Category: PGA Golf

By Jeremy Harness

AP file photo: Tiger Woods as vice captain at the Ryder Cup golf tournament at Hazeltine National Golf Club in Chaska Minn from Sep 29th photo will not be participating in the Safeway Open this week

NAPA–There were hundreds of people in the Bay Area – not to mention the promotors of the event itself – who were highly anticipating the return of Tiger Woods to the PGA Tour at this week’s Safeway Open.

However, despite this anticipation and commercials that featured Woods as the highlight of this upcoming event, Woods announced his decision to withdraw from the tournament Monday morning.

The reason behind the decision was not due to any physical ailment, which is surprising since he has struggled mightily with assorted injuries, such as an ongoing condition with his lower back. Rather, he stated that his game is not at the level that is satisfactory to his being able to compete at this point.

He also said that he also plans on withdrawing from the Turkish Airlines Open next month, which he had intended on playing until Monday.

“After a lot of soul searching, and honest reflection, I know that I am not yet ready to play on the PGA Tour,” Woods said in a statement released Monday afternoon. “My health is good and I feel strong, but my game is vulnerable and not where it needs to be.

“It’s not up to my standards, and I don’t think it would be up to yours.”

Woods was last seen as one of the vice captains for Team USA in the Ryder Cup, which was held a little more than a week ago and saw the American team beat Europe for the first time in eight years.

However, as a player, he has become less and less relevant with each tournament that he plays. He has either withdrawn due to a back injury, or he has shot 80 or above – which he did in three of the past 16 competitive rounds he has played in the past two years – while being engulfed in issues with his short game as well as inaccuracy off the tee.

However, this was great news for an up-and-coming star on the tour. With Woods’ withdrawal, Max Homa, the Cal grad who spent last season on the Web.com Tour , got into this week’s field as the first alternate.

 

By Jeremy Harness

zimbio.com file photo: Stephan Jaeger makes web.comtour history with the lowest 36 and 54 hole marks at the Ellie Mae Classic in Hayward

HAYWARD, Calif. – Going into this week, Stephan Jaeger did not have a single win in the four years that he has played on a major pro tour. He scratched that one off the list in emphatic fashion Sunday afternoon.

The 27-year-old German, who played his college golf at the University of Tennessee-Chattanooga, immediately took control of the Web.com Tour’s Ellie Mae Classic at TPC San Francisco at Stonebrae and never lightened his grip.

He made only one bogey during the entire tournament and set several scoring records along the way – the lowest score in the history of the Web.com Tour as well as the lowest 36 and 54-hole marks, and finally, the lowest 72-hole score as he finished with an overall mark of 30-under par – and as a result, he was the wire-to-wire winner.

The victory, which he sealed Sunday with a seven-under 63 to win by nine strokes, also means that he will now be in the top-25 on the tour’s money list, and if that holds up to the end of the season, he will have full exemption on the PGA Tour next season.

“I’m speechless,” Jaeger said. “It was a phenomenal week for me. I stayed in the moment today, which was hard. (But) I knew if I played solid all the way around, it was going to be hard to catch me. I really played very, very solid today.

“I won a few small mini-tour events, and you get a check for $2,000 or something, but it’s a little different story this week (in receiving $108,000 for this victory),” he continued. “But if you win a golf tournament, you’re happy, no matter what stage. Obviously the bigger the stage, the more benefits come out of it.”

Jaeger said after Saturday’s round that someone could get hot, which would make things quite interesting down the stretch, and for the first six holes, that’s exactly what happened.

His closest competitor, San Diego State grad Xander Schauffele, made virtually every out he looked at for the first six holes, compiling four birdies to go along with an eagle in that span and cutting Jaeger’s sizable lead to four shots before a bogey at the par-4 eighth derailed his momentum.

“I did everything I could,” Schauffele said. “That was all I had, and it clearly wasn’t enough.”

Meanwhile, Jaeger continued to make birdies without any mistakes in between. He played the front nine bogey-free and threw in five birdies to keep Schauffele – or anyone else, for that matter – to gain any more ground.

Rhein Gibson, the owner of the lowest golf round ever recorded with a 55 four years ago, needed that kind of performance on Sunday to catch Jaeger, but he did not get it. Although he made a nice run at it, shooting (a five-under 65), he simply ran out of holes, and Jaeger did not give any opportunities to make up ground.

Not everyone was knocking in birdies at a regular clip, however. Maverick McNealy, who is the world’s top amateur and is currently going into his senior year at Stanford, took a considerable step back from his first two rounds.

