PGA Tour: Europeans Countdown to Play-Offs: Notes from the Ballwasher

1).No tournament this week, so let's have a look at the PGA Tour's Europeans as they close out the "regular season":

The Open / Barbasol
Canadian Open
PGA Championship
Travelers
John Deere
Wyndham

That's right, just six tournaments for players to reach the Play-Offs and keep their card for the 16/17 season, just five for those not qualified for the PGA.

2).First we'll knock off those who are certain to be at The Barclays, first tournament of the FedEx series:
Knox, Garcia, McDowell, McIlroy, Lingmerth, Rose, Stenson, Jacobson, Cejka, Lowry, Casey, Donald. Not sure about Danny Willett.

3).But these have work to do as they play towards a Barclays-qualifying FedEx points tally of, say, 475 pts:
Molinari: At 452 points, Franny may be OK, but another Top 30 finish should be enough to be absolutely sure. In The Open and PGA.
Laird: 378 pts, and rather missed the boat at last week's Reno action. He's committed for the Barbasol but will miss out on the PGA unless he wins one of the next two weeks. Not exempt for 16/17 so needs some good form in the coming month or it's the web.com Finals for him.
Donaldson: 296 pts. In The Open and PGA but badly needs some good results. Only played 10 tournaments so wonder if he will try to save his card or resign himself to Europe next year?
Harrington: 292 pts. Past Champion so will surely play Troon and PGA. Could miss the rest due to Olympic ambitions. Exempt for 16/17.
Owen: 287 pts. Perennial bubble boy. Committed for Barbasol but not qualified for the PGA. In trouble, and with no exemption for next year. Needs one more decent result to qualify for conditional status for next year and sure to qualify for the web.com Finals.
Poulter: Out for the season but will presumably play next year on a medical exemption. Which won't do him any good at all unless his play improves. A lot.

4).And the rest of 'em look destined to lose their cards barring a miracle:
Norlander: 166 pts and in a lousy run of form. Has made 8 of his last 9 cuts but no Top 30's all season. Not good enough - seems to have found his level, a web.com destiny. Should qualify for web.com Finals though.
Pettersson: 48 pts. Hopeless, adrift without his anchor. Should be eligible to play next year on a one-time career money exemption. Is it worth it Carl?
Davis: 23 pts. Finished 28th in his first event of the season but has only played sporadically since, with no cuts made. No idea what's in store for him next year, web.com perhaps but is he fit? Will hold "veteran player" status on the PGA Tour and Greg Chalmers' win last week in Reno shows that all is not lost, even with a (likely) ten-event calendar.

5).Well done to DJ last week, and well done to Snakey Chalmers too, a PGA Tour win at last at 42 and probably the only over 40 winner on Tour this season.

Just the Barbasol Championship over here next week, so I'll leave The Open thread to you GB&I experts.

kwinigolfer wrote:

Just the Barbasol Championship over here next week, so I'll leave The Open thread to you GB&I experts.

I understand the ballwasher philosophy but I think you should break ranks and do an Open ballwasher. Maybe the admins will even make it a global thread

Nah,
You guys have the perspective and expertise . . . . . . . .

Awww modesty can be such an irritating trait. It's a demonstrable fact that your ballwasher threads are the most commented on threads on the golf board. If we wanted a thread to go global for one week (as opposed to interminable wussball blogs) then surely the ballwasher is the candidate

Think about it - it could be a McLaren thread that makes the grade!

Kwini

If you don't write an Open article I doubt anyone else will, and it is technically a PGA tour event. And obviously yours will be better.


Doesn't seem like Donaldson really gave the PGAT a proper go, I know double dipping is hard but he has made a real mess of it.

Do you know if Kaymer will take up PGAT membership again next season?

Mac,
I've never written an Open thread, always focussed on the "opposite field" tournament.

Donaldson looks like he's fallen out of love with the idea of playing in America - as you say, he's never fully committed to it, his schedule always seeming to be "if this works and I play well, I'll keep doing it. If not, I'll go home".
Lowry gives the same vibe, but his best usually better than Donaldson's best.

No idea about Kaymer but I get the sense that he may have had some sort of disagreement with the PGA Tour - he now seems very ambivalent about it. Playing well this summer, just not finishing off tournaments the way one (I) would like to see.

I'll put up a thread if Kwini decides not to do it, I'll just put up the tee-times because it is hard to write an article that lives up to these threads!

