Tour Championship’s new socring a hot topic

Those early tee times notwithstanding, Chris Kirk says he’s not a morning person. But when he lived on St. Simon’s Island in southeastern Georgia, one of his favorite things to do was to get up and go paddle boarding at sunrise. That’s when the Atlantic Ocean was the calmest. Kirk would paddle out into the blue-green water, the morning’s light shimmering on its glassy surface, for 30 or 40 minutes. Sometimes he’d sit down or stretch out on the board, alone in his thoughts. “I think it has some similarities to being on the driving range by yourself when you’re a kid just kind of working, trying to get something just right,” Kirk says. “You feel like you’re just kind of standing on the water, walking on water a little bit. Just being out where you could barely see the shoreline with nobody around, it was so kind of peaceful and calming.” An added benefit? It was also good exercise for the lanky Georgian who admits that he isn’t exactly the kind of gym rat some PGA TOUR players are. Particularly if the waves were up when Kirk returned to shore, he could get in a little surfing, too. “I struggle with that,” the 6-foot-3, 175-pounder admits with a smile. “… I just really don’t enjoy working out that much. But being able to do something like paddle boarding was really a great release.” Kirk now lives on a 40-acre retreat outside Athens, not far from the University of Georgia where he was a member of the Bulldogs’ 2005 NCAA title team and winner of the 2007 Ben Hogan Award. His paddle boards are stored at the home of his parents, who live on a lake. Someday, though, he hopes to the sunrise calls him back to the ocean. Kirk actually started paddle boarding on something of a whim. He missed the cut at the 2010 Melwood Prince George’s County Open in College Park, Md., on what is now known as the Korn Ferry Tour and was headed home, looking for something to pass the time. Kirk called Mac Barnhart, who was his agent at the time, and asked him what he knew about paddle boarding. He told him he wanted to try it. So, the next day, the two men drove to Jacksonville Beach, Florida and rented a couple of boards. Suffice it to say, they were hooked. Kirk and Barnhart both ended up buying paddle boards that day and bringing them home to St. Simon’s Island. Turns out, another friend and local icon, World Golf Hall of Famer Davis Love III, already had one – but he hadn’t quite caught the bug yet. “We were talking to him, saying this is awesome, you’ve got to try it,” Kirk recalls. “And he’s like, oh yeah, I have one of those. And we’re like, of course you do. “So, the three of us went out a ton, Mac and Davis and I, and we’d go out in the mornings. Mac and Davis even opened a paddleboard shop for a little while. And then it became this whole huge thing. And it all came from me missing the cut and wanting to do something on the weekend.” The story gets even better, too. After essentially spending the better part of next week on his paddle board, Kirk went to Arkansas and won the Fort Smith Classic – his first victory as a pro. He would go on to win again that summer and finish second on the Korn Ferry Tour money list to lock up his PGA TOUR card. “We paddled every day for a week,” Kirk said with a grin. “And then I went and won the tournament the next week. So, we’re, like, this is the answer to being a professional golfer.” Kirk, a four-time winner on TOUR, was a quick study. He learned early on to jump off when he felt like he was going to fall rather than risk a collision with the board. “Learning on relatively flat waters is a very easy,” Kirk says. “I don’t know why anyone ever gets on a kayak ever. It’s so much better. It’s kind of the same thing. You can go in and out wherever you want, but I mean, a kayak kills my back and wears out your arms. “On a paddleboard you’re using your whole body standing up and you can see everything better. It’s awesome.” With the exception of a lightning scare when he was out on the water one day, Kirk hasn’t had any mishaps on the paddle board. He can’t say the same about skim boards, though. After the pro-am at the (Korn Ferry) Tour Championship at Daniel Island later that year, Kirk was in the ocean for a little R&R and lost his balance on a skim board. The result was an avulsion fracture of a bone at the base of his left thumb that sidelined him for several months. “So yeah, no more skim boarding,” Kirk says. These days, Kirk’s three energetic young sons – aged 3, 7 and 9 – keep him busy. The oldest, Sawyer, is “just obsessed” with baseball, he says. The middle child, Foster, likes baseball, too, but he also enjoys fishing and shooting his bolt-action single-shot .22 rifle at the range on the family’s property. The baby of the family, Wilder, is usually up for anything but he particularly like wrestling with his dad and riding the trails in Kirk’s 1976 Bronco. Balancing their “me and dad time” with his kids is all-important these days. When they’re older, though, don’t be surprised if Kirk and his family get back to St. Simon’s Island on a more regular basis, maybe even buying a second home there. “We moved away really for being closer to family and to make travel easier for me,” Kirk says. “But we still love it. I wish we got down there more often than we do, and we talk about it all the time.” And when that happens, Kirk might have to buy some more paddle boards.