After posting a 67 and a 66 on Thursday and Friday, respectively, he struggled mightily on Saturday and shot 78 to take himself out of the running right then and there. He did come back on Sunday and shot an under-par round, however, but he was nowhere near a threat to Jaeger’s title.

By Jeremy Harness

mb.com.ph photo: Stephane Jaeger set the web.comtour record for the lowest hole score at 36 Saturday at the PGA Ellie Mae Classic in Hayward

HAYWARD, Calif. – About the only thing that Stephan Jaeger had not done this week was record an eagle. Well, after Saturday’s action, you can scratch that one off the list, too.

After a record-setting 58 in the opening round, which compelled the crew at TPC San Francisco Bay at Stonebrae to coin a drink called the Jaeger-bomb – which is appropriately priced at $5.80 – and adding a rash of birdies to set another record for the lowest 36-hole score in Web.com Tour history, Jaeger followed an outstanding 3-wood shot that settled only about 10 feet from the hole at the par-5 15^th by draining the ensuing putt for an eagle that extended his lead to seven shots.

As was the case in the first round, he did not record a single bogey and finished with a six-under 64, and at a hard-to-believe 23-under par, he carries a seven-shot lead into Sunday’s final round.

“It’s been a good week, it really has, everywhere, in my whole game,” Jaeger said. “Sometimes you don’t get the good breaks and sometimes you do, and I’m fortunate enough that I’ve had a few this week.”

However, what’s even harder to believe is that he has not really locked up anything yet.

Despite how well he has played up to the point, Jaeger knows that he will need to continue to make birdies in the final round to ensure himself a victory. To illustrate that point, Eric Axley of Knoxville, Tenn. got into the thick of things on Saturday by shooting a 10-under 60 Saturday morning and finds himself nine strokes back.

Meanwhile, Georgia native Keith Mitchell fired a nine-under 61 and also finds himself nine shots behind with an overall score of 14-under par.

“I’m going to stay aggressive (Sunday) and try to shoot the lowest score I can,” Jaeger said. “You never know, one of the guys in second or fourth (place) can shoot a good round and make it a little more interesting.

“But if I play well, I think it’s going to be tough to catch (me).”

Speaking of record-breaking rounds, Jaeger’s third-round playing partner, Rhein Gibson, is no stranger to historically-low rounds himself.

Four years ago, the Australian who played his college golf at Oklahoma Christian University, where he was an NAIA All-American, shot a score of 55 on a par-71 course. The mark earned him a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records as the lowest round ever recorded.

Gibson finished Saturday’s round with a three-under 67, but it could have been lower had his short birdie putt at the 18^th not spun out of the hole and forcing him to settle for a par, nullifying a fantastic iron shot into the green that fed down and nearly found the hole for an eagle.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

By Jeremy Harness

dailymail.com photo: Stephan Jaeger set another record going a total of minus 17 on Friday at the PGA Web.com Tour’s Ellie Mae Classic in Hayward

HAYWARD–Stephan Jaeger bogeyed the first hole that he played on Friday, which is enough to cause doubt to creep into the average golfer’s mind, as they wonder how the rest of the round is going to go.

That didn’t happen to Jaeger, however. A day removed from the record-setting 58 that he fired in the opening round of the Web.com Tour’s Ellie Mae Classic, he would not have another bogey on his card for the rest of the day and soon built on to his lead.

Seven holes later, the German native began yet another birdie streak that was a familiar theme on Thursday, running off three in a row before recording three more on holes 15 through 17 to go into the clubhouse with a five-stroke lead and an overall score of 17-under par.

In the process, he put his name on the best 36-hole mark in Web.com Tour history with a score of 123, beating out the 124 that was held by Kevin Chappell and Martin Piller.

Among Jaeger’s closest followers on the leaderboard is Rhein Gibson, who followed his opening-round 62 with a four-under 66 and is currently 12-under par, briefly tying Jaeger atop the leaderboard before he went on the first of his two birdie streaks.

Brandon Hagy, who is now projected to sneak into the top-25 on the tour’s money list – which gives players full exemption on the PGA Tour next season – fired a seven-under 63 to get into a tie for second as the weekend rolls around.

An intriguing story involves Austin Cook, who made it through five Monday qualifiers on the PGA Tour last year but could not hold on to his tour card, thus his current status on this tour. He is currently tied for 10^th at eight-under, and if this holds up, he will crack the top-25 and put him in great position for that elusive card on the big tour.

