Power Rankings: Valspar Championship

Here are nine tidbits from the first round of the THE PLAYERS Championship that gamers can use tomorrow, this weekend or down the road. THE PLAYERS Stadium Course TPC Sawgrass in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, has been the host since 1982 and plays 7,189 yards to a Par-72. Know Thy Enemy These were the top-10 picked golfers in PGA TOUR Fantasy Golf game presented by SERVPRO. With warm temperatures and light winds, relatively speaking, TPC Sawgrass was there for the taking. The PGA TOUR radio crew suggested that these were some of the easier pin placements they have seen in recent memory. There were six bogey-free rounds, which reinforces that point. It appears the cut is going to take a red number as the forecast looks fantastic again tomorrow. People’s Choice For the second week in a row, gamers have run Rickie Fowler to the top of the list above. For the second week in a row, gamers will have to cross their fingers heading into Friday. His 74 sees him needing 69 or better on Friday to play the weekend. The good news is his Round 2 scoring average is the best of the bunch. The bad news is his last round in the 60’s was his unbelievable 67 on Sunday in 2015 to force a playoff. The better news is he’ll be out first with a clear plan of what it takes. I’m on board. Number 1 Dustin Johnson knows that finishing outside of the top 10 this week could see him lose his perch on the OWGR rankings. He also is keenly aware that he’s never collected top-10 cash in nine previous attempts. His bogey-free 66 is his best ever in 31 loops and his only clean card as well. He’ll share the lead with five others to begin Round 2. He was in my lineup today and he’s not going anywhere. Defense It was incredible to watch 21-year old Si Woo Kim win by three shots last year to become the event’s youngest winner. Even though there has never been a champion repeat in the previous 36 events at TPC Sawgrass, Kim’s opening round of 67 deserves mentioning because it’s the best from a defending champion since the tournament moved to TPC Sawgrass. The only player to hit the top 10 this century defending was Adam Scott with T8 in 2005 and that was in March. Kim was on point today as he had it to seven-under thru 15 before bogeys at Nos. 7 and 8 knocked him out of solo lead. The Auld Guard Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson were choices Nos. 11 and 12 on the list above so there’s PLENTY of interest again this week. Woods holed an 11-foot bogey on the last to finish even as he scraped through the afternoon. Mickelson was even through 13 holes before closing double, bogey, double, double and par for 41. I tried to warn gamers that Mickelson annually arrives here on a high from Quail Hollow Club but that it never translates. His last top-10 finish was in 2007 when he won. His last round in the 60’s was in 2011. Connect the dots. Woods knows he doesn’t need 64 or lower to make the weekend so if you have to choose, it’s a simple one. Wrong Patrick? Patrick Reed entered the week with five straight finishes inside the top five plus his first major victory at the Masters. He matched Woods on 72 and will need something decent Friday morning to extend his streak. Patrick Cantlay was four shots off the 54-hole lead last year before learning a valuable lesson. His 77 knocked him out of contention (T22) but he continues to prove he’s a quick learner everywhere. His eight birdies in Round 1 were T1 and his round of 66 matched. #51Watch The ageless Steve Stricker continues to pop up on difficult courses and demands to be counted. He’s made the weekend the last four years at TPC Sawgrass and he made the cut in all four majors last season. The 51-year old is tormenting the Champions Tour and had a share of the lead before a late bogey knocked him to T7. Glass Half-Full or Half-Empty? Jordan Spieth played in the final group in 2014 in his debut, shot 74 and finished T4. He has one round in the red (71) and a trio of MC in the following three seasons. His 75 to open in the morning wave burned plenty of investors. Those who decided to play him have a very difficult decision tomorrow. I’m glad I faded him and will use him next week at Trinity Forest where he’s a member. Study Hall This will be the last PLAYERS to be held in the month of May. Mickelson was the first winner when event moved in 2007. Next year’s edition will move to St. Patrick’s Day weekend. Sorry Moms! … Round 1 played 72.014 (+0.014). … The six players tied for the lead are the most since eight were knotted up back in the old days at Sawgrass Country Club. … Paul Casey (back) WD on Wednesday so 49 of the top 50 in the OWGR are playing this week. Casey’s replacement Keith Mitchell opened his round with four consecutive birdies before signing for 67. … David Lingmerth said on his Twitter feed that his neck was giving him issues today and restricting his swing. … Brice Garnett added up 88 of them last Sunday at Quail Hollow Club. He only needed 69 of them today. Golf, bloody hell!  

