The 30 players headed to the Tour Championship and finale of the PGA Tour’s FedEx Cup playoffs

THE OVERVIEW By Cameron Morfit, PGATOUR.COM When Xander Schauffele lost his tee shot wide-right on the last hole of the U.S. Open sectional qualifier in Germantown, Tennessee, last summer, playing partner Steve Stricker thought the ball might not be findable. Schauffele not only found the ball, he (deep breath) birdied the 18th to make a 5-for-2 playoff; survived the playoff; finished T5 at the U.S. Open at Erin Hills in his first major championship start; won The Greenbrier Classic; held off Justin Thomas to win the TOUR Championship (becoming the first rookie to win that tournament in the FedExCup era); and to no one’s surprise was named Rookie of the Year. TOP 30 PLAYERS TO WATCH IN 2018: We’ll countdown our list with one new player each day in December. Click here for the published players. MORE: Top 30 explanation and schedule Oh, he also finished third in the FedExCup. Any questions? Apparently, the La Jolla, California-born Schauffele, who played for San Diego State, has a game that can travel far and wide. In fact, he claims four nationalities, what with his French-German father and his Taiwanese mom who grew up in Japan. A veritable one-man world tour, Schauffele was delighted to start his sophomore season at the CIMB Classic at TPC Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia, where he not only enjoyed the local cuisine, he tied for third. Hard to believe Schauffele missed the cut in his only two PGA TOUR starts of 2016, at the CareerBuilder Challenge and Farmers Insurance Open. If his 2018 is a continuation of his 2017, when he also made 20 cuts in 28 starts, he may have fellow high school Class of 2011 co-valedictorians Thomas and Jordan Spieth looking over their shoulders. Click here to follow Cameron on Twitter BY THE NUMBERS How Xander Schauffele ranked in Strokes Gained statistics during his last full season on the PGA TOUR. FEDEXCUP Current 2017-18 position: 39th Playoff appearances: 1 TOUR Championship appearances: 1 Best result: 3rd (2017) INSIGHTS FROM THE INSIDERS PGATOUR.COM’s Insiders offer their expert views on what to expect from Xander Schauffele in 2018. TOUR INSIDER by Ben Everill Chip on the shoulder much? This youngster came out of nowhere in the minds of many to win twice last season, including the TOUR Championship. In the process, he took Rookie of the Year – and raised the expectation level. If you think this guy is inferior to his competition, he will up his game and prove you wrong and step on your throat on the way past. When the big moments came, he was ready to handle it. Fascinated to see if he keeps it going or suffers from any second-year syndrome. Click here to follow Ben on Twitter FANTASY INSIDER by Rob Bolton It was unprecedented in the FedExCup era for any golfer with some pedigree to carry it to the heights that he reached en route to Rookie of the Year honors in 2016-17. He didn’t shift into overdrive until the U.S. Open, where he tied for fifth. So, despite a massive swing in performance and no doubt confidence, gamers have reason to remain skeptical. For one, he cannot be expected to sustain the pace of the last six months. And while he’s logged five top-fives worldwide since Erin Hills, two were victories that can inflate long-term value for the previously unproven. Click here to follow Rob on Twitter EQUIPMENT INSIDER by Jonathan Wall Played TaylorMade’s M2 2017 driver and M1 2017 3-wood during the 2016-17 season. Mixed P-Series iron setup includes a P790 2-iron that first made an appearance in Schauffele’s bag during the WGC-Bridgestone Invitational. Vokey SM6 wedges have a raw finish that gradually rusts over time to produce a well-worn look. Only other non-TaylorMade club is an Odyssey Works Big-T #5 putter. Click here to follow Jonathan on Twitter STYLE INSIDER by Greg Monteforte Schauffele is one of the exciting young guns on TOUR and he has the fashion game to match. He frequently steps out in super clean looks that blend classic sensibilities with modern details. He will give Dustin Johnson a run for best dressed on the Adidas staff in 2018. Click here to follow Greg on Twitter

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Collin Morikawa and Viktor Hovland have teamed up this week at the 2022 Zurich Classic in New Orleans. The young superstars combine for only 49 total years of age (Morikawa is 25 years old, and Hovland is 24 years old), but they already have eight PGA TOUR victories between them (Morikawa has five, and Hovland has three). With Morikawa currently ranked No. 2 in the Official World Golf Rankings, and Hovland ranked No. 5, the Morikawa-Hovland duo is sure to be both a fan favorite — and a betting favorite to win the event, too. While neither player has made any major changes to their equipment setups in the last few months, each have recently made one minor tweak: Hovland has changed into a modified Ping G425 LST driver, and Morikawa changed the weight of his TaylorMade TP Collection Juno putter. Ahead of the 2022 Zurich Classic, GolfWRX.com spoke to both players to gain further insight about why they made their respective gear changes. Viktor Hovland Leading up to the Masters, Hovland was using a Ping G425 LST 9-degree driver head, which has a relatively flat lie angle to influence a fade bias. Hovland, however, who already plays a natural cut shot, noticed he was struggling to draw the ball. To help combat the issue, Hovland and Ping Tour rep Kenton Oates experimented with different loft and lie angle settings. The two eventually settled on a setting in his Ping G425 LST 9-degree head that shifted the lie angle upright by 2 degrees. All things being equal, a more upright lie angle will typically help golfers draw the ball, whereas a flat lie angle will influence a fade. According to Hovland, the upright driver setting also matched up better with the lie angles on his Ping i210 irons, helping him achieve more consistency throughout the set. ”We had a hard time drawing the driver, because it was too flat,” Hovland told GolfWRX.com at the 2022 Zurich Classic on Tuesday. “I have pretty low hands at impact, so we figured it’d be easier to make it more upright so I didn’t have to work as hard to draw it. When I do draw it, with that current setting, I tend to draw my irons too much. We just kind of matched it up to the rest of the set.” While many PGA TOUR players would be concerned using an upright driver, since they tend to guard against a left miss, Hovland doesn’t worry as much about missing to the left. “Most of the time when I’m playing well, it’s not going left too much,” Hovland said. Collin Morikawa You may not think five grams is a lot of weight, but for Morikawa, it can make a huge difference in feel on the greens. Typically, Morikawa uses a TaylorMade TP Collection Juno putter with 2.5-gram weights in the heel and toe portions of the sole. When he plays on relatively slower green complexes, however, he says he wants something a bit heavier. Ahead of The 2021 Open Championship, which Morikawa won, he replaced the 2.5-gram weights on his putter with 7.5-gram weights. Ahead of the Zurich Classic, he’s doing something similar by replacing the 2.5-gram weights with 5-gram weights. Although the change only equates to 5 grams of additional overall head weight, it’s significant for Morikawa, who’s going from the lightning fast Augusta National greens to the relatively slower TPC Louisiana surfaces. “I just added a little more weight to the putter,” Morikawa said on Monday at the 2022 Zurich Classic. “For me, it’s what I do on slower greens, like what I did at The Open. Instead of trying to hit it harder, or do something different, it just matches my feel a little better, and helps me work my way from fast greens to slow greens.” For amateur golfers, take this as a lesson to not underestimate the power of just a few grams. Adding or subtracting weight, especially in certain areas, can drastically change both performance and feel. If you’re using a putter that has interchangeable weights, we recommend messing around with different configurations to see what feels best for you, or consult with a professional fitter to get dialed in.

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