As a tale of how unpredictable the game of golf is from week to week, Nicholas Lindheim, who was victorious in last week’s Utah Championship, was among the ones who missed the cut – which was set at three-under – and will not play the final two rounds this weekend.

Lindheim was far from the only notable to miss the cut on Friday. Of the players in the top-25 on the Web.com Tour’s money list, nine of them saw their tournaments end after the second round, including Cal product Max Homa, who bounced back from an opening-round 73 to post a 67 on Friday but was not enough to make the cut.

Homa, however, is in very good shape in the overall standings, as he currently sits in the 12^th position on the money list and stands a great chance to gain his card for next year.

 

By Jeremy Harness

dailymail photo: Stephan Jaeger hit the first 58 recorded in a US professional tournament at the Ellie Mae Classic in Hayward

HAYWARD–On a day that saw low scores dominate the day, Stephan Jaeger’s round took the cake by a longshot.

The German native, who makes his home in Chattanooga, Tenn. these days, set a major tour record on Thursday by shooting a 58 in the first round of the Ellie Mae Classic, which is being held at TPC San Francisco Bay at Stonebrae, as part of the Web.com Tour.

Starting in the afternoon and on the 10^th hole, Jaeger got off to a fast start and never let the foot off the gas pedal. He birdied the 11^th hole before running off five birdies in a row from holes 13 through 17.

He then marched to the front nine, where he recorded six more birdies without a single bogey for a score that has never been seen before on either the PGA Tour, the Web.com Tour nor the Champions Tour.

As a result, he takes a commanding four-stroke lead into the second round, leading Josh Teater – who has gone back and forth between the PGA Tour and this tour – as well as Xander Schauffele and Rhein Gibson, each of whom shot 62 in the first round.

If this holds up, it would be a huge leap for Jaeger. He currently sits 102^nd on the tour’s money list, and a win would vault him 80 spots to 22^nd. That is very important, as the players who finish the season in the top 25 on the money list earn full exemption to the PGA Tour for the following year.

There are several players with Bay Area ties in this tournament as well, but none of them are within earshot of Jaeger at this point. Maverick McNealy, who is entering his senior year at Stanford and happens to be the world’s top amateur, opened his tournament with a three-under 67. His lone blemish came at the 14^th hole, as his tee shot found the native area and ended up with a double bogey.

Meanwhile, Max Homa, who played his college golf at Cal, did not fare as well. He shot an opening round of 73 and was also victimized by the 14^th hole. He didn’t hit it into the native area, as McNealy did, but he found himself in a greenside bunker and had to take three shots to get out of, resulting in a triple-bogey.

Unlike McNealy, he could not immediately recover, as he bogeyed the par-5 15^th.

Homa, however, is in very nice shape overall. He is currently 12th on the money list and does not stand to fall out of the top-25, even is he misses the cut.

 

By Jeremy Harness

UPI photo: Vaughn Taylor winner of the PGA Tour at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro Am on Sunday

The last time Vaughn Taylor won on the PGA Tour, Jordan Spieth was in middle school, and Tiger Woods was near the height of his powers as the dominant force in the game.

Taylor, who turns 40 in less than a month, used a lights-out back nine that included four birdies in a row at holes 13 through 16, to chase down 72-hole leader Phil Mickelson and propel him to his first tour win since 2005.

He did wait 11 years for this moment, but after completing his round of 65, he had to wait just a little bit more. Upon holing out for par, Taylor, leading by two strokes at the time, still had to hang out a little while the last two groups finished their round to know his fate.

For a moment, it looked as if he and Mickelson, who floundered for much of his round on Sunday en route to an even-par 72, until making a valiant comeback attempt on the final two holes, were headed to a sudden-death playoff.

Mickelson made an 11-footer to save par at the 16^th as well as a 12-footer for a birdie at the 17^th to close to within a stroke of the lead heading into the par-5 18^th. After a fine chip shot, he had a five-footer – a distance from which tour players make 82 percent of the time, while Mickelson had drained all of his previous 23 putts inside of six feet this week – for the birdie and to tie Taylor.

However, the attempt lipped out, leaving the veteran doubled over and crowning Taylor a champion at long last.

To add to the excitement, the victory means a berth in the Masters, which left the native of Augusta, Ga. – where the tournament is held every April – ecstatic.

