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GolfWRX Morning 9: Quiet on the first tee? | Ryder Cup highlights | Tony Ro-no

Published

8 years ago

Sep 28, 2018

Ben Alberstadt

1. Sitting Mickelson

Live updates are outside the scope of this newsletter, but as highly perishable as the news may be, but looking ahead to the rest of the week, Rory McIlroy is playing exceedingly poor golf. Jordan Spieth is playing superbly, as is Paul Casey. The rest of the combatants are availing themselves as expected, Fleetwood/Molinari, perhaps a bit better, as Tommy’s two late birdies salvaged a point in the morning session for the Euros.

Interesting, though, as Golf Channel’s Rex Hoggard notes, “The subtext