Top 30 Players to Watch in 2019: No. 10 Webb Simpson

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ORLANDO, Fla. – Rory McIlroy is a well-read man, and he likes to tell people that he knows “a little about a lot.” On golf, on business matters of the PGA TOUR, and even about the golf course at Bay Hill Club & Lodge, home to this week’s Arnold Palmer Invitational presented by Mastercard, he could hold an advanced doctorate. It took McIlroy some time to get to Arnie’s Place, but once he visited, played, soaked in the meaning and was able to spend some quality time with the tournament namesake before Palmer’s passing in 2016, he was sold on everything about it. Course conditions the past few years have been firm, dry and windy – it’s a little softer so far this March – and Bay Hill can be an intimidator, the way that Palmer always wanted it. But the mop-haired McIlroy, now 32, just seems to whistle along at this venue. For him, the course is one in which he can stay within himself, take care of the friendly par 5s, play smartly on the tougher holes and more often than not produce a good score. Seven times in seven years he has fired 66 or better, including a final-round 64 in 2018, when he won. McIlroy has finished T11 or better in six of his seven visits. His winning total of 16-under 270 in ’18 stands as the lowest 72-hole score at Bay Hill since 2015. With his trophy and winner’s share ($1.6 million then, $2.16 million this week, along with 550 FedEx Cup points) came the champion’s red cardigan sweater, a nod to Palmer’s fashionable side. It remains a treasured piece of McIlroy’s “trophy” collection. “I haven’t broken it out since then – it’s a little scratchy and wouldn’t be comfortable on the skin,” McIlroy said of the alpaca sweater. “The tradition, the cardigan, I think it’s one of the coolest trophies that we have in golf. I wish Arnold would have been around to be with me on the 18th green then. That would have been the icing on the cake.” McIlroy, a 20-time PGA TOUR winner who is ranked fifth in the world, does not have much in terms of a sample size to his 2021-22 season. That will change soon with a handful of bigger events looming, starting with the Arnold Palmer Invitational presented by Mastercard and THE PLAYERS Championship next week, and running up toward the Masters, the lone major standing between him and the Career Grand Slam. His two official PGA TOUR starts this season include a victory at THE CJ CUP @ SUMMIT, and a tie for 10th at The Genesis Invitational two weeks ago, where he shot 67-68 on the weekend. His reunion with his longtime swing coach, Michael Bannon, after the two were apart for most of 2021, has led to McIlroy being more cognizant of what his left arm is doing in his backswing, and he has tried to become more “neutral” at the top. That’s the golfspeak of his world. More simply, he wants to contend more often and regain the uber-confidence that made him world No. 1. He aims to become more consistent, and to win major championships again. Major No. 4 (his last) was at the PGA Championship in the summer of 2014, a considerable drought. He has won two FedExCups and THE PLAYERS since, but his Career Grand Slam quest continues. “I’ve driven the ball pretty well,” McIlroy said. “I’ve seen a bit of improvement in iron play. My short game’s been really good. If anything, just getting the consistency to a point where I feel like I can play like that day in and day out. But the game feels good, so just sort of trying to keep doing what I’m doing.” On Wednesday afternoon, after his pro-am and a few media obligations, McIlroy was headed to the chipping area next to the practice green behind the Bay Hill clubhouse, where pictures of Palmer adorn the walls. This year’s course setup at API includes replacing some of the tightly-mown runoff areas near the green complexes with thick rough. Greens can be hard to hit at Bay Hill; McIlroy said the new setup “is definitely a different test than the one in previous years.” McIlroy had shared his Bay Hill game plan with world No. 1 Jon Rahm, who is here for the first time. He told Rahm how he could play conservatively as long as he attacks on the par 5s. Rahm could hit iron off the tee at the par-4 10th, for instance, and maybe on a few other holes, McIlroy advised. The two stood together on the tee at Bay Hill’s par-5 sixth because of a backup on Wednesday. Rahm: “I said, Rory, where are the irons? I’m hitting driver on every single hole!” (Later, Rahm would add, “It’s a great golf course. I can see why Tiger won so many times here.”) In McIlroy’s group on Wednesday was former Major League Baseball knuckleballer Tim Wakefield, who showed off a World Series ring to the group. Wakefield is a pretty decent golfer. When he received a call on Tuesday night that informing