Round 3 recap of Wyndham Championship

ERIN, Wis. – The house shared by Rickie Fowler and Justin Thomas not far from Erin Hills was supposed to be the scene of someone’s breaking out party Sunday night… instead it served as the scene of post mortems. Heading to Sunday the U.S. Open was well and truly up for grabs with 16 players within six shots of the lead, none of whom had a major victory to their name. Of those, Fowler and Thomas were the ones most likely. Fowler had gone through enough near misses in majors to have learned from the experience with four previous top-5 finishes. He had since won THE PLAYERS in 2015. The 28-year-old had also claimed The Honda Classic earlier this season, knocking off the notion from some that he struggled to close although he opened the door to doubters again when he faded from one off the lead through 54 holes at the Masters in April to finish T11. Thomas had invigorated the tournament by terrorizing Erin Hills on Saturday for a record 9-under 63. He already had three wins on the PGA TOUR season and sat second in the FedExCup. Oh and the now 24-year-old joined the 59 club earlier in the year. Surely one of them would kick ahead. Starting two back, Fowler could only muster an even-par 72 to finish six shots back in a tie for fifth. Starting one back in the final group, the U.S. Open was effectively over for Thomas after just five holes and three bogeys. His 3-over 75 left him finishing in a tie for ninth. “I just didn’t have it today. Anytime you don’t win, it stings,â€� Thomas said. “It just sucks to not even have a chance on that back nine. To try to go out there and try to get in a top-5 or trying to get up near the lead is not what I play for, but, unfortunately, that’s really all I was dealt, so it’s what I had to try to do.â€� Fowler tried to take only positives away from the occasion. He only needs to look at his Zurich Classic partner Jason Day, who had nine top-10 finishes in majors before his win at the 2015 PGA Championship, to know he must forge ahead.
 “I feel like golf-wise I’m playing at the highest level. If you look at the negatives too much, you’re going to be stuck doing that the whole time,â€� he rationalized. 

“You have to measure success in different ways, not just by winning, just because that doesn’t happen a whole lot. I think Tiger had the best winning percentage of all time at 30%, and you’re lucky to even sniff close to 10.

“You kind of have to say, hey, it’s a major. We played well this week. I felt like I did a lot of good things, especially in the first round, executing my game plan. To finish in double digits, under par at a major championship, especially the U.S. Open, it was a good week.â€� Perhaps the writing was on the wall for Thomas from the opening tee shot as it sailed left into a hazard and it’s always tough to back up a super low score with another one. The three previous players to shoot 63 in an early round at a U.S. Open all struggled the next day. Jack Nicklaus shot 71 and Tom Weiskopf 75 after their opening 63s in the 1980 U.S. Open. Vijay Singh shot 72 in Round 3 after his second round 63 in 2003. (Johnny Miller shot 63 at Oakmont in 1973’s final round to win.) Only Nicklaus rebounded well enough to win. The gas tank on Thomas just didn’t fill up in time, despite having a long wait before his tee time. Too long he felt. “It was a lot of kind of laying around and just trying to stay off the phone and try to stay away from reading stuff just because there are so many things out there that are being said or written,â€� Thomas explained after he woke early Sunday ahead of his 2:54 p.m. tee time. “I just tried to stay away from it but it was hard to. I would like to think that’s not why I played how I did today.â€�
 The good news for the pair is perhaps this first-time majors thing is going to be a lasting trend. Going back to Day’s win at Whistling Straits, the last seven major winners have been first timers. Perhaps they will get their chance to continue the narrative at the Open Championship next month at Royal Birkdale. “I think it’s a great thing. It’s a lot of new blood, young guys. Kind of some of the younger crew is coming in,â€� Fowler said. “I’m not saying the older guys are out by any means, but I think we’re making our presence a little bit more known.â€�

