MEMPHIS, Tenn. – A row of pine trees casts a speck of shade on the westernmost corner of the driving range at TPC Southwind. Under it, Justin Thomas and Keith Mitchell are finishing the workday at the FedEx St. Jude Championship.
They’re cramped, close together, sharing the only shelter from the Memphis sun’s incendiary rays. There’s so little space between them that if Cashmere Keith pushed one, it might hit JT in the calf. JT is so far towards the corner that he’s practically in the rough.
The air feels steamy, so thick with heat.
Every once in a while, the pair hit in unison. JT fades it, Cashmere draws it. Their balls rise and apex together, then tail away, falling in opposite directions, as though repelled from one another by some invisible magnetic field.
Mitchell, his cotton shirt changing to a darker color as the session goes on, looks like he just played a game of full-court basketball. After every swing, he wipes his brow with shirtsleeves already soaked through with sweat, then shrugs his shoulders to realign them.
Bereft of any headwear, his forehead shines with perspiration. His signature cloth tour visor, long ago having lost its shape, rests drenched, draped over an alignment stick, retired for the day.
An anonymous player walks by, his face obscured, buried in one of those extra-large deluxe bath towels, maybe taken from the hotel or locker room, which look comical lain over the bag, almost enveloping it, like a car cover, or a drape.
There are other extreme measures taken for a time such as this. Some players burn through half a dozen gloves, some even resort to rain gloves. Some use umbrellas, others parasols, some, at their most desperate, a handheld fan.
Over the last few weeks, the heat wave hitting the southern tournament swing has everyone in the golf world fulminating with an almost apocalyptic fervor.
Every interviewer has asked about it. Every player has talked about it. Managing hydration, energy, and sun exposure.
We don’t have perfect information on the PGA Tour’s 2028 schedule changes, but we do know that the South’s extreme summer heat will be an important factor in the tour’s considerations.
Greensboro is already projected to be a spring tournament in ’28. Memphis and Atlanta, site of the Tour Championship, have reportedly been offered similar calendar relocations. The tour is looking to dial down the temperature while it also realigns status. Memphis and Atlanta have expressed little interest in either and could both be off the schedule after next year.
Where is it more tolerable in the summer? The tour must figure that out. But Louisville in mid-July might not be it.
As banal as it is to talk about the weather, that’s the most frequent topic of conversation this week at the FedEx St. Jude. This weekend’s weather forecast is extremely hot, even for Memphis, with temperatures forecasted to exceed 100º.
It shouldn’t come as any surprise; the tournament has always been a summer scorcher.
If the second law of thermodynamics is that all systems tend toward entropy, then maybe the first should be that in August everything in Memphis turns to sweat.
While the intense weather has dominated the narrative, players are otherwise complimentary about the rich history of the tournament, the course, the town, the cause, and the hospitality. Defending champion Justin Rose even said it’s one of his favorite courses on tour:
“Obviously the hospital and the kids that you meet this week is so heartwarming, there is definitely something special. It has a special feel. It’s one of the golf courses I truly love on tour. It’s one of those courses that the whole membership can play well on.”
Memphis has long been a beloved stop on tour, despite the exhaustive heat. If it ceases to be a part of the new schedule in ‘28, it will be dearly missed by players, fans and the community.
Back on the shade-sparse range, JT takes a break, turns around, and is talking to Mitchell now. In between sentences, he wipes beads of sweat off his nose, then forehead, then nose again. His caddie, Matt “Rev” Minister, intently listening, does the same, almost mimicking him. Mitchell is doing it, too. So are the security guards flanking the ropes. So are the volunteers at the ball stand.
JT asks Matt for a cold towel. Mitchell’s bag man, Brad Schneider, likes the idea and follows. Brad wears a tall ankle brace and walks with a pronounced limp towards the white RCTIC cooler that’s labeled COOLING TOWELS. The 10th person in the last 5 minutes to make the trip. Players, caddies, and coaches are constantly reaching in for relief.
They grab the towels, and linger for a moment by the oscillating fans, which are smoothly moving back and forth just as they have been since dawn, working overtime, the only ones on the grounds seemingly unaffected by the heat.
The pair finish up their practice and call it a day. They look tired, skin flushed red, as though they just emerged from a steam room. These two golfers from the South, Chattanooga and Louisville, are used to this heat. Born in it, molded by it, and even they’re still worn out.
Given the changes coming to the schedule, this might be one of the last times these two southerners hit balls together on a summer’s day in the land of the blues.