him of the pairing, he immediately phoned his wife, very excited, much the way a 10-year-old kid might. “HEY, GUESS WHO I’M PLAYING WITH TOMORROW!!!” he started. “Impressive,” was the word that Wakefield kept using to describe McIlroy after their round. Wakefield was asked if he was surprised that so much power can be generated by a player so relatively small in stature – McIlroy is 5 feet 10, and weighs 160 pounds, but was second on TOUR in Driving Distance last season (319.3 yards). He wasn’t. “He knows how to generate the power with what he has,” Wakefield said. “I’ve pitched against guys his size who hit homers a long ways. It’s all a matter of timing, and how he does it.” McIlroy’s emergence as a marquee regular at Arnie’s Place has been about great timing, too. He will be a crowd favorite this week, a thoughtful player with boatloads of charisma. (Sound familiar?) McIlroy is glad he is here. He gets it. The meaning of the week, and Arnold Palmer, isn’t lost on him. He’d absolutely love another one of those itchy red sweaters. “We all know what Arnold Palmer means to the PGA TOUR, and to the game of golf in general,” McIlroy said. “So, it’s always nice to be here and try to sort of remember his legacy, and remember what he meant to everyone. He was probably the catalyst with maybe a few other guys of why we’re here today, and why the game of professional golf is at such a high level.” At Bay Hill, Rory McIlroy knows a lot about a lot.

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KAWAGOE, Japan – Xander Schauffele is your gold medalist, fulfilling his family’s Olympic dreams and winning in the same country where his mother grew up. It was a victory that was special for several reasons. Before departing Japan, here are five things to know about this year’s Olympic men’s golf competition. 1. SCHAUFFELE SHUTS THE DOOR It wasn’t just that Schauffele won the gold medal. It was how he did it. Schauffele has held a 54-hole lead four times in his PGA TOUR career. He hasn’t converted any of them into wins. He started the final round at Kasumigaseki with a one-stroke lead over home favorite Hideki Matsuyama and, while there were some tense moments after his bogey on the par-5 14th, was able to win the gold. He clinched victory with a clutch up-and-down on 18 after hitting a 98-yard wedge shot to 5 feet. “I needed to get over the hump,” Schauffele said about finishing off a 54-hole lead. His four PGA TOUR wins have all come in comeback fashion. He trailed by an average of 3.3 shots entering the final round in each of those wins. He’s shot a final-round 68 or better in each win, including a Sunday 62 in the 2019 Sentry Tournament of Champions, which is his most recent TOUR win. While he hadn’t won in 2 ½ years, his consistency has been impressive. He has 30 top-25 finishes in his last 36 TOUR starts. His 13 top-3 finishes over the last three seasons are second only to Justin Thomas (14). Schauffele also has nine top-10s in 18 majors since 2017. One of those was a painful loss in this year’s Masters to Matsuyama. Schauffele birdied four straight holes on Augusta National’s second nine before hitting his tee shot into the water at the par-3 16th. Matsuyama and Schauffele were together again in the final group Sunday, but this time Schauffele got the better of him. “As a competitor, personally it’s always important to take the next step and I was kind of stuck in a gear over-thinking, over-complicating certain moments,” Schauffele said Sunday. “So if you put just everything aside for me personally this is a big deal just to pull through while having the lead since I have never done it before.” 2. FAMILY TIES It’s hard to discuss Schauffele’s Olympic performance without mentioning his family. His great-grandfather, Richard Schauffele, was one of Germany’s track and field athletes but missed the Olympics with a shoulder injury. Xander’s father, Stefan, was an aspiring decathlete whose athletic career was ended by a drunk driver. While golf’s major championships stand alone, the Schauffeles’ connections to both the Olympics and Japan (his grandparents still live in Tokyo) definitely made this a title that Xander desired. “I maybe put more pressure on myself to go win this more than anything else for quite some time,” Xander said. “It was more than just golf for me and I’m just really, really happy and fortunate to be sitting here.” The experience of handling this pressure should bode well for Schauffele, who’s become a consistent contender in majors but is seeking his first victory in one. 3. DIFFERENT STROKES There have been calls for a different format ever since golf was added to the Olympic catalog. There is no shortage of 72-hole events in professional golf, so the desire is understandable. Team formats, especially in match play, have