“I mean, are you kidding?” asked Taylor, who is not a member of the PGA Tour and got into this tournament on a past-champion exemption. “I’m so thankful. So lucky to be here. So many people have helped me get here, the list is endless. So, I’m just super excited.

“I worked so hard and just kept getting knocked down and knocked down. And I just can’t believe it actually happened. It’s amazing. I’m just at a loss for words right now.”

Mickelson, who struggled to find the fairway all week long and is in the process of making changes in his swing, was not as sharp with his short game on Sunday as he was in catapulting to a two-shot lead in the previous round, and it cost him.

“I played a little tighter than I wanted to,” Mickelson said. “I made a few more mistakes in the short game around the greens. I didn’t salvage some pars the way I wanted to, and it just tells me I still need a little bit of work.”

 

By Jeremy Harness

AP photo Phil Mickelson from the 17th tee at Spy Glass Hill in first round of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro Am

If you ask any player what the key ingredients to success on the PGA Tour are, they will point right to short game and putting. Phil Mickelson showed why those two facets are so very important on Saturday.

Mickelson hit only nine of the 18 greens in regulation and only hit seven of the 14 fairways during his third round at Pebble Beach, which means that a lot of pressure was placed upon the short-game prowess that he is widely known for.

His deft touch around the greens came through for him when he needed it the most, as his bogey-free round of 66 included a chip-in for birdie at the par-5 18^th and gave him an overall score of 16-under and a two-shot lead heading into Sunday.

This is Mickelson’s first 54-hole lead in more than two years.

“I fought hard (Saturday),” Mickelson said. “I thought the golf course was playing much more difficult with the firm greens and the wind picking up. I was very pleased to shoot that round, but there were a lot of holes I just had to fight for pars. It wasn’t a pushover by any means.

“It’s been a while since I’ve been in contention, and it would mean a lot to me to be able to play a good final round.”

In the process, he shot right past Japan’s Hiroshi Iwata, who himself shot a three-under 69 at Spyglass Hill Saturday to keep himself in contention, only a pair of strokes off of the lead and will be in the final pairing with Mickelson on Sunday.

The co-leader along with Iwata on Saturday was South Korea’s Sung Kang, who shot a two-under 70 at Pebble in the third round and ended up falling into a tie for third place.

“I tried to play very conservatively (early on), and then I think I played all right,” Kang said. “I missed a couple of short putts but still finished all right.

“If the weather is good (Sunday), we’ll play more aggressively. If the weather is bad, like (Saturday), we’ll play a little more safe. We’ll see how it is (Sunday), and I’ll just try my best.”

 

By Jeremy Harness

AP photo Sung Kang of South Korea hits from the 11th tee at the Monterey Peninsula Country Club leads the tournament after shooting an 11 under par 60

PEBBLE BEACH – While walking up the second fairway at Monterey Peninsula Country Club, country singer Jake Owen took notice of a group of people huddled around a cooler with his hit song, “Barefoot Blue Jean Night,” blaring from the speakers, and decided to have a little fun.

After hitting his second shot, Owen hopped over the short fence into the front yard to join the group for about a minute before emerging with a cold one in each hand.

Two holes later, Jordan Spieth and Dustin Johnson took the opportunity to share a friendly moment with Larry the Cable Guy as he was walking off of the adjacent 18^th tee. A short moment earlier, Spieth spotted Andres Gonzales standing in Larry’s immediate shot path as the comedian was teeing off and teased, “Hey Andres, stay right there!”

Gonzales did not oblige and smoothly moved over to his left.

Those were the kind of good vibes that were felt during the entire second round of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, and the scores certainly reflected that, particularly at Monterey Peninsula.

Sung Kang (not to be confused with the actor who starred in the Fast and the Furious movie series) was among those who took advantage of the scoring opportunities that the course presents. After an even-par round at Spyglass Hill on Thursday, during which he said that he did not hit the ball particularly well, he bounced right back by shooting a career-low 60 to surge into a two-way tie for the lead at 11-under.

The South Korean got things rolling and never took a backward step for the rest of the round. He recorded four birdies and an eagle on his front nine, and then ran off five more birdies on the back nine to beat his career best by one shot.

Kang attributed a slight change in outlook to his game to the quick turnaround.

“I was putting too much pressure on myself (before),” Kang said. “I was trying too hard. So now I’m just (saying), ‘I don’t have any pressure.’”

“Even if I miss a shot, or if I hit it bad, or if I make it or not, my family’s still going to love me,” Kang said. “Nobody’s going to hate me. They might like me better if I play good.”