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The eagle has landed. Clinging to a one-shot lead over Bay Area product Maverick McNealy (66), Daniel Berger leaves no doubt with an eagle at the par-5 18th hole to shoot 65 and salt away his fourth PGA TOUR victory at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am. Berger's second eagle of the day (par-5 second hole) was his fourth of the week, a career high and the most by a winner at this tournament. He moves from 63rd to 10th in the FedExCup. Here are five stories you may have missed from the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am. 1. Berger eyes mountaintop. Berger's second eagle of the day (par-5 second hole) was his fourth of the week, a career high and the most by a winner at this tournament. He moves from 63rd to 10th in the FedExCup. Although he is often overlooked in comparison to other members of golf's vaunted high school class of 2011 (Schauffele, Spieth, Thomas), Berger says that's fine with him. He's plenty used to playing with a chip on his shoulder, and he's not about to settle for average or even pretty good. "I do feel like I’m underrated, but that’s OK with me," said Berger, 27, who prevailed just one week after his former Florida State teammate, Brooks Koepka, won the Waste Management Phoenix Open. "I just think it’s puts a little chip on my shoulder which is totally fine. I think a lot of the guys that they give credit to deserve credit. But I’ve been pretty consistent, and I’ve accomplished a lot for the short amount of time that I’ve played out here on TOUR." Pretty consistent? That's an understatement. Berger's closing 65 was his 26th consecutive round of par or better, the longest active streak on TOUR. Cameron Tringale (67, T7) is next with 24. "I just want to continue to get better," Berger continued. "I feel like, my goal has always been to be the No. 1 player in the world and some people will laugh at that and that’s fine, but that’s something that every day I wake up and I strive for." Read more about his brilliant win here. 2. McNealy threatening to break through. Runner-up McNealy, a 12-time winner at Stanford just a few hours up the coast, now has two top-10 finishes in 50 career TOUR starts. He tied for fifth at the 2020 AT&T at Pebble. "It was fun," McNealy said after making five back-nine birdies for an inward 31. "I had the adrenaline pumping coming down the stretch there and feelings that I hadn’t really felt on the golf course in a little while, trying to close this out and give myself a chance." Knowing he was in contention, he was especially proud to smash his drive and reach the green in two at the par-5 18th, where he gave himself an eagle look from just inside 22 feet. Alas, the ball veered away at the last instant and he settled for a tap-in birdie. "I’ve always been a guy that has to earn my own confidence," said McNealy, who will tee it up at The Genesis Invitational at Riviera this week. "I can’t stand there and just tell myself I’m good at something or I’m doing something right. I have to earn it with myself too. "I feel like I earned a lot of confidence ... I’m excited to get to playing again." 3. Spieth comeback still ‘progressing'. Former world No. 1 and 2015 FedExCup champ Jordan Spieth (70, T3) hit his fewest fairways of the week Sunday (42.86%), and it proved costly as his three bogeys left him three back. On the bright side, he has gone from FedExCup 179th to 64th the last two weeks, what with his T3 at Pebble coming on the heels of a T4 at the Waste Management Phoenix Open - his first back-to-back top-five finishes since 2018 (Vivint Houston Open, Masters Tournament). What's more, Spieth has had at least a share of the 54-hole lead in two consecutive starts after getting lost with his swing and missing the cut at the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines. "If I look back at Friday night of San Diego and you tell me I was going to share and have the 54-hole lead two weeks in a row and really just fight, finish strong to both weeks, I would have said you’re crazy, to be honest," Spieth said. "I was not in a great head space following that missed cut there and just did some really phenomenal work from Sunday through Wednesday of last week that was probably the best period of a few days of work that I’ve put in in a long time." It's just a matter of time, he added, before he wins again. "If I put myself in the position of leading after 54 holes enough times," he said, "especially with how I know I’m going to fight even if it’s not going my way, I’ll end up on top one of these