Rory McIlroy’s new 3-iron helps him hit it higher

PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – Fred Funk returned to TPC Sawgrass’ Stadium Course this weekend, site of his signature PGA TOUR win at THE PLAYERS Championship in 2005. There was plenty to reminisce about. After a string of weather delays on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, this year’s PLAYERS will finish on Monday for the first time since Funk’s triumph, where he completed 32 holes on a marathon final day, becoming the oldest PLAYERS champion at age 48. This year’s field will face a similar challenge, with the third round’s final grouping of Sam Burns, Tom Hoge and Harold Varner III completing nine holes as play was halted Sunday due to darkness. The plethora of contenders – 17 players within four shots of leader Anirban Lahiri – will aim to channel their inner Funk, who weathered gusts up to 42 mph with 2-under play across those 32 holes. Monday’s conditions at TPC Sawgrass aren’t slated to be quite as severe, but winds of 14-16 mph will pose a demanding test on the water-infused Pete Dye layout. As he returned to the scene of his iconic triumph – punctuated with an up-and-down for par from a greenside bunker at the 72nd hole and a hat spike – Funk offered some words of advice to the field. “You’ve just got to stay super focused,” said Funk of the best way to handle a marathon Monday finish. “The biggest thing in these kind of conditions is hitting it solid. If you’re not hitting the ball solid, you have no control, none at all. “It’s not only a big-time tournament, and it’s got the prestige of being the fifth major, but it’s also on a really, really hard golf course. It’s a very visually intimidating golf course in normal conditions, and then when you’ve got conditions like this, you’ve just got to stay super focused.” Monday finishes at THE PLAYERS haven’t just produced the oldest winner in tournament history, but also some of its most memorable finishes. Hal Sutton’s famous “Be the right club today” shot clinched his win on a Monday in 2000, and Tiger Woods won his first PLAYERS on a Monday a year later after a duel with Vijay Singh that saw Singh make a triple bogey and an eagle in the final five holes. It was Woods at the height of his powers, as he won the Masters a few weeks later to complete the Tiger Slam. He held the five largest titles in golf concurrently. Funk, who was men’s golf coach at the University of Maryland before earning his TOUR card, spent the majority of his TOUR career as a resident of Ponte Vedra Beach. The home-field advantage came in handy during the myriad weather delays throughout the week. That Saturday, competition was delayed after Funk completed three holes. He went home for lunch and a nap. “My caddie comes running in; he says, ‘Wake up, wake up. We’re in position on the 10th tee in 20 minutes,’” remembered Funk. “I go, ‘Wow, if I weren’t so close, I would’ve missed my tee time.’ “I just threw on my pants and I went to the 10th tee, and then we play three or four more holes, and back off the course again. So it was that kind of week.” Funk’s defining stretch came midway through the fourth round, as he rattled off four birdies in a seven-hole stretch, punctuated with an aggressive line into the par-3 13th and subsequent 6-foot birdie. “The pin was really tucked left, right by the water, right by the bulkhead,” remembered Funk. “There were like four paces onto the green, and I was left of the hole, closer to the water than it was to the pin. It could’ve gone in the water and it didn’t, and I made birdie there.” After three-putt bogeys on 14 and 15, Funk faced another critical moment with his second shot into the par-5 16th. One of the most historically accurate drivers of the golf ball, Funk split the fairway, leaving 234 yards into the hole. The wind whipped. Funk pulled 3-iron and played boldly. “A little bit of a hook lie, side of the mound, and the wind is howling, and I aimed 10 yards out into water on purpose,” recalled Funk. “I started it dead on line, 10 yards out into the water, and I hit it so solid that the wind didn’t hit it at first. So I’m like, ‘Oh, it’s going in the water,’ and finally the wind slammed it and I got it up on the green, 20 feet for eagle. “A shot you’re normally not going to try in that big of a tournament, but the conditions were so difficult, and the guys I saw later when I saw some replays, they aimed at the middle or left side of the green and played it safe, they got it blown over into the left side of these mounds, and you’re dead over there. “Taking on the pin and taking on shots, I did that all day. I got away with it on some, that probably shouldn’t have.” Funk three-putted for bogey on 17, a result he didn’t mind as much, considering the alternatives – “I’m watching everybody hit it in the water.” With par on 18, he posted 9-under total, then watched as Luke Donald and Scott Verplank failed to make closing birdie to match. Who will follow in Funk’s footsteps and raise THE PLAYERS trophy on a marathon Monday? Time will tell. “I was ecstatic,” said Funk, who recorded eight PGA TOUR victories in addition to nine on PGA TOUR Champions. “It was my signature win.”

