Woods takes 3-shot lead into final round of TOUR Championship

Wyndham Clark … After enduring a spring slump, which is common for rookies, the 25-year-old connected top 20s at TPC River Highlands and Detroit Golf Club to position himself for a return to the PGA TOUR in 2019-20. With two top 10s among six top 20s this season, he’s 99th in the FedExCup. At a glance, it’d seem logical that a sketchy tee-to-green game not only would get in the way of success, it’d apply too much pressure on his short game. But, wow, his short game. He’s ninth on the PGA TOUR in strokes gained: putting, first in putts per GIR, fifth in one-putt percentage, second in conversion percentage inside 10 feet, third in putting: birdies-or-better and first in three-putt avoidance. Yet, he’s hardly a one-trick thoroughbred at sixth in par-5 scoring. Denny McCarthy … No sophomore slump for this guy. Besides, when you’re exempt from the reshuffle and lead the PGA TOUR in strokes gained: putting, expectations are higher and there are no excuses. Save a week off in early March, he’s been positioned inside the top 125 of the FedExCup standings since a T7 at the Sanderson Farms Championship in his second start. Thrills and spills ensued, but a rock-steady T21 in Detroit last week lifted the 26-year-old to 110th. One more decent showing and he’s a lock to keep his card. Tom Hoge … Regional flavor. The 30-year-old from Fargo, North Dakota, could use a injection of the kind of confidence that guided him to state amateur titles in Minnesota in 2009 and 2010. He arrives with consistent form, albeit lackluster. Since late April, he’s 7-for-8 but without a top-30 finish. However, he did place T43 at the U.S. Open, so that demands some respect. Currently 170th in the FedExCup standings. Tyrone Van Aswegen … Buried in the same category out of which Nate Lashley emerged with victory at the Rocket Mortgage Classic, the South African is no stranger to playing for his job, it’s just that the deck is stacked against him this deep into this season. He’s just 3-for-11 with only one top 40 in 2018-19, and that was but a T29 at Colonial near his residence in late May. So, the bad news is that he’s 217th in the FedExCup standings. The good news is that he needs only 32 points to crack the current top 200 and qualify for the Korn Ferry Tour Finals to begin anew in 2019-20. He’s also gliding in on a T14 at the Utah Championship presented by Zions Bank where he led outright after 36 holes. Collin Morikawa … It’ll take some time before the Class of 2019 can be compared fairly to the Class of 2011 that includes Justin Thomas, Jordan Spieth, Daniel Berger, Emiliano Grillo and others, but it has the makings. With Morikawa, Viktor Hovland, Matthew Wolff and Justin Suh all having turned pro in recent weeks, the clock has started. The very early leader as the most impressive is the 22-year-old who logged a decorated career at Cal. Morikawa already is 3-for-3 with a T14 at the RBC Canadian Open. His equivalent of 88.833 FedExCup points as a non-member would slot him 192nd among members and inside the bubble to qualify for the Korn Ferry Tour Finals. 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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It was far from a New York minute. More like a New York lifetime – or so it felt for Sean O’Hair last August at Bethpage Black. One thought hung over O’Hair heading into THE NORTHERN TRUST, the first event of the FedExCup Playoffs. “You play good or you go home.â€� Which he accepted, by the way. “I think it’s cool to have a situation where you can have a very average year and then have the chance to make it a very good year if you get hot at the right time,â€� he said. You’re not OK with that? Well, to O’Hair it sounds like pro sports. “Isn’t that what it’s all about in (the team sports). It’s not about your stats or how many games you won during the season, it’s about playing well at the right time. The best team doesn’t always win the World Series (or the Super Bowl). It’s usually the team that gets hot at the right time.â€�   It’s about here where O’Hair should have been told of an exchange between a football writer and New England Patriots coach Bill Belichick just before last year’s playoffs were to begin. “You know, you’re not even that good,â€� the writer suggested to the coach. A shrug, a bit of a pause, but no argument from Belichick. Instead, he offered a slight grin and then this vintage Belichickian. “We only have to be better than the team we’re playing each week.