-Bridgestone (5); Dell Technologies (2); TOUR Championship (3)  Kevin Chappell … Valero (1; defending); St. Jude (5); WGC-Bridgestone (2); Dell Technologies (3)  Jason Day … Masters (4); PLAYERS (13); U.S. Open (2); Canadian (11); WGC-Bridgestone (9); PGA Championship (1); THE NORTHERN TRUST (8); Dell Technologies (5)  Jason Dufner … Fort Worth (2); Memorial (3; defending); U.S. Open (4); Wyndham (6); TOUR Championship (7)  Tony Finau … Valero (5); Memorial (3); Greenbrier (2); Canadian (4)  Rickie Fowler … Masters (8); Wells Fargo (7); PLAYERS (9); WGC-Bridgestone (3); THE NORTHERN TRUST (10); Dell Technologies (6)  Sergio Garcia … Masters (3; defending); PLAYERS (5); Open Championship (1); TOUR Championship (4)  Branden Grace … Heritage (1); Valero (2); U.S. Open (4); WGC-Bridgestone (3)  Brian Harman … Fort Worth (4); John Deere (3)  Russell Henley … Greenbrier (2)  Charley Hoffman … Heritage (7); Houston (5); Valero (1); Fort Worth (4); Travelers (2); Canadian (3)  Billy Horschel … Valero (3); St. Jude (1); TOUR Championship (4)  Dustin Johnson … Masters (4); Memorial (12); St. Jude (8); U.S. Open (13); Canadian (10); WGC-Bridgestone (14); PGA Championship (9); Dell Technologies (11); TOUR Championship (6)  Zach Johnson … Fort Worth (2); John Deere (1); Open Championship (5); WGC-Bridgestone (6); TOUR Championship (8)  Kevin Kisner … Heritage (4); Fort Worth (1; defending); Memorial (5); Wyndham (6)  Matt Kuchar … Masters (5); Heritage (1); Valero (10); PLAYERS (11); Fort Worth (6); Memorial (2); Canadian (3); WGC-Bridgestone (7); THE NORTHERN TRUST (9)  Marc Leishman … Fort Worth (7); Memorial (5); Travelers (2); Open Championship (1)  Hideki Matsuyama … Masters (5); Wells Fargo (13); PLAYERS (9); Memorial (10); U.S. Open (6); WGC-Bridgestone (8; defending)  Rory McIlroy … Masters (2); Wells Fargo (1); PLAYERS (8); Memorial (9); Open Championship (4); WGC-Bridgestone (7); Dell Technologies (5); TOUR Championship (3)  Phil Mickelson … Masters (4); Wells Fargo (2); St. Jude (1); Open Championship (5)  Francesco Molinari … PLAYERS (2)  Ryan Moore … Masters (8); Travelers (2); John Deere (3); TOUR Championship (6)  Louis Oosthuizen … Masters (2); U.S. Open (5); PGA Championship (4); Dell Technologies (3)  Pat Perez … Heritage (5); Valero (7)  Patrick Reed … Travelers (5); PGA Championship (8); Wyndham (7); THE NORTHERN TRUST (9); Dell Technologies (2)  Justin Rose … Masters (1); Wells Fargo (4); PLAYERS (9); Memorial (6); Open Championship (8); WGC-Bridgestone (7); TOUR Championship (2)  Charl Schwartzel … Memorial (4); U.S. Open (5); Open Championship (6); WGC-Bridgestone (2)  Adam Scott … Masters (4); PLAYERS (5); U.S. Open (10); Open Championship (8); WGC-Bridgestone (3); Dell Technologies (9); TOUR Championship (6)  Webb Simpson … Wells Fargo (7); Fort Worth (4); Travelers (8); Greenbrier (5); Wyndham (1)  Jordan Spieth … Masters (1); Heritage (12); Fort Worth (2); Travelers (6; defending); John Deere (7); Open Championship (9; defending); WGC-Bridgestone (10); TOUR Championship (4)  Brendan Steele … Valero (6); Wells Fargo (7); Travelers (3)  Henrik Stenson … Open Championship (6); WGC-Bridgestone (4); PGA Championship (7); Wyndham (8; defending); Dell Technologies (9); TOUR Championship (2)  Justin Thomas … Wells Fargo (9); Dell Technologies (6; defending); TOUR Championship (3) Jimmy Walker … Valero (6); Greenbrier (8); Dell Technologies (7)  Bubba Watson … Memorial (6); Travelers (5); Greenbrier (8); WGC-Bridgestone (1); TOUR Championship (4)  Gary Woodland … Wells Fargo (5); Barracuda (1); Dell Technologies (3)  Tiger Woods … Masters (2); WGC-Bridgestone (3)

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WHITE SULPHUR SPRINGS, W. Va. — Kevin Chappell, needing two birdies in his final two holes to shoot 57 on Friday at A Military Tribute at The Greenbrier, was not only battling The Old White TPC golf course, but he was also battling a shortage of “newâ€� golf balls. After every birdie Chappell makes during competition, he switches to a brand new golf ball, because he says that there’s only one birdie in each ball. The problem on Friday was that Chappell made 11 birdies in 16 holes, and he only had 11 new Titleist Pro V1 golf balls in the bag to start the round. That meant, with two holes left and sitting at 11-under par for the day on the par-70 golf course, he had to reuse a golf ball that he had already made birdie with. Chappell said, in a press conference following his Friday round of 59, having to reuse birdied-out golf balls could be the reason why he failed to birdie his final two holes. “We ran into a problem there, and that could have been the reason… why I didn’t make those putts on the last few holes,â€� Chappell said. In troubleshooting mode down the stretch, Chappell tried out two different used golf balls on his final two holes (he started on the back nine). “When I made birdie on 7, and I reached in [my bag] on 8 tee, there were no more new balls in the new ball pile,â€� Chappell explained. “So I had to reuse a ball… I reused a ball on 8, and I didn’t like the way that one went. So I put that one back and grabbed another one, and reused a ball on 9.â€� Using the already-been-birdied golf balls, Chappell two-putted from 54 feet 3 inches on his 17th hole for par, and he missed a birdie putt from 10 feet 9 inches on 18. Throughout the course of the round, Chappell did make his fair share of putts, however. He made 141 feet 2 inches worth of putts in total, picking up 5.008 strokes over the field. While he may attribute those made putts to his golf ball superstition, he also has a new prototype putter in the bag that helps with his setup. Chappell has a custom, half-mallet TaylorMade Mullen putter in his bag with a hosel that adds offset to the putter. Since Chappell sets up with his hands behind the putter face on occasion, the offset helps Chappell achieve his desired putter loft. “It’s got a lot of offset on it,â€� Chappell explained about his putter. “I tend to get my hands back when I putt, so this the grip sits in front of the face already. So if my hands tend to get back, they’re already in front of the face, so the putter has the proper amount of loft on it. The putter is actually the second version of a prototype putter made by Chris Trott, Director of Global Tours at TaylorMade. Due to Chappell’s love of the onesie clothing style, Trott stamped the first prototype putter “onesie,â€� and the second one “twosie.â€� So, Chappell’s custom TaylorMade Mullen putter that he used to shoot 59 on Friday has “twosieâ€� stamped on the sole. “It’s the second iteration of a putter that TaylorMade makes, and I have quite the onesie collection at my house,â€� Chappell said. “Chris Trott with TaylorMade, he named the first [prototype putter] ‘onesie.’ This one has a little bit more offset, so this one is called ‘twosie.’â€� Chappell currently sits in 5th place at 10-under par through two rounds, three strokes behind the leaders.

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