Ishikawa returned from injury this week on the Japanese tour with a missed cut, good to see him return though!

First Open without Ivor Robson? Hopefully they'll replace him with someone more successful than on Top Gear..

pedro wrote:First Open without Ivor Robson? Hopefully they'll replace him with someone more successful than on Top Gear..

According to Golf Digest they are replacing him with two blokes.

sirbenson

Hadn't even noticed Rio had been missing.

OK, We were talking last week's thread a little about Charlie Howell.
My lad just sent me a fortnight-old podcast on NLU with CHIII. If you have a spare hour to listen to a golfer sound like a genuine human being, this is well worth your time:

http://nolayingup.com/2016/06/14/nlu-podcast-episode-42-charles-howell-iii/

I was chatting to an older lady also following Chuck once and she lived in the Windermere gated community that Tiger and Chuck, among others, lived in and she reckoned Charlie Howell was just about the nicest guy ever. This podcast won't be everyone's cup of tea but he certainly sounds more interesting and fun than the guy on TV churning out Top Ten's relentlessly.
Ironic that he ascribes his relative longevity on Tour to not being injured, and now he's had surgery and is out for a month . . . . . .

Daniel Berger out of the Open (( That's a shame

Seems like a return to the bad old days when so many would keep their passports in their drawer.
Pity you didn't get a chance to pick him, sirb.

Not the absolute worst field you've ever seen for next week's Barbasol Championship, and Laird, Norlander, Owen and Pettersson are declared runners. And a welcome return to Tour action by Jarrod Lyle.

There goes DJ, the first American to just say no to Rio. Patrick Reed first in line, wonder whether he'll go?

No wonder Golf Digest put Bubba on the cover of their Olympic issue - he's the only one who's said he's 100% going!

I am sure Gerry could get "injured" at some point between now and Rio.


What was Berger's excuse for withdrawing from the Open?

Reed said in his Scottish Open Presser that he will go

Q. There's been a lot of talk about golf in the Olympics, guys pulling out, Zika virus. What's your take on that whole scenario?

PATRICK REED: Well, I can't catch Rickie at the end of this week. Mathematically, it's impossible. So our team is set on the four. If one of them happened to pull out, then I will definitely be playing.

Any time I can wear stars and stripes, I do it. I get the call tomorrow, I'll be on the flight. It doesn't matter to me on where it is, when it is. If I can play for my country, I'm going to go play.

Berger tweeted this yesterday. (looks like he WD for the same reason he WD from B-Stone last week.)

https://twitter.com/DanielBerger59/status/751516706908938240

Mac,
Bubba will definitely go, no reason for him not to really. Plus, it's a family thing, Bubba second in this regard.

Bubba has been in TV saying only three things will stop him going: he doesn't qualify; government tells him no; Olympic Cttee tells him no. He appreciates he is in a different position re other players re families etc.

The greatest of athlete of all time won today!!

A side note Brooks has withdrawn from the Open

That's a big deal for Koepka, must put his Ryder Cup place in jeopardy, especially if he's not fit for the PGA (altho he seems to suggest he will be).
Colt "Big Gravy" Knost will be lugging his fat arse to Troon, Jon Curran on deck.

sirbenson wrote:The greatest of athlete of all time won today!!

If you mean Serena, then I agree she has a pretty strong case.

Indeed Mac, ICONIC!LEGEND!

sirb,
Tks yr note - you apparently have a v2 setting which doesn't allow "private messages". But be my guest this week; I'll do a couple of notes for the Barbasol, but I'll leave The Open open!

She great but not in Tigers league.

This week would normally see us following the Greenbrier - last year's Champ was Danny Lee and you'd think he'd've "defended" his title and not followed the Rickie Fowler route.
In that case, Danny Lee would not now be contending in Scotland.
Fate. You just never know!

What happens if Danny Lee wins the Scottish Open and next year both tournaments are scheduled for the same week?
Which one would he defend?

I'd put my half crown on Dundonald. (Which reminds one that his brother Luke had another very average week.)

Confirmation from the USA Olympic qualifiers that Rickie Fowler and Patrick Reed join Bubba Watson as definites for Rio, Spieth still waffling.
And we haven't heard an absolute positive for Rio from Danny Willett or Justin Rose, have we?

Heartbreaking loss for Anna Nordqvist.