â€� O’Hair chuckled and because he’s a sports fan, he knows the flavor that accompanies a story involving Belichick and the Patriots. Seemingly perfect in 2007, their 18-0 record went up in smoke in the Super Bowl. Seemingly “not even that goodâ€� last year, they were good enough to win the Super Bowl. Go figure. Then again, O’Hair said you can’t. It’s sports and that’s why he loves that the PGA TOUR has the FedExCup playoffs. “The thing that’s interesting is, maybe they’re not the playoffs that we know with the team sports, but they’re as close as golf can get to it,â€� said O’Hair. Certainly, O’Hair’s viewpoint has integrity. He broke onto the PGA TOUR when there weren’t playoffs and he’s experienced it all in 13 years. O’Hair made the TOUR Championship the old way (via the money list, in 2005) and he’s made it twice through the FedExCup playoffs. He’s played two seasons and not qualified for the playoffs. The years when he’s made the playoffs have come in different shapes and sizes. In 2012, O’Hair had had a decent season going and when he finished T-7 at the Greenbrier Classic in early July, he was 45th in the FedExCup standings. No reason to think he couldn’t be penciled in for at least three rounds of post-season stuff, right? Wrong. The opposite of “getting hot at the right timeâ€� is going MC, MC, WD to fall down the standings. When he finished T-54 at THE NORTHERN TRUST (then called The Barclays) and T-64 at the Dell Technologies Championship (then known as the Deutsche Bank Championship), he was outside the top 70 and his season was over. Contrast that to last year. O’Hair entered the playoffs 108th in the standings and knew everything was on the line at Bethpage Black. Offering his “best stuff at the right time,â€� O’Hair finished joint second, one behind Patrick Reed, and piled up enough points to make it all the way to the TOUR Championship. While it wasn’t quite the Giants beating the 18-0 Patriots, O’Hair is OK with being held up as an example that these FedExCup Playoffs do deliver the sort of unpredictable drama that we’ve become accustomed to elsewhere on the landscape. “Listen, no one would say that Dustin’s (Johnson) season didn’t blow away Rory’s (McIlroy) season away last year,â€� said O’Hair. “It was Dustin’s FedExCup to lose – and he lost it. It was Rory’s to capitalize on – and he did. I think that makes for great TV.â€� Years ago, Padraig Harrington endorsed what is at the heart of the FedExCup Playoffs – trimming the fields, from 125 to 100 to 70 to 30. “I think you need to have people missing out. I think that’s what’s missing at times,â€� he said. “We need to have players get knocked out. That’s what happens in a playoff.â€� It explains why plenty of players feel the pressure just to advance. William McGirt, for instance. When he was a PGA TOUR rookie in 2011, McGirt entered the playoffs No. 125. For the first time all year, if he wanted to play the next week, McGirt knew he had to earn it, that he couldn’t simply commit. That afforded him a sense of playoff pressure which was only amplified late in the third and final round. (Hurricane Irene was bearing down, thus the first event had been shortened to 54 holes.) Sarah McGirt was encouraged by Caroline Harrington, whose husband, Padraig, was paired with McGirt, who told William he stood, according to the projections. “One-oh-one,â€� she flashed. Translation: With two holes left in his tournament, McGirt was not projected inside the top 100 to get to the next week. Do-or-die time, and McGirt did. He stiffed a 7-iron at the 17th hole, made birdie, finished T-24, and jumped inside the top hundred. Was he excited? “Heck yeah, man,â€� said McGirt. “It’s the playoffs. There’s still a chance.â€� Heath Slocum had proved that two years earlier. Coming into first playoff event 124th in the FedExCup standings, Slocum won at Liberty National, a prime example of playing great at the right time. In 2014, Billy Horschel was 69th to start the FedExCup playoffs, then spiraled to 82nd when he missed the cut in New York. You would have gotten incredible odds against him winning the FedExCup, yet from there he went on an uncanny run – second in Boston, first at the BMW Championship, then at the TOUR Championship. Vintage playoffs. Sometimes you get Kentucky-Kansas (2012), other times you get a surprise like UConn-Butler (2011). For those times like 2012 and 2014 when McIlroy stumbled as the favorite, you get 2016 when the Northern Irishman rose to the occasion as the underdog. Every week starting at THE NORTHERN TRUST, there will be a sense of pressure, a do-or-die mentality for FedExCup Playoffs qualifiers. At the heart of their approach is something Adam Scott said a few years ago:

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Tiger might have to play a lot more than he expected if the U.S. is going to overcome a disastrous first day at the Presidents Cup.

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