Monday Scramble: Match Play reveals flaws, the future, and frustration

Kevin Kisner gets his revenge, Sergio Garcia and Matt Kuchar land in another controversy, Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy surprise, Graeme McDowell wins again, Tony Romo shoots 15 over, and more in this week’s edition of Monday Scramble:

Go ahead and pencil in Kevin Kisner for the next few U.S. team competitions.

He might just be America’s answer to Ian Poulter – only with a Southern drawl.

Kisner proved his match-play chops once again in Austin, rolling through a gauntlet of 2018 Ryder Cupper Tony Finau, red-hot Keith Mitchell and the aforementioned Poulter to advance to pool play. He then knocked off Chinese star Haotong Li, match-play specialist Louis Oosthuizen and a seemingly unbeatable Francesco Molinari to reach the finals for the second consecutive year.

Unlike last year, when he was blown out by Bubba Watson, Kisner kept his head during the championship match and cruised to a convincing, 3-and-2 victory over Matt Kuchar for the biggest title of his career.

Including the 2017 Presidents Cup, Kisner is now 15-1-2 over his past three match-play competitions.

There’s no sense revisiting the decisions of past captains, but it’s clear that Kiz shouldn’t be left at home anytime soon.

1. Kisner wasn’t about to make the same mistake as last year.

Before getting steamrolled by Watson in the finals, he tried to cram everything into an hour: media, a quick lunch and a full range session before returning to the first tee.

“That’s just not feasible with how much golf you’ve played,” he said.

So this time, Kisner took a shower, hung out, received some treatment on his body and hit maybe 20 range balls before heading to No. 1.

“I think it helped my mental side of the game as much as anything,” he said. “I wasn’t overhyped for it and just tried to play a casual round of golf.”

Kisner never trailed in the finals.

2. Kisner isn’t shy to admit it: “Money has driven me my whole life.”

That’s been the case ever since his father gave him $16,000 to start his pro career, and it was up to Kisner to make it last as long as he could or find another job.

Well, with his victory Sunday, he banked $1.745 million and pushed his career earnings to nearly $19 million.

“I’m the cheapest guy in the world,” he said. “I hoard that money like crazy, because I don’t know when it’s going to run out, and I don’t want it to run out. I don’t know how long I’m going to be able to make a 10-footer.”

3. All that talk about how every match in pool play still matters? That took a hit last week.

Prior to this year, only eight players had lost a round-robin match and advanced to the knockout stage.

Kisner became the first champion who also dropped his opening match, shattering the myth that this event is still, essentially, win or go home.

4. Hey, imagine that, Sergio Garcia and Matt Kuchar found themselves in another controversy at the WGC-Match Play.

It’s already been a long year for the two veterans – Garcia was DQ’d in Saudi Arabia for reportedly destroying five greens, while Kuchar suffered waves of bad p.r. for stiffing his temporary caddie – and not surprisingly neither player emerged from this incident unscathed, either.

Garcia, obviously, screwed up, and he later owned that. He’s the one who didn’t wait for the audible concession before he botched his 6-inch backhanded putt. And he’s the one who put Kuchar in an unfair position, asking him to concede the next hole in an apparent make-good.

But Kuchar wasn’t exactly a shining example of sportsmanship. He simply could have kept quiet about the no-concession and headed to the next hole. Instead, he told Garcia that he hadn’t conceded the putt and then snitched to the official: “I didn’t want that to be how a hole was won or lost.”

Right. So don’t bring it up.

It was awfully sneaky ...

5. This isn’t how we expected Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy to head into the Masters.

Let’s start with Tiger. He was fortunate to advance out of pool play, after getting some help from Brandt Snedeker. Then he knocked off Rory with a display of clinical precision, only to squander a back-nine lead against Lucas Bjerregaard. In the afternoon, at the end of a 36-hole day, Woods missed four times inside 6 feet, including a shocking misread from 5 feet on the 18^th green to lose.

It sure doesn’t seem like his game is sharp enough to win the Masters.

6. As for Rory ... he looked totally out of sorts in his Round of 16 match against Woods, missing low on several makeable putts early in his round – a clear sign of tension while competing against his boyhood idol.

Though he rallied to cut the deficit to one hole, McIlroy self-immolated in the biggest moment of the match. After a 395-yard (!) drive on 16, he dumped what couldn’t have been more than a 9-iron short and right of the green, in a tricky spot, leading to a bladed pitch shot, unplayable lie and double-bogey 7. Woods, whose drive was buried under the lip of a fairway bunker and had 200-plus for his third shot, didn’t even have to attempt his 30-footer for birdie.

The meltdown spawned so many questions – Why the early misses? Why were you going anywhere near the flag on 16 with your opponent in trouble? Mis-club or mis-hit? – none of which McIlroy answered afterward, since he was so hot that he bolted for his courtesy car without speaking to the media. [Though, he did post this statement to his Instagram page.]