days." 4. Knox battles back after penalty. Two-time TOUR winner Russell Knox (70, T7) hadn't been in contention for a while, so it was especially frustrating to be dealt a one-shot penalty on the very first hole. He was over his second shot when he saw the ball move. Had he addressed it? If so, he would get a one-shot penalty as per the Rules of Golf, as happened to playing partner Maverick McNealy on Saturday. Knox made par and wrote it down. Rules officials went to the videotape. He birdied the second and third holes, hit his approach to three feet at the fourth. He was, he said, "flying." Then he came back to earth. His birdie putt at the fourth horseshoed out, his tee at the par-3 fifth found the bunker, and while walking toward the green he was told that he would be dealt a one-shot penalty for the ball moving at address at the first "It’s just one of those horrible Rules which every one of us is against," Knox said after birdies at 17 and 18 gave him his first top-10 finish since a T9 at the Safeway Open in September. "There’s no advantage gained in any way, and it happened to Maverick yesterday, my playing partner." Still, Knox, who barely missed the FedExCup Playoffs last season (127th), moved from 73rd to 54th in the standings as he continues to chase his form of 2016, when he won twice. "I’m super happy the way I played," he said. "Obviously a few weird things happened today, so obviously it wasn’t my day, but my game is in good shape and I look forward to the future." 5. Cantlay new FedExCup No. 1. Patrick Cantlay (68, T3) hit the ball well enough to win but faulted his putting. "I didn’t get them to go in today," he said after a five-birdie, one-bogey effort. Still, he moved to FedExCup No. 1 with a victory (ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP @ SHERWOOD), runner-up (The American Express) and T3 (AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am) on the young season. Now the Southern California and UCLA product heads to his hometown tournament, The Genesis Invitational at Riviera Country Club, where he will be one of the heavy favorites. "All parts of my game are really good," he said, "and I really love Riviera, so I’m going to ... get rested over the next couple days and know that my game’s in a good spot." TOUR TOP 10

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HILTON HEAD ISLAND, S.C. – When the COVID-19 pandemic shut down the pool where he trained a year ago in March, Tommy Hughson had to get creative. He had aspirations of swimming in college, and he had to stay in shape. So, during the week, the high school senior would run and ride bikes to work on his cardiovascular fitness. Then, on Saturdays, Hughson, who has competed at junior nationals since he was in ninth grade, would swim in the river near a friend’s house. One day they saw an alligator about 200 yards in the distance, and they did the only logical thing. “We swam the other way,” Hughson says matter-of-factly. Meanwhile, Julia Kubec and her mother were spending some of their free time in the early stages of the nationwide shutdown last April and May sewing personalized home-made masks and handing them out to medical workers at various facilities on Hilton Head Island. “I’m not the best sewer, but we made them by hand,” Kubec says. If it’s true, as playwright Oscar Wilde once said, that no good deed goes unpunished, though, Kubec’s gesture turned out to be one of them. In October, she tested positive for COVID-19, along with several other members of the Seahawk soccer team at Hilton Head Island High. It was the weekend before Kubec was set to return to in-person classes. “At first I was like really concerned, but I was pretty asymptomatic, so I wasn’t super worried about it,” recalls Kubec, who did lose her sense of taste and smell. “But in my house, like, my family would not even acknowledge me whatsoever. They would leave food like outside my door.” Later this spring, Kubec and Hughson will graduate from high school this spring with GPAs in excess of 5.0, heading to Duke and the University of Chicago, respectively. They are among 11 seniors from Beaufort and Jasper counties who were named Heritage Classic Foundation Scholars earlier this year. All were deeply affected by COVID-19. One of the recipient’s father was in the hospital for 11 days battling acute respiratory distress syndrome, viral pneumonia and sepsis. He survived thanks to a transfusion of convalescent plasma. Another family needed food bank donations after several members tested positive and had to stop working. One recipient worked at a local