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PARAMUS, N.J. – Bryson DeChambeau takes a four-shot lead into the final round, then keeps his nerve for a 2-under 69 and a four-shot victory at THE NORTHERN TRUST at Ridgewood Country Club. Welcome to the Monday Finish, where DeChambeau picked up his third PGA TOUR victory and second this season, this one kicking him into first in the FedExCup. FIVE OBSERVATIONS 1. Seeing is believing for DeChambeau. Bryson DeChambeau sat down before the press, the tournament and FedExCup trophies in front of him, and was asked what he likes most about his work. “It’s being able to step up to a shot like I did on 17 today, knowing it’s a difficult tee shot, and executing it exactly the way I wanted to,â€� said DeChambeau, who was T27 in driving accuracy. “That’s what brings me joy and that’s why I work so hard, and all this other stuff is fantastic and I wouldn’t trade it for anything, but the No. 1 thing that makes me happy is seeing a golf ball go exactly the way I felt it should go.â€� DeChambeau is a true original, but his work habits are reminiscent of Vijay Singh. What did DeChambeau do after his third-round 63 had staked him to a four-shot lead on Saturday night? The same thing he always does: He hit balls, closing down the range. Told that some guys wouldn’t have camped out for so long after such a round, he was quick with a response. “Well, it’s not a 54—it’s not birdieing every hole,â€� he said. He and his caddie have an inside joke that they repeat to one another when they find themselves logging the long hours on the range or practice green: Just another day at the office. “You could say what I do is crazy,â€� DeChambeau said, “but in the end, I’m the one with the trophy this week.â€� 2. Finau is a phenomenon. Hard to believe Tony Finau doesn’t have a win this year, given his consistency. The long-hitting Utah pro finished second to move from 12th to 4th in the FedExCup, the highest position among players without a win this season. He has nine top-10 finishes and 16 top-25 finishes in 25 starts so far this season. How’s that for week-in, week-out excellence? Finau played three of the four days alongside Phil Mickelson, and more than held his own as he collected his third runner-up finish on TOUR. If he can remain in the top five in the FedExCup going into the TOUR Championship, he will control his own destiny. “Yeah, great position to be in and that’s where I want to be,â€� said Finau, who qualified for his first TOUR Championship last season, when he ultimately finished 19th in the FedExCup. “When I do win, hopefully it means a lot and maybe even a FedExCup. … Bryson was extremely tough to catch. He didn’t really open a window for us.â€� 3. FedExCup movers were everywhere. Give credit to Danny Lee, who entered the week at 103rd in the FedExCup standings but birdied five straight holes (Nos. 10-14) on the way to a 4-under 67 that gave him a T34 finish and gave him just the boost he needed to 98th. That means he’s on to the next stop in the Playoffs, the top-100 Dell Technologies Championship at TPC Boston, starting Friday. It was a similar story for Nick Watney, who was making his 350th TOUR start and finished T11 to move from 102nd to 67th in the standings and on to Boston. The biggest leap was by Ryan Palmer, who was the Bubble Boy at No. 100 in the standings but carded a timely 65 in the final round to finish T5 and move up to 50th in the standings. That should get him not only to Boston but all the way to the BMW Championship in Philadelphia. “It’s huge,â€� Palmer said. 4. Woods not discouraged. Tiger Woods was coming off a runner-up finish at the PGA Championship two weeks prior, so his T40 at THE NORTHERN TRUST was slightly underwhelming. He never really made much happen at Ridgewood, where his putter remained cold all week, but now he heads to TPC Boston and the site of his win in 2006 and runner-up finishes in ’04 and ’07. “Well, welcome to golf,â€� Woods said of his suddenly dry birdie well. “I’m sure you guys are used to seeing me win five times a year or more. It’s not that easy to win out here. That’s what you’re seeing is that I’m close and just one shot here, one shot there, per day, flips momentum. “That’s what either I had been missing or I had gotten and I would lose it,â€� he added. “It’s just looking for one shot a day here and there, and you just never know when that shot may come, early in the front nine, late in the back nine, but it’s not that far.â€� 5. Mickelson taking nothing for granted. New York favorite Phil Mickelson (71, T15) got off to a good start at THE NORTHERN TRUST, his pair of 68s getting him at least within shouting distance of the lead. Alas, a third 68 didn’t do him much good, though, as DeChambeau began to run away, and Mickelson, 48, struggled in hitting just 5 of 14 fairways during an even-par final round Sunday. Now he heads to TPC Boston, where he won in 2007, for the Dell Technologies Championship. “I’m going to go down to Boston and build on that and get myself in contention,â€� he said. “I’ve played well there, I’ve won there, and my game’s comin’ around, and I’m gonna put it together.â€� Mickelson is 10th in the FedExCup, and while he’s won in Boston, and at East Lake, he’s never won the whole thing. Also on his mind: He has played on every Presidents Cup and Ryder Cup team since 1994, and is hoping to keep that streak going at the Ryder Cup in the fall. “I’m still fighting hard to get on that team,â€� he said. FIVE INSIGHTS 1. DeChambeau came into the week T67 in Strokes Gained: Putting, but was fifth in that statistic at Ridgewood; T116 in one-putt percentage, but was T12 at Ridgewood; T93 at putting inside 10 feet, but was T1 at Ridgewood; and 145th at putting from 4-8 feet, but was fifth at Ridgewood. All told, he made 65 of 68 putts from inside 10 feet. 2. Finau (68, solo second), the winner of the 2016 Puerto Rico Open led the field in Strokes Gained: Tee-to-Green (+12.562) and Strokes Gained: Around-the-Green (+7.8) in collecting the third runner-up finish of his career (2017 Safeway Open, 2018 Genesis Open). 3. Billy Horschel (68, T3) played his final 46 holes without a bogey and led the field in scrambling (14 of 17). He moves to 14th in the FedExCup as he tries to join Woods as the only player to win the FedExCup more than once. 4. Cameron Smith (69, T3) notched his fifth top-five finish this season and moved from 53rd all the way to 16th in the FedExCup. He had shot under par only four times in his last 20 rounds coming into THE NORTHERN TRUST, but shot in red numbers all four rounds at Ridgewood. 5. Adam Scott (69, T5), who came into the field outside the top 150 in Strokes Gained: Putting, led the field (+8.464) in that stat at Ridgewood. He made nearly 368 feet of putts, and all told it was his best performance on the greens since winning the 2004 Booz Allen Classic.

