Max Homa arrives, Rory McIlroy retreats, Brooks Koepka misfires, Robby Shelton earns a promotion and more in this week’s edition of the Monday Scramble:
Max Homa is a sports writer’s dream: Young, engaging and irreverent, with a terrific story to tell.
Homa, 28, has been to hell and back in his career, but he just kept pounding away, chasing a dream that at times felt miles away.
His lows were extraordinarily low – so low that most in his position would quit – but that overlooks a background that was ripe for Tour success: NCAA champion, Walker Cup member, Web.com Tour winner.
And so in his third crack on the PGA Tour, at one of the toughest tracks all year, Homa played with the poise of a seasoned veteran, coasting to a three-shot victory at the Wells Fargo Championship.
Then he filled up the notebook, as he always does, with thoughtful remarks like this: “When I hit rock bottom, I found a shovel and kept digging. ... I’m very proud I finally found a ladder and started climbing upward, because it was getting dark down there.”
Golf is infinitely better with players like Homa.
1. Two years ago, Homa was lost. Suffering through the driver yips, he made just 2 of 17 cuts, earned $18,008 and saw his world ranking plummet into the 1000s.
“Nobody knew who I was; no one cared,” he said. “I felt like I shouldn’t be playing practice rounds with people. I felt like I was on an island and it was borderline embarrassing.”
Sent back down to the Web, Homa needed to birdie the last four holes of the regular-season finale or he wouldn’t have even qualified for the 2018 Finals, where he eventually earned back his card. Without that birdie run, Homa would have been back at square one – Q-School.
It’s the small steps that led to a big breakthrough.
2. So why was this Homa’s time?
Sure, he’s sorted out his driver. And yes, he has a better attitude nowadays, thanks to the playful banter with his caddie, Joe Greiner. And, no doubt, he was trending, with just one missed cut since late January.
But the real reason why Homa was able to outduel a strong field on a major-caliber course, as usual, came down to the putter. He led the field in strokes gained: putting, picking up nearly 10 shots on the field and holing a number of clutch putts on his back nine to stay comfortably in front.
On Sunday, he missed just twice in 16 attempts from inside 10 feet – an impressive feat considering he was in Tour contention for the first time.
3. The Wells Fargo continues to produce one of the most bizarre leaderboards of the year. Just look at the winners there since 2012!
• Rickie Fowler
• Derek Ernst
• J.B. Holmes
• Rory McIlroy
• James Hahn
• Justin Thomas (2017 PGA)
• Jason Day
• Max Homa
Try to find a pattern in THAT.
4. Rory McIlroy squandered a golden opportunity to assert his dominance.
Just two shots behind heading into the final round, needing to chase down players who were either unproven or recently untested, McIlroy instead retreated. He parred the first eight holes, then went on a tournament-killing run around the turn, three-putting the ninth and then flubbing two pitch shots short of the 10th green en route to a double.
McIlroy shot 73 – a forgettable Sunday that was reminiscent of his sloppy finale at Bay Hill – and added to an already pedestrian final-round scoring average that now ranks 93rd on Tour.
5. Credit to Jason Dufner: he’s rebuilt his life and his game from rock bottom. Now 42, he’s capable of playing exquisite golf from tee to green – in fact, he led the field in that category at Quail Hollow, gaining nearly 13 shots on his competitors with his ball-striking.
But on the greens ... well, on the greens, it continues to be NSFW-level stuff, especially the closer he gets to the hole. Even while working with putting guru Phil Kenyon, Dufner stands over the ball for an agonizingly long time. Last week he missed 12 times inside 10 feet, including three whiffs from inside 5 feet. Oftentimes it looked as though the putts had no chance to drop – and that he knew it.
He sank just 29 feet worth of putts on Saturday. In the final round, he wasn’t much better – only 42 feet.
He’ll need to ball-strike his way to a sixth PGA Tour title, because his putting doesn’t inspire much confidence.
6. Brooks Koepka continued its feud with Golf Channel analyst Brandel Chamblee by pinning a red clown nose on Chamblee’s photograph on Twitter.
His latest beef? That Chamblee said on a podcast that Tiger Woods’ chief challengers are Dustin Johnson and Rory McIlroy, thus leaving out the man who has won three of the past seven majors he’s played.
Noted-moron Steve Elkington jumped in and said that Chamblee, a one-time Tour winner, wasn’t “qualified” enough to offer an opinion on the matter. That’s ridiculous, of course – by that logic, Jack Nicklaus is the only one who can critique Tiger.
As usual, Elkington’s trite response is easy to dismiss, but Koepka’s sensitive response is just another example of how most of the world’s best players are placed in bubble wrap and shielded from anything resembling criticism.
These guys could use a dose of honesty every once in a while.
7. As an avid follower of college golf over the past decade, it was great to see both Robby Shelton and Scottie Scheffler lock up spots on the PGA Tour for 2020.
Shelton prevailed in a playoff over Scheffler at the latest Web.com Tour stop, but their early-season returns have been so good that they’re already guaranteed a promotion to the big tour come fall.
Both have been standout players for a long time. Shelton has a rock-solid all-around game but needed to cut his teeth in the minor leagues and gain confidence. Scheffler has been tabbed as a can’t-miss prospect (and the best Texan since Jordan Spieth) as far back as his junior days, but he’s battled through injuries to get to the top. Can’t wait to see how they fare against the world’s best.
It’s easy to imagine the governing bodies allowing the flagstick to be kept in on the greens for the everyday amateurs, for the 9-to-5ers who want to zip around the course after work, save time and officially count a score.
But they didn’t foresee moment like this.
They didn’t foresee the unsightliness of a winning putt that clanks off the stick and never even drops.
Gross.
That winning moment for Taehee Lee #MaekyungOpen 👏 #whereitsAT pic.twitter.com/bucb9ut6ry
— Asian Tour (@asiantourgolf) May 5, 2019
This week’s award winners ...
So Much For That: Lydia Ko. Just when it seemed like the former teen phenom was finding stability, she parted ways with swing coach Ted Oh. Short and inaccurate off the tee, with declining iron play, it’s becoming increasingly clear that Ko won’t ever recapture her once-dominant ways.
Drive for Show, Chip for Dough: Joel Dahmen. The Tour journeyman wasn’t able to put much heat on Homa down the stretch, but he played a nifty pitch shot from left of the creek on 18 for a closing par to finish second, three shots behind. That up-and-down was worth an extra (gulp) $263,000.
Politics-Free Zone: Tiger at the White House. The Masters champion will be in the nation’s capital on Monday to receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom, becoming just the fourth golfer to earn the highest civilian honor.
What Were You Doing At 14?: Not making the cut on the European Tour, clearly, as Yang Kaung did last week at the China Open. Hopefully he’ll have avoided burnout by the time his body develops.
Don’t Count Her Out: Bronte Law. The former UCLA star was 10(!) shots back heading into the final round at Lake Merced, but she played a nine-hole stretch in a sizzling 7 under par to join a three-way playoff. She eventually lost to Sei Young Kim, but it should go without saying: Stud.
Blown Fantasy Pick of the Week: Phil Mickelson. Well, that wasn’t quite the PGA tuneup Lefty was hoping for. Teeing it up at one of his personal playgrounds, Mickelson had eight top-5s there and his only early exit at Quail Hollow came at the 2017 PGA. Then he bombed out in the second round by playing his first 11 holes in 7 over par, sealing his fate for the weekend and burying memories of Pebble even deeper. Sigh.