Jon Rahm will certainly try to end up being the very first PGA Tour gamer to win in 3 successive beginnings because 2017 when he tees it up on Wednesday at the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines outdoors San Diego.
How unusual would certainly his task be?
According to Justin Ray, head of material for Twenty First Group, a gamer has actually won 3 straight PGA Tour begins 18 times because 1997– and also Tiger Woods did it in all yet 4 of those circumstances.
Rahm, that began the period with victories at the Sentry Tournament of Champions and also The American Express, would certainly be the very first gamer to win in 3 successive PGA Tour begins because Dustin Johnson did it at the Genesis Open, WGC-Mexico Championship and also WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play in very early 2017. Rory McIlroy did it in 2014 and also Woods last did it in 2008.
According to Ray’s study, Woods won 58.3% of the moment when he had a possibility to win his 3rd straight begin. Everyone else had a 10.5% success price.
Here’s what’s occurring in guys’s specialist golf today:
What’s following on the PGA Tour
Farmers Insurance Open
When: Wednesday-Saturday
Where: Torrey Pines, La Jolla, California
Defending champ: Luke List
Purse: $8.7 million
Three stories to watch:
Rahm’s trifecta shot: Rahm need to have an excellent chance to three-peat at Torrey Pines, which is among his favored programs worldwide. He won the 2017 Farmers Insurance Open and also the 2021 UNITED STATE Open, his only significant champion success, at Torrey Pines.
In 24 job rounds at Torrey Pines, Rahm has a racking up standard of 69.29. That’s second-best amongst gamers with a minimum of 10 rounds because 1968. Woods had a 69.28 standard in 69 job rounds. Woods won the occasion 7 times, as well as the 2008 UNITED STATE Open, dipped into Torrey Pines.
“I feel really healthy and I feel really comfortable in my swing,” Rahm claimed. “So, I’m going to go to Torrey, a place that I’m already very confident at, with very high hopes, knowing that I’m doing all the right things.
“If I can maintain clicking the tee and also my iron video game maintains remaining at this degree I’m going to have a truly great chance at that golf links. So I can not assist to smile due to the fact that, once more, it’s an extremely, really psychological week each time I go, in an excellent method. It’s an extremely unique area in my heart.”
How good has Rahm been so far this year? He leads the PGA Tour in greens in regulation (81.02%), birdie average (6.67), scoring average (68.889), par-4 scoring average (3.76) and shots gained: off the tee (1.071).
Rahm has been pretty good in PGA Tour events played in California, too.
@JonRahmpga in California PGA Tour events since beginning of 2017
Wins: 4 (1st)
Scoring average: 68.74 (1st)
Score to par: -246 (1st)
Bogeys/worse per round: 1.97 (1st)
SG Tee to Green: +1.71 (1st)— Justin Ray (@JustinRayGolf) January 24, 2023
Early tee times: For the second year in a row, the Farmers Insurance Open will be played from Wednesday to Saturday to avoid TV competition with the NFL’s conference championship games on Sunday. It’s the only event on the PGA Tour schedule that has a Saturday finish. Rounds 3 and 4 will be broadcast in prime time on the East Coast.
The field includes Rahm, Collin Morikawa, Xander Schauffele, Hideki Matsuyama, Tony Finau, Justin Thomas, Max Homa and Will Zalatoris, so there’s plenty of star power at Torrey Pines. In fact, five of the top 10 players in the OWGR and 13 of the top 50 are there.
Hello, again: There will undoubtedly be jokes about the PGA Tour moving up the start of the Farmers Insurance Open a day to make sure they get all four rounds completed with J.B. Holmes in the field. Holmes, 40, isn’t exactly known for his fast play.
Still, it’s good to see Holmes back on tour after dealing with a back injury for much of the past two seasons. He is competing on a major medical exemption and has 26 starts available to earn 288.816 FedEx Cup points to keep his tour card. Earlier in Holmes’ career, he battled back from two brain surgeries to win three of his five career victories on tour.