It was precisely the kind of head-scratching miscue that has undone McIlroy over the past few years, and next week the stakes will be higher than ever for the prohibitive Masters favorite.

7. Francesco Molinari’s reign of terror ended in the Sunday semifinals.

It was a shocking end to Molinari’s 10-match winning streak, especially considering how dominant he’d been across his first four days in Austin. Prior to facing Kisner, he had led for all but seven holes and had yet to see the 18^th hole in competition.

But Molinari couldn’t overcome his worst performance of the week, during which he made six bogeys (including a three-putt on the final green) to lose to Kisner. He got right during the hour-long break and won the consolation match over Bjerregaard, in the process taking an extra $138,000 and more world ranking and FedExCup points.

8. This was Year 4 of the round-robin format at the WGC-Match Play, and apparently players aren’t wholly satisfied with it.

That was the takeaway after it became public that the PGA Tour player advisory council rejected a proposal that would have seen pool play early in the week before a stroke-play finale over the weekend.

Of course that idea was shot down. The winner of the Tour’s premier match-play event would be determined by ... stroke play? It made no sense.

Instead, if there’s a change to be made – and we’re not yet sold that it’s necessary – it should be this: Have a 36- or 54-hole stroke-play qualifier and then a knockout bracket on the weekend.

That format keeps the stars there for two or three days, appeasing sponsors and TV partners. The stroke-play portion is better prep for those with an eye on Augusta. There’d likely be an epic playoff for the final few spots. And it guarantees that the 16 players who are performing the best make it through to the weekend, when there’ll be the most drama and volatility.

Those watching the early coverage of the PGA Tour’s opposite-field event in the Dominican Republic were probably confused: Why was Tony Romo allowed to play as an amateur while he’s also endorsing Skechers golf shoes? Isn’t that what got Lucy Li in trouble?

Well, it’s two different cases, apparently, since Romo’s reputation is built, first and foremost, on his NFL career, not what he’s done on the golf course.

The USGA inadvertently delivered a crushing blow to Romo’s ego with this explanation: “The Rules of Amateur Status prohibit an amateur golfer from being part of such promotions only when he or she has ‘golf skill.’ In the case of Tony Romo, while he plays at a high level he is not considered to have ‘golf skill’ as they are defined in the rules.”

Savage!

By the way, Romo missed the cut again, firing the same 36-hole score (79-80) as last year and beating only one player.

Maybe the Nelson will go smoother ...

This week’s award winners ...

Welcome Relief: Graeme McDowell. After a rough few years adjusting to life as a family man, G-Mac is back in the winner’s circle for the first time since November 2015. With a clutch birdie on the 71^st hole in the Dominican Republic, McDowell won by a shot, his victory keeping him exempt on Tour through 2021.

Lucky Charm: Stephen Gallacher. The former Ryder Cupper snapped a five-year winless drought by capturing the Indian Open – with his 18-year-old son on the bag, who constantly reminded his pops: “Just keep doing what you are doing. Make sure you have the right club. Get the process right. Pick your shot and hit it. That’s all you can do.” Good stuff.

Guess Who’s Heating Up?: Inbee Park. The Queen Bee’s putter went cold Sunday at the Kia Classic, but her tie for second (behind winner Nasa Hataoka) was her best finish in nearly a year and portends well for this week’s ANA Inspiration, which she won in 2013.

Oh?: Rory’s pre-Masters run. There have been just two players to record seven or more top-10 finishes, including a win, in a PGA Tour season before April 1: Tiger (2000) and ... Rory, this year.

Career First: Justin Rose. The Englishman was upended in the Round of 16, but for the first time in his career, he’ll enter the year’s first major at No. 1 in the world. Both he and Dustin Johnson are idle this week, but the math will work in his favor before the Masters.

Guessing Game: WGC-Match Play. So much for all of the talk about “upsets” – with 64 of the top 66 players in the world, and 18-hole match play, anyone can win. And so it was that 41 of the matches were won by higher seeds in poor play ... and 41 were won by lower seeds. It’s a toss-up.

Up and Down of the Week: Tiger. Seemingly dead over the back of the green, Woods instead dropped to his knees, turned the club around and popped a left-handed punch out onto the green, 5 feet away, to improbably tie the hole.

Timely: Chip McDaniel. The former Kentucky standout and Monday qualifier dialed up 10 birdies in the final round in the Dominican Republic, vaulting all the way into joint fifth and earning a spot in this week’s Valero Texas Open.

Blown Fantasy Pick of the Week: Tommy Fleetwood. Well, he was a popular one-and-done pick, given his current form (T-3 at Bay Hill; T-5 at Players) and his outstanding record while teaming with Molinari at the Ryder Cup. Instead, he couldn’t even advance out of pool play, going 1-1-1 as Louis Oosthuizen (whom we also considered) marched on. Sigh.