Weekend Wrap: Rahm May Be Gone, Distance News, Tiger's Comeback
Meanwhile Scottie Scheffler cruises to Hero win an LIV golfers capture national Opens. Rory defends governing bodies as the world awaits a monumental decision from Jon Rahm.
Just another eventful weekend in golf.
Two LIV players won national Opens.
Scottie Scheffler did not three-putt en route to winning the Hero.
Tiger Woods finished 72 holes looking like he can be competitive in 2024.
The player portion of the PGA Tour Board sent out a rosy memo making clear they want the kind of private equity that’s not plundering nursing homes and Toys R Us.
A high-energy particle headed toward earth to the bafflement of scientists.
And if it’s not clear by now, I’ve buried the lede long enough: Masters champion/YouTube golf historian Jon Rahm—who would never go to LIV—might be headed to LIV for hundreds of millions in a move that may implode the history-rich PGA Tour and confirm it’s an American entity while ceding the globe to LIV.
Oh, and the governing bodies are (finally) going to announce distance rule changes this week.
The distance news included a reveal of another two-year implementation delay to 2028. That did not stop the sweeping declarations lacking a shred of factual backing, inevitable “grow the rough” shallowness and little shortage of conflict-of-interest-laced histrionics from a coddled golfing world hoping sugar daddies in Carlsbad and Fairhaven might send a free dozen or buy a full page print ad. But at least the whining grew so ridiculous that Rory McIlroy pried a changed-so-he-can’t-Tweet-password away from his spouse so he could question what all the fuss was about. Best of all, he slammed money interests for dictating what’s best for the game in his view (bifurcation).
But let’s start with tournament outcomes where LIV golfers succeeded in 72 hole, full-field events and the World No. 1 solidified his standing after a very short off-season. After all, on-course dramatics still—barely, sometimes, maybe—supersede the boardroom antics of the Real Tour Wives Of Ponte Vedra.
Scheffler Picks Up Where He Left Off, Only Better
Scottie Scheffler carved out a post-Ryder Cup “off-season” to work on his putting with short game guru Phil Kenyon. Despite woes on the greens, Scheffler was returning from another excellent campaign that saw 13 top 5’s in 2023 and impressive wins in several statistical categories. But Scheffler ranked a woeful 167th in Strokes Gained putting that prompted extreme irritability with himself and his team.
Refreshed, maybe a few pounds heavier and looking comfortable on Albany’s tricky greens, Scheffler captured the Hero World Challenge by three over Sepp Straka.
Scheffler was runner-up to Viktor Hovland in his first two Hero appearances.
In holding off a solid field of 20, Scheffler hit 43 of 52 fairways, 50 of 72 greens and gained strokes on the field with his putting (0.769) thanks to an average of 26.5 putts per round.
The win keeps Scheffler at No. 1 in the world, marking his 64th career week atop the Official World Golf Ranking.
Elsewhere in the Hero:
Collin Morikawa (7th/-12) was assessed a two-stroke penalty Sunday morning after breaching Model Local Rule G-11 restricting use of green-reading materials during the third round. His caddie J.J. Jackovac recorded data on the putting green and used it on the course. The breach was reported to the rules staff by Excel stablemate Matthew Fitzpatrick, according the Todd Lewis of NBC.
Two-time defending champion Hovland posted a final-round 63 to finish 10th.
Will Zalatoris finished 20th of 20 in his first completed worldwide start since the 2023 WGC Dell Match Play. Out since a pre-Masters WD and subsequent back surgery, the 27-year-old introduced a long putter in place of his previous arm lock method. He continued to struggle with short putts to the point the PGA Tour issued takedown demands on Twitter. A few are out there still. Thoughts and prayers.
Tiger Woods finished 18th in his first start since the Masters. More details below.
Australian Open: Niemann Wins, Buhai Defends
Joaquin Niemann captured the men’s portion of the ISPS HANDA Australian Open in a sudden death playoff over Rikuya Hoshino. It is Niemann’s first win since the 2022 Genesis Invitational and joining LIV in August that year.