Joining Kang atop the leaderboard is Japan’s Hiroshi Iwata, who recorded four birdies and an eagle on the front nine to carry him to a six-under 66.

Iwata momentarily held the lead after a birdie at the 10^th hole, but a pair of bogeys on the next four holes dropped him back before a birdie at the 16^th brought him back to 11-under and the tie for the lead.

Meanwhile, Phil Mickelson was yet another guy who used Monterey Peninsula as a springboard to catapult him into contention on Friday. After shooting a 68 in his opening round at Spyglass Hill, Mickelson went even lower on Friday with a six-under 65.

He was clean on the front nine with five birdies without a single bogey. He kept the momentum going with an eagle at the par-five 10^th before birdieing the 16^th, but two bogeys on that side kept him one shot off of the lead.

Freddie Jacobson will get his crack at that course on Saturday after getting out of Spyglass, considered the toughest of the three courses that are being used in this tournament, with a three-under 69 on Friday. He only sits two shots behind, and with the scores coming in as low as they have, he figures to be at least near the top by the time the third round is over.

“If you really get it going, especially with the weather being the way it is, you can make some birdies,” Jacobson said. “But you still got to do it. It doesn’t matter what the course looks like, you got to hit the shots and keep it in play and keep doing it.

“That’s what I’ve done for two days, so I got to keep attacking (Saturday) and see if I can put up some birdies there.”

 

By Jeremy Harness

photo credit: AFP photo–Chez Reavie takes a shot from the fairway 12th hole during the first round at the AT&T Pro Am

PEBBLE BEACH – Most people who come to this year’s tournament will be tempted to follow the likes of Jordan Spieth, Phil Mickelson as well as celebrities such as Mark Wahlberg and Bill Murray. However, it was a relatively unknown who surged to the top on Thursday.

Chez Reavie, who has had marginal success on the PGA Tour in recent years, ripped apart the back nine at Monterey Peninsula Country Club in the opening round, shooting seven under par on the final nine holes on his way to an eight-under 63 to take a one-shot lead.

He was one under par at the turn after bogeying the par-3 ninth, but he quickly turned it on and never cooled off. He ran off four birdies in a row before settling for a par at the 14^th.

Reavie then picked things right up with a birdie at the 15^th and then followed that right up with an eagle at the par-5 16^th before parring the remaining two holes to the lead.

“I had a lot of good looks on the front nine and missed a couple of (putts),” said Reavie, who played part of last season on the PGA Tour and then lost his full playing status before getting it back by winning a Web.com Tour finals event and then nearly winning the Tour Championship. “(I) hit good putts and just stayed patient and was able to make the putts on the back.”

Of the three courses that this tournament is played on – Monterey Peninsula, Pebble Beach, and Spyglass Hill – Monterey Peninsula is the one that players tend to get their low scores, and that trend continued on Thursday.

Cameron Smith and Bronson Burgoon, both rookies on the PGA Tour, each fired a seven-under 64 at Monterey Peninsula to tie for second. Smith got off to a hot start to his day, birdieing four of the first six holes on his way to a five-under front nine. He recorded two birdies on the back nine and did not have a single bogey on his scorecard.

“It was really good today,” Smith said. “I got some putts rolling in from the start, which got me on a good momentum booster for the first 12 or 13 holes, which was nice.”

Burgoon got off to the best start of them all. Starting on the 10^th hole, he blistered his front nine to the tune of a seven-under 30 to shoot his 64, including an eagle at the 16^th, and then parring out on the back nine.

“I got off to a good start and just kept rolling,” Burgoon said. “I wouldn’t say I slowed down on the back, but (I) missed a couple putts, but that’s golf. I gave myself opportunities on the back nine, (but) I just didn’t make anything.”

Meanwhile, Spieth did not play up to his standards on the first day. Playing at Spyglass Hill, he bogeyed the fourth hole before recording birdies on the fifth as well as the eighth and seemed to be on his way to the top of the leaderboard.

However, he just could not seem to break through on the back nine, as he countered two birdies with a pair of bogeys to finish with a one-under 71.

“(It was) just kind of a bit odd,” Spieth said. “I just was not quite dialed in with the wedges or short game, so (I am) a little frustrated with that.

“But I’ve got a lot of very easy golf holes coming in the next couple days if I put myself in positions off the tees, and I’ll certainly get better when it comes to the wedge play.”