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He understands the larger conversation around social justice going on in America and the significance of a black golfer winning the sport’s first event back after a 91-day shutdown. He isn’t thinking about that. He just wants to get his first Tour win.

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The first word was “sadness.” Minutes after signing his scorecard, Collin Morikawa was blunt in assessing his final round at the Sentry Tournament of Champions, in what he described as the most disappointing experience of his career. Morikawa began Sunday at the Plantation Course at Kapalua six strokes clear of the field at the PGA TOUR’s first event of 2023. He made three birdies in his first six holes Sunday, and he was bogey-free for the event’s first 67 holes. He looked unflappable. Until he was undone by three consecutive bogeys on Nos. 14-16, missing par putts of 10, 8 and 7 feet respectively. Morikawa carded a final-round, 1-under 72 to finish solo second at 25-under total, two short of Jon Rahm, who capitalized on Morikawa’s mishaps with a final-round, 10-under 63 that included a 5-under stretch on Nos. 12-15 Sunday. “It sucks,” Morikawa said. “You work so hard and you give yourself these opportunities, and just bad timing on bad shots, and kind of added up really quickly. Don’t know what I’m going to learn this week, but it doesn’t seem like it was that far off. It really wasn’t. “Yeah, it sucks.” Morikawa hasn’t won on TOUR since The Open in July 2021; this marks his third runner-up finish since then. He arrived at serene Kapalua inspired by recent work with new putting coach Stephen Sweeney, and the stats backed it up, as he averaged nearly two strokes gained on the greens across the first three rounds. Sunday was a different story, though, as Morikawa missed birdie putts of 3 and 7 feet on the fifth and ninth holes respectively. His lead was in the five- to seven-stroke range for most of the day, but he couldn’t quite push the margin to the point of insurmountable. The bogeys came, and Rahm took advantage. The first bogey was perhaps the most agonizing. After finding a front greenside bunker at the 284-yard, par-4 14th hole, Morikawa missed the green long on his second shot. He chipped to 10 feet and could not convert the par putt. That’s the point when he started to feel like he might be losing control of the situation, he said. “I’ve been in that bunker; it’s not like it’s an impossible bunker shot,” Morikawa said. “Normally 10 out of 10 times, you’re putting it to within 15 feet at worst. I caught it thin. “Everything felt fine. You make a bogey there on 14, you’re like, ‘OK, you’ve got 15, you’ve got 18, we’re still in it, we’re still right there. No problem. “Then 15, just pushed the 5-wood just enough and knew it was going to roll down. Practiced that chip a bunch too, and obviously not enough.” Despite the Sunday stumble, Morikawa remains upbeat about the spring ahead. He’ll stay in Hawaii for a quick vacation, then return to the TOUR for the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines later this month. He plans to play the WM Phoenix Open and The Genesis Invitational, as well. It wasn’t the preferred result this time, but each week in contention represents a valuable learning experience. Morikawa sees better days – and additions to his five TOUR titles – just around the corner. “I can finally say it’s not back to the drawing board after this week,” Morikawa said. “It’s really just figure out the small little things. My game hasn’t felt like that in a very long time; I saw little specs of it throughout the fall season and was never able to put four rounds together. We’re still getting there, but for me, I know there’s still a lot of work to do. Obviously it shows today, but I’m willing to put in the work. “I think at this point now, it’s just kind of going to hopefully just push me more and more to really figure out what it’s going to take for 72 holes.”

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