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DETROIT – Jeff Roth was hard to miss in a loud orange golf shirt, light blue shorts and PGA-crested Titleist staff bag as he hit balls at Detroit Golf Club on Wednesday. He has a squat, unchiseled build that harkens to an earlier era, and is the only person in the field this week who’s 63, making him the club pro equivalent of Bernhard Langer and the bookend to big-hitting Bryson DeChambeau. While DeChambeau and others have flirted with 200 mph ball speed, Roth is at 140. He will be playing a very different game when the Rocket Mortgage Classic begins Thursday. “The obvious – making the cut and playing the weekend,” he said of his goals for the week. “I’ve got people coming in from New Mexico, California, and of course I’ve got family and friends here in Michigan. My daughters are putting together a couple of Fatheads of me, so it’s gonna be pretty cool. I’m really looking forward to it.” All told, he added, his gallery might number 50-70 friends and family. Older players are having a bit of a moment. Phil Mickelson won the PGA Championship at nearly 51. Tim O’Neal, 48, won The John Shippen tournament earlier this week to earn his place in the field at the Rocket Mortgage. Dick Mast, 70, Monday-qualified for this week’s DICK’s Sporting Goods Open on PGA TOUR Champions. And now we have Roth, who admires them all. A resident of Farmington, New Mexico since 2010, Roth teaches at Michigan’s Boyne Golf Academy in the summer. He is, to borrow a movie title from 10 years ago, a human hot tub time machine. He played collegiately for Arizona in the 70s and made his first PGA TOUR start at the 1983 Buick Open won by Wayne Levi at nearby Warwick Hills Golf and Country Club. His game didn’t blossom until the 90s. He qualified for the Rocket Mortgage by winning the 2019 Michigan PGA Professional Championship; his spot in the field was held over a year because of the pandemic. If you haven’t heard of him, then maybe you’re not from here; Roth has won six Michigan majors. TOUR pro aspirations? Yeah, he had those, but once he settled down with his wife, Maureen, they began to fall away. “Plus,” he added, “I just wasn’t that good.” He made five of 20 cuts on TOUR. Still, not everyone has played in six PGA Championships in four decades, from 1988 to 2020. Roth has stood the test of time, and will have 40 years on players like Davis Thompson and Joaquin Niemann this week. “We figured when they met that it was the oldest and the youngest in the field,” said Thompson’s caddie Damon Green, who competed against Roth at the 2011 U.S. Senior Open at Inverness. Green’s recollections of that week are commonplace amongst those who have seen the Roth magic up-close. Green was longer off the tee, sometimes by a lot, but Roth wouldn’t go away. “I was outdriving him by 40 yards,” he said, “and then he hit his hybrids inside my wedges and short irons. It was impressive. My brother turned into a Jeff Roth superfan that week. “He’s very accurate,” Green continued, “and very disciplined.” He has to be, since he has no margin for error. Roth is so short, relatively speaking, that when he played in the 2020 PGA Championship at TPC Harding Park, he couldn’t reach six of the par-4s in two. “So it was a par 76 for me,” he said. He shot 74-75 and missed the cut by eight shots. And yet it would be foolish to write him off this week. “I was always a long hitter,” said friend and college teammate Dan Pohl, who had a 30-plus-year PGA TOUR career before he built Pole Cat Golf Course in Mt. Pleasant, Michigan. “Jeff was a thinker who manages himself around the course very well. He doesn’t make many mistakes. “Now at 64,” Pohl said with a laugh, “we make mistakes just getting up in the morning, but he’s still got the passion and the want to play at this level. He doesn’t have anything left to prove.” Roth wears his staying power like a badge of honor. “We grew up in an era where longevity was part of the formula for being a good player,” he said. “It’s just my opinion, but I don’t think today’s players look at it like that. I think they look at it where a career could be like five to 10 years. I don’t know if that’s the money, I don’t know if it’s that the physical part of what they put into it is so much greater than what we did. “Nobody trained like that in my era, so there were probably fewer injuries,” he continued. “Or you never heard about them because you just played through them.” If he could be gifted the career of Jay Haas or two-time U.S. Open champion Curtis Strange, Roth added, he would take Haas, “because he’s still playing, still grinding, still lovin’ it. “That to me is what it’s all about,” he said. Roth will go off the first tee at 8:45 a.m. Thursday, with much younger Mark Anderson and younger still Daniel Wetterich. Roth will have a nice gallery in tow, Fatheads included. He figures his personal par will be 73, which means he’ll have to shoot around 6 under to make it to the weekend. He’s still playing, still grinding, and still lovin’ it.

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