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Kyle Stanley … The 32-year-old has survived only six of 16 cuts this season, but he’s 126th in the FedExCup thanks in part to a T24 two weeks ago at TPC River Highlands. For the week, he landed inside the top 20 in most measurements of his game off the tee and into greens, but that’s been his profile throughout his career. It’s paid handsomely at Muirfield Village where he has a pair of podium finishes among three top 10s, including a playoff loss just two years ago. He deserves attention again due to that success in conjunction with the familiarity of the sightlines and slower greens. Cameron Tringale … A solid first half of the Rocket Mortgage Classic triggered thoughts of the Diaper Dimension but a third-round 72 thwarted a realistic run at his first victory on the PGA TOUR. He settled for a share of 30th place. That there were signs of something special at all suggests that he’s under the influence of the imminent birth of his first child. His irons were dialed in at Detroit Golf Club. With slower greens than usual at Muirfield Village this week, piling up the scoring opportunities will be first priority. Adam Long … When 13 of 23 career cuts made result in a top 25, it’s not a reach to define him as a top-25 machine. It also means that he licks his chops on weekends. As a rookie in 2018-19, his third- and fourth-round scoring averages were lower than his averages for each of the first two rounds. This season, he’s currently 37th on TOUR in final-round scoring average, but he’s also 20th in the second round. So, the key is simply getting to the weekend, which is, well, not always that simple. However, if he strikes his irons with the precision that yielded a T24 at the Travelers Championship, you won’t be surprised. He led the field at TPC River Highlands in proximity to the hole. Henrik Norlander … Shadowed by Bryson DeChambeau’s statistically historic week at Detroit Golf Club was the Swede’s own triumvirate of pacesetting analytics. No one split more than Norlander’s 48 fairways hit, scored better in Strokes Gained: Approach (+8.29) and no one was more efficient in getting up and down for par (15 of 16). All of that outbalanced below-average putting as he manufactured a T12. He arrived at Muirfield Village with nine consecutive red numbers in tow. Richy Werenski … While he didn’t close the Rocket Mortgage Classic as well as he opened, his T21 easily was his best finish of the restart. And he’s yet to rest. In addition to three appearances on the PGA TOUR since play resumed, he stayed warm in a Korn Ferry Tour event. And he’s yet to miss a cut. He’s also been known to go on a heater. Ranked T2 in fairways hit, T8 in greens in regulation and eighth in proximity at Detroit GC to frontload his signature confident putting. NOTE: Sleeper is a relative term, so Rob uses unofficial criteria to determine who qualifies. Each of the following usually is determined to be ineligible for this weekly staple: Winners of the tournament on the current host course; winners in the same season; recent major champions; top 50 in the Official World Golf Ranking; recent participants of team competitions.

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FARMINGDALE, N.Y. – Everything that is old is new again… or is it? Former FedExCup champion Jordan Spieth revived memories of his dominant times with a putting masterclass at Bethpage Black on Friday, but the question becomes whether or not the 11-time PGA TOUR winner can keep it up. RELATED: Berger back in contention on Long Island | Late birdie run saves McIlroy’s day, week Spieth needed just 23 putts to shoot a second round 4-under 66 and move to 5-under at the PGA Championship, the only major missing in his quest for the career Grand Slam. It moved him into second place on the leaderboard after the morning wave, two shots adrift of Brooks Koepka’s first round lead. Spieth has been without a top-10 on the PGA TOUR since he lost the 54-hole lead at the 2018 Open Championship last July to finish T9. He hasn’t won since the 2017 Open Championship. During the lean times, the Texas native has had issues with both his swing and his putting, particularly from short range. However, in two rounds at Bethpage Black, he’s 30 of 31 from inside 10 feet, reviving memories of 2015 where he won five TOUR events, including the Masters and U.S. Open, as well as the FedExCup. “(Putting is) probably 90 percent back to when I was at my best, and the only difference maker is I think just speed control,â€� Spieth said. “Speed control has still been just a little bit iffy… but I feel as good or better 15 feet and in. I feel like I’m where I should be. I’ve put a lot of thought and work into it, and the putting feels good.â€� Spieth made six birdie putts Friday, including one from 39 feet and another from 20 feet. “It was a bonus to have the right reads and the right pace and with some of the putts I made today, I don’t expect to putt as well as I did today, each and every day. It’s just not possible,â€� he added. “But it feels consistent enough to where the good days are like they were today, and off days, I’m still rolling some good putts and still coming away with some confidence.â€� This weekend, he will need every bit of the confidence he’s built. While Spieth’s opening two rounds this season have been fine, his weekend play that has let him down. Coming into the week, Spieth’s round one scoring average was 69.83, and his second-round average was 68.33. But it drops to 71.67 for the third round and 73.11 in final rounds. Spieth claims the numbers speak to luck in the early parts of tournaments rather than poor play on the back end. “This is different. I don’t feel the same. I feel like the way I scored was actually the way that I played, and any time I was in a situation where it maybe looked like I was contending, it didn’t feel like it this year so far,â€� he said. The key, he says, was being able to trust tighter targets with his swing. But with just 15 of 28 fairways hit through two rounds, and just nine of the 18 greens in regulation on Friday, he will need to be even better to have a shot at being just the sixth man to win all four majors in a career. “Ball just needs to find the fairway as often as it was for the guys around me; DJ, Brooks… It’s not going to be as far as theirs, so I’d better be in as many fairways,â€� Spieth said. “I’m 100 percent not hitting it as well as I did a couple years ago, but I’m hitting it a lot better than I did the end of last year, beginning of this year.â€� And will the career Grand Slam enter his thoughts? “It certainly hasn’t. I can’t imagine it will because I haven’t been in contention on a Sunday since The Open last year,â€� the 25-year-old said. “If I’m able to put some good work in tomorrow, then I will be in contention on Sunday. And at that point, it will be just more of trying to win a golf tournament. It won’t matter to me what tournament it is. I’ll be pleased to be in contention, knowing that the work I put in from being pretty far off has really come back nicely on a very difficult golf course.â€�

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