The 27-year-old Chilean started four strokes behind last week’s runner-up Hoshino and the Australian PGA winner, Min Woo Lee. Niemann waited over 90 minutes for the playoff after posting 66. In sudden death, Niemann lipped out an eagle putt on the first hole of sudden death before recording the winning three on the second hole.
“During the whole week I was driving really good, enjoying one of my best weeks off the tee,” Niemann said. “Then coming down the stretch I didn’t hit a good driver on 17 and on 18, I didn’t know if I was able to get on the play-off and did a few drivers on the range and I found something.”
With their finishes, Niemann, Hoshino and Adam Scott have secured their places at The 152nd Open at Royal Troon through the Open Qualifying Series.
However, with Scott ranked 46th in the world ranking and likely to get in The Open on his ranking status next year, Grant Forrest of Scotland would receive the third spot after tying with Scott. He will be next in line based on world ranking, with Laurie Canter next as an alternate out of the Australian Open. (Any golfer who earns an Open qualifying place before the closing date for entries and then becomes exempt under one or more other categories will see their OQS place will awarded to the next best placed non-exempt golfer at that qualifying event.)
On the women’s side, Ashleigh Buhai successfully defended her title won last year on the sandbelt despite a final round 75, holding off Australia’s Minjee Lee.
“I’ve never defended professional tournaments back-to-back although I have as an amateur, very proud,” Buhai said. “Minjee made a run at me, to do it against her, she played fantastic today. I know that everybody was kind of cheering for her, but it was great, there were a lot of South Africans out there too that were supporting me.”
You can read Martin Blake’s account of the women’s championship here.
Burmester Wins Again
Dean Burmester has recorded back-to-back South African victories in DP World Tour sanctioned events. A final round 68 led to a comeback win in the South African Open Championship over Renato Paratore, Jesper Svensson and South Ryan van Velzen.
The 34-year-old LIV golfer now has four DP World Tour victories and two in a row wearing his Stingers garb.
“Back-to-back, I’ve never done that before so that was special,” Burmester said. “It’s obviously one as a South African that I’ve always wanted to win. It’s a tournament I watched growing up and I watched a lot of legends.”
Tiger’s Encouraging Comeback
After round one Woods said “everything hurts” when asked how he felt about his first competitive effort since April. But he recovered for Friday’s second round and overall looked far more comfortable walking than at any time since his February, 2021 car accident near Palos Verdes.
“I'm ecstatic how the week turned out not just from me playing but I think organizationally of the event and how everything’s been run,” Woods said after Sunday’s Hero World Challenge final round. It was the third time Woods has made a comeback at the event benefiting his foundation.
This time around a surgically repaired ankle gave him newfound freedom walking.
“I haven't done it with my ankle the way it is now and I was excited each and every day to kind of get through it and kind of start piecing rounds together again,” he said. “I haven't done this in a long time so it was fun to feel that again.”
Woods averaged 304.9 yards and hit one 370-yard drive over four rounds, posting 75-70-71-72-288 (E) for a T18 and beating only Wyndham Clark and Will Zalatoris. Woods hit 42/72 greens, while averaging 28 putts and 1.67 putts per green in regulation. He gained 3.7 strokes off the tee but lost 2.8 around the green, another 4 strokes to the field on the greens and in a stat he will most want to clean up going forward, -5.15 approaching.
“Every day I got faster into the round,” he said of working off the rust. “The first day took me a while to get a handle on it, second day was faster, today was right away. And that's eventually, when I play on a regular basis, that's normally how it is. It takes me usually during warmup before I get a feel for the round.”
On the short game front Woods appeared to be standing taller and closer to the ball. But he also worked in a few of his traditional Albany-induced flubbed wedges.
“It's one of the most difficult golf courses we come to with grain and having to chip the ball up with the holes running away from you,” he said. “It's tough. There's a lot of -- Sam [Burns] and I were talking about it today, you use 3-wood, 4-iron, 5-wood, hybrid. That was kind of -- he was talking about using pitching wedge instead of a 60. These are all weird things that we don't normally see, right? It's normally just a lob wedge and go hack it out, but this is a different golf course around the greens.”
Woods was most encouraged by his driving.