their inherent drama on every hole. We’ve seen it in everything from the NCAA Championship to the Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup. A team format also raises the possibility of a mixed format where men and women compete alongside each other. Those are all good things, but I would hesitate before tossing stroke play aside. Individiual accomplishments are important to the top players. They’re the primary way legacies are measured. Standing alone atop the podium was special for Schauffele. “What does it mean to win a gold medal? It means you’re the champion,” Schauffele said Sunday. “It means you beat everybody. For me specifically, I don’t play golf for money or medals, in all honesty, I just play to be competitive and I want to beat everyone. So for this week I’m lucky enough to be sitting here with these boys, but I’m also lucky enough to be the No. 1 player to beat everyone. So that’s what it means to me.” For those who say that stroke play is too predictable, consider that the silver and bronze medalist were both ranked outside the top 200 in the world ranking. 4. CHANGE OF HEART Even though he left Japan empty-handed, Rory McIlroy was among the players whose Olympic experience exceeded their expectations. “It makes me even more determined going to Paris and trying to pick one up,” McIlroy said about an Olympic medal. “To be up there in contention for a medal certainly had a different feeling to it than I expected.” Even though it meant a longer commute, many golfers enjoyed staying in or near the Olympic Village and fraternizing with other athletes. Members of the U.S. team spent time with the U.S. basketball team. Tommy Fleetwood was invited to a sparring session with Great Britain’s boxers. Abraham Ancer roomed with the Mexican boxing team, while Carlos Ortiz was with the country’s equestrians. McIlroy was excited to watch the dressage, which he called “mesmerizing.” He told his wife, Erica, that the Olympics showed him that he should give new experiences an opportunity instead of entering them with a cynical mindset. “I need to give things a chance,” McIlroy said. “Maybe I shouldn’t be so skeptical. I think I need to do a better job of just giving things a chance, experiencing things, not writing them off at first glance. That’s sort of a trait of mine, but I’m happy to be proven wrong. I was proven wrong at the Ryder Cup, I’ve been proven wrong this week and I’m happy that, I’m happy to say that.” Playing alongside countryman Shane Lowry in the third round only enhanced McIlroy’s experience. They’ve known each other since their amateur days, helping Ireland to the 2007 European Team Championship. Teaming with Lowry, in a tournament with no prize money and having his clubs carried in a small stand bag all reminded McIlroy back to his amateur days. “It’s just been a throwback to the good old days when we didn’t play for money,” McIlroy said. “It was great. It was a really enjoyable week and I hope we both make it for Paris again in three years’ time and have another good crack at it.” 5. HIDEKI’S HEARTBREAK Ever since Hideki Matsuyama won the Masters, attention turned to his gold medal quest. The Olympics were being held in his home country and on a course that is very special to him. He won the 2009 Japan Junior and 2010 Asia-Pacific Amateur Championship at Kasumigaseki Country Club. The latter earned him his first Masters invitation. The Olympics also were Matsuyama’s first tournament since contracting COVID-19, however, and it seemed he was still feeling the effects. He hadn’t played a tournament in four weeks and his endurance was lacking. Japan’s captain, Shigeki Maruyama, said it’s been “night and day” since Matsuyama’s battle with the virus. The high heat that players faced all week didn’t help. Still, Matsuyama fought for a medal. No spectators were allowed at Kasumigaseki but by Sunday he was trailed by hundreds of volunteers, media and athletes. He just missed a birdie putt on the final green that would have given him the bronze, then fell in a seven-man playoff for the third medal. “I have no energy or endurance left at this point,” Matsuyama said. “But I kept fighting at the end with my heart.” That’s the Olympic spirit. COMCAST BUSINESS TOUR TOP 10 The Comcast Business TOUR TOP 10 highlights and rewards the extraordinary level of play required to earn a spot in the TOP 10 at the conclusion of the FedExCup regular season. The competition will conclude prior to the FedExCup PLAYOFFS where the top 10 FedExCup points leaders will be recognized and awarded as the most elite in golf. Week after week, shot after shot, each event matters more than ever before. Who will finish in the Comcast Business TOUR TOP 10? Click here to follow the weekly action.

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