Weekend Wrap: Clark Wins Rain-Shortened AT&T After Historic 60
Weekend Wrap: Clark Wins Rain-Shortened AT&T After Historic 60
Niemann takes LIV's opener and reiterates his hope of help getting into more majors. Plus, more weekend action, U.S. Women's Open has new partner and what exactly is the SSG getting for $1.5 billion?
The AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am was called Sunday evening as hurricane force winds damaged tournament infrastructure and the 17 Mile Drive remained closed. Wyndham Clark will go down as the PGA Tour’s first “signature” event winner after a third round 60 left him one clear of Ludvig Aberg and two ahead of Matthieu Pavon. This was the first Tour event to be shortened in eight years.
Pausing here for 54-hole irony jokes.
In today’s Quad we’ll look at Clark’s epic 60 coming in the same era when manufacturer lapdogs have said records aren’t falling, it’s all about the agronomy and don’t you stop us from shopping until we be dropping $700 on an AI-infused driver!
Off the soggy golf course, it sounds like the Tap Room and The Lodge housed no shortage of First World gossiping and ego-tussling over the ongoing mystery of what the PGA Tour’s future looks like. Down in Mexico, the first LIV event of 2024 showed off their new acquisitions and produced a wild finish. Also, weekend tournament outcomes to note, a new U.S. Women’s Open sponsor, Bernhard Langer’s “training exercises” mishap, and a question about what we did not learn from this week’s PGA Tour equity infusion news.
This is also a reminder ICYMI: Friday I wrote about prospects for a Vision Pro second screen experience, while Thursday’s News and Notes included Netflix news coupled with Scott Simpson’s lively interview prompting plenty of comments. Onward.
60 At Pebble Beach!
With weather shortening the 2024 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, Wyndham Clark’s decision to cautiously strike his 18th hole eagle putt looks pretty brilliant. Even if eagle would have meant a 59, an excessively-aggressive three-putt would have meant a tie with Ludvig Aberg.
With the tournament shortened to 54-holes Sunday night as Pebble Beach was hit by a massive winter storm, Clark has now recorded his third PGA Tour title in ten months. The AT&T win will go nicely with his 2023 Wells Fargo and 2023 U.S. Open. Clark’s previous three appearances at Pebble Beach had produced little to suggest he was prepared to break the course record by two strokes (T61/2019, T18/2020, T65/2022).
Alright, alright I’ve put it off long enough: the 60 came on a day when preferred lies were in place. As with Al Geiberger’s historic 59, lift, clean and place produces an inevitable debate. I’m leaving it up to you all to vote on that a bit later into this post. Some numbers to possibly influence your vote:
Clark hit 9/14 fairways. Hit 16/18 greens. Hit 23 putts. Averaged 289.7 yards on all drives and 308.7 on the two measuring holes. Did I mention the balls were hitting and bouncing backwards?
Three of his nine birdies were made on holes where Clark missed the fairway.
Breaks the Pebble Beach course record by two with a 12-under 60 (62: Matthias Schwab/2022, Patrick Cantlay/2021, David Duval/1997, Tom Kite/1983).
Clark’s left dead-center putts just short at the 16th, 17th and 18th. He was within inches of a 57. With a bogey on the card.
It’s the 54th 60 in PGA Tour history, just two weeks after Nick Dunlap shot the same score at La Quinta CC.
Clark’s opening 28 tied the lowest score held by three others for Pebble Beach’s front nine and at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am.
He made 189 feet, 9 inches of putts. His previous career best was 156 feet, 6 inches at the Shriner’s.
The likely record—Shotlink unconfirmed—for length of putts in a round belongs to Cameron Smith at the 2022 Open Championship. Smith’s 255 feet of putts to Clark’s 190 feet Saturday came at the Old Course. Its double greens average over 22,000 square feet. Pebble Beach’s 18 putting surfaces average just 3,500 square feet.
Okay, those are the numbers.
So is it a course record? (Tom Kite’s 62 in 1983 was also played under preferred lies, as Bill Fields notes in this piece about Clark’s record round and players getting to touch the ball).
Also…
Rory McIlroy recently took himself off a rich-getting richer player text chain and continues to lukewarmly endorse a PGA Tour partnership with the Public Investment Fund’s (Alex Miceli/SI.com). An advocate for a more global perspective, McIlroy recently retired from policy board Zoom meetings to spend less time listening to Patrick Cantlay’s wisdom, McIlroy appears to be in the player minority regarding his stance. That became more evident when his board replacement, Jordan Spieth, suggested a different approach toward Saudi Arabia after the PGA Tour’s new Strategic Sports Group capital infusion was made official. Spieth seems unaware that the PIF has already won and McIlroy is advocating for a compromise solution to prevent more problems. The two had an hour-long meeting after McIlroy turned in his text chain key and it sounds like they agreed to disagree.
The full amateur leaderboard is here.
Most of the world rejoiced at Tom Brady providing incontrovertible evidence he is human.
LIV: Niemann Wins, Legion XIII (Finally) Conquers
Those team names, those uniforms!