pharmacy and delivered medications while separated from his mom and sister, who couldn’t get back home from Nevada due to travel restrictions. Ten of those impressive students received four-year awards that ranged from $16,000-20,000 while the 11th was a one-year grant of $3,000. A total of 353 students have been named RBC Scholars and earned grants totaling $4.63 million since the beginning of the program in 1993. The Heritage Classic Foundation Scholars program is funded by members of the Tartan Club, who make a minimum family contribution of $1,000 year, and ticket sales. “It means a lot,” Hughson says. “It really means a lot. And it puts me again in debt to this Island. I’ve grown up here and I’ve gotten so much from this Island. I have so many great memories and yet again, I’m being helped along in my life by something amazing.” Kubec’s reaction was similar. “I feel like it kind of is a way for me, like, all the sacrifices and hard work that I’ve accomplished over the past few years finally feel like they’re being recognized kind of, because there’s just been so much that I’ve had to give up throughout high school in order for like my academics and athletics,” she says. “So. with this, it just finally feels like worth it.” Academic success, leadership and community service – three hallmarks of the RBC Scholar program — go hand in hand for Kubec and Hughson. Kubec was vice president of her freshman and sophomore class and president as a junior. She’s helped organize homecoming activities and food drives and donations for local animal shelters. The last year has been different, though, and milestones like graduation ceremonies and the prom are up in the air. “It’s just been crazy and I’m not like the biggest fan of like surprises, but everything with COVID just feels like new surprises showing up every week,” Kubec says. “It’s been really interesting, like kind of disappointing in some ways, because a lot of the things that we may have been like looking forward to this year, haven’t been able to go on. … “So that’s definitely been upsetting, but I feel like everyone, especially our school has been really good at like adapting to it. And they still like have tried at least to provide us with some of those things, which is positive.” Kubec, who will attend Duke in the fall and likely study economics, has also taken mission trips with her church to work at youth recreation camps in the Honduras and build houses in the Dominican Republic. She calls the experience “life changing. “Just seeing how different, life is in one of those countries and even just like the culture and the way that people interact,” Kupec says. “The communities are so close and everyone is just so like appreciative of everything. Especially when we worked with the children, just seeing how even despite like the language barriers and everything, we were just able to like form these close relationships with them. It was very heartwarming.” Hughson, who will swim for the University of Chicago next year, is president of the Model United Nations and French National Honor Society at Hilton Head Island High. If not for COVID-19, Hughson would be preparing to travel to a conference where students like him roleplay as delegates to the UN. This year it’s on-line. “You pretend to be a country or a representative from that country and you debate and argue and try to solve world issues such as maybe a hunger crisis in a country or a conflict over in another region,” Hughson explains. “So, you have to do it through diplomacy, and you have to make decisions and write the laws and bills. It’s really interesting.” Small wonder, then, that Hughson hopes to work in the State Department. As much as he’s interested in current events, though, the Seahawk swim team captain also loves looking into the past. Hughson has been interested in archeology since he was in preschool – “I’ve always liked old ruins, digging in the dirt and finding old stuff,” he says. His interest is so keen that the local archeological society has given him the opportunity to work on a native American shell ring that turned out to be 3,500 years old. Hughson started small, moving dirt, then screening through it to find artifacts. As he gained experience, he was able to operate some of the machinery like the magnetometer and spectrometer. He calls the opportunity “pretty cool.” “Growing up with the island, you only really know about the beaches and the tourists and all the big hotels,” Hughson says. “So, I didn’t really know we had such a rich history.”

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