It will be Holmes’ first PGA Tour start since he missed the cut at the Fortinet Championship in September 2021. He hasn’t finished in the top 10 of a Tour event since winning the 2019 Genesis Invitational. About five months after winning at Riviera, Holmes shared the 36-hole lead with eventual champion Shane Lowry in the 2019 Open Championship at Royal Portrush. Holmes was 6 shots back going into the final round and carded a 16-over 87 in driving rain. He finished in a tie for 67th. Holmes has just one top-15 finish in 31 starts after that.
Lanto Griffin, who won the 2019 Houston Open, is also scheduled to make his first start since undergoing back surgery after the John Deere Classic in July. He tied for 66th at the Bahamas Great Exuma Classic on the Korn Ferry Tour last week.
LIV Golf wants Augusta National documents
The latest discovery dispute between LIV Golf and the PGA Tour involves communications between the PGA Tour’s independent directors and former commissioner Tim Finchem and employees and members of Augusta National Golf Club.
According to a court filing on Monday, LIV Golf’s lawyers are seeking communication between the involved parties ” connecting to a New Tour, consisting of yet not restricted to LIV Golf.”
The subpoenaed persons have agreed to provide their communications with four Augusta National employees and seven members, including chairman Fred Ridley. But LIV’s lawyers want to expand discovery to include Augusta National members Jimmy Dunne, Condolezza Rice, Billy Payne and others.
” A main part of the Tour’s plan to foreclose competitors from LIV was to intimidate golf enthusiasts, various other excursions, suppliers, broadcasters, enrollers and also essentially any kind of various other 3rd parties if they worked with LIV,” LIV Golf’s lawyers wrote in a joint statement filed to the court. “Discovery has actually revealed that the Tour provided these risks not just with its very own execs and also staff members, yet by sending off various other prominent individuals on its part.”
In the same court filing, an attorney for PGA Tour policy board independent director Mary Meeker called LIV Golf’s attempt a ” angling exploration for interactions with people that LIV takes into consideration ‘America’s most effective individuals,’ yet or else have no importance to the concern in conflict.”
” LIV competes– improperly– that the TOUR has actually ‘leaned on’ or forced Augusta National to obstruct LIV golf enthusiasts from the Masters,” Meeker’s attorney wrote. “According to Plaintiffs, the TOUR and also Augusta National straightened in reaction to LIV, which seed[ed] question amongst leading specialist golf enthusiasts whether they would certainly be outlawed from future Masters Tournaments.’ This concept is completely unjustified as shown by the truth that the Masters has actually enabled LIV golf enthusiasts to contend in the 2023 competition.”
On Dec. 20, Augusta National announced that any golfer who qualified for the Masters based on its previous criteria will be invited to play in April, including 16 players competing in the LIV Golf League.
Garcia drops out of DP World Tour dispute
DP World Tour communications director Scott Crockett told reporters in Dubai this week that LIV Golf players Sergio Garcia, Branden Grace and Charl Schwartzel have removed themselves as appellants in an upcoming arbitration hearing, which will decide whether the DP World Tour can suspend them for competing in conflicting LIV Golf events.
Thirteen LIV Golf players, including longtime Ryder Cup participants Ian Poulter, Graeme McDowell and Lee Westwood and 2018 Masters champion Patrick Reed, remain appellants in the case. The hearing in front of a three-person panel convened by the Sports Resolutions Arbitration and Media Centre in London is scheduled to begin on Feb. 6.
A decision isn’t expected for several weeks after the hearing. Either side can appeal the ruling as well.
“The result is whatever the outcome is,” DP World Tour CEO Keith Pelley told reporters in Dubai. ” I assume it’s a vital minute for our tour and also to safeguard our tour and also for our participants in any way various degrees.”
Baby image!
Joel Dahmen took out from recently’s American Express forever factor. He and also his partner, Lona, invited their very first youngster to the globe. Their boy, Riggs, was birthed at 11:26 a.m. ET onThursday Where’s his container hat?
Hey, remember me?
World No 1 golf enthusiast Rory McIlroy is betting the very first time this year at the Hero Dubai Desert Classic.
< p lang=" en" dir=" ltr">On the tee from Holywood, Northern Ireland…@tommckibbin8