Sounds like another moment of glory for the USGA.

kwinigolfer wrote:And we haven't heard an absolute positive for Rio from Danny Willett or Justin Rose, have we?

Justin Rose has been doing a sort of count down on his Twitter account to the Olympics. I thought I saw somewhere that Willett said he was going.

Anyone got a link to a video of the Nordqvist incident in the bunker?

Although hard to see how it would have altered the outcome even if Lang had not known about the penalty. It wasn't like she was about to try fire right at a tight pin just over the water whatever info she had.

Would Nordqvist have been more aggressive if she knew she was really two back? Did Nordqvist know there was the possibility of a penalty being applied?

Lang said she was thinking she needed birdie on that final hole so she would have gone at that pin. Nordqvist found out after her approach to 18 so had no opportunity be aggressive

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bY5IX4p_fAo

I'm never wrong wrote:What happens if Danny Lee wins the Scottish Open and next year both tournaments are scheduled for the same week?
Which one would he defend?

Greenbrier is scheduled two weeks before next years Open Championship. John Deere takes back its normal spot in the schedule, the week before the Open.

I, for one, am sick of this TV interference.

So, she did move some sand. Does anyone really think (a) it helped her execute the shot (b) she did it on purpose? My opinion is no on both counts.

I would get rid of all this TV replay stuff and totally rely on what 99% of golfers do in professional tournaments ... call infractions on themselves.

Shotrock wrote:I, for one, am sick of this TV interference.

So, she did move a some sand. Does anyone really think (a) it helped her execute the shot (b) she did it on purpose? My opinion is no on both counts.

I would get rid of all this TV replay stuff and totally rely on what 99% of what golfers do in professional tournaments ... call infractions on themselves.

100 % with you on this one Shotrock. One of the people who posted a reply to the clip shown on YouTube asked if they were going to video - in great detail - all the players bunker shots over the four days? Not practical. So are you doing a disservice to her, by not videoing everyone else? The game of golf is all about equity, after all.

There goes another one, as Spieth just says NO! to Rio. Koocha up next.
Bet the USGA & PGA Tour are less than thrilled with losing their top two golfers.

Haven't FatPrick Reed and Sh1t Shoes already been given the 2 yank spots Kwini?

Up to four slots for any nation provided that the golfers are in the Top 15 of the Olympic ranking system (how many arms did Finchem twist to get that sop to the US included?). Kooch is 15th apparently, so if he drops out (unlikely I would think) the US will be down to three participants.

Thought it's two women and two men though isn't it Kwini?

A nation gets 4 players per sex if they have 4 or more players in the top 15 of the world ranking.

super_realist wrote:Haven't FatPrick Reed and Sh1t Shoes already been given the 2 yank spots Kwini?

Classy!

Shotrock wrote:I, for one, am sick of this TV interference.

So, she did move some sand. Does anyone really think (a) it helped her execute the shot (b) she did it on purpose? My opinion is no on both counts.

I would get rid of all this TV replay stuff and totally rely on what 99% of golfers do in professional tournaments ... call infractions on themselves.

while I agree with you in theory, it is much harder to put "gray areas" in the rules. Much easier to write rules that are black & white.

Junior golfers are taught from a young age that "Thou shall not ground club in a hazard".

Nordqvist did. Her biggest problem that she gave her club an opportunity to touch the sand. Her club should have been no closer than an inch to the sand.

KT Kim and Vic Dubie also out. Wonder if Vic will play Troon?

GPB - True enough with the club being that close ... but I would still rather rely on players calling infractions on themselves.

Kwin - I know you thought you saw Tim Finchem at the Masters Champion's dinner this year, but now he "twisted arms" to get the US 4 spots? Conspiracy!!!

!!!! Life's a conspiracy . . . . there's always something!
Hadn't realised Que and Tanihara also out. Reported withdrawals now stand at 20.

Can someone explain why someone likely on the verge of impotence like Vijay Singh has "pulled out" Surely to be Alan Partridge about this neither Mr or Mrs Singh need to worry about the consequences of Zika?

The Olympic Golf medal isn't just going to have one * next to it, it should have dozens, it's going to be about as strong as a midweek sweep at Mac's Muni.

F-king amateurs, in every sense. (Just if you were in doubt..)

http://www.golfchannel.com/news/golf-central-blog/usga-president-apologizes-name-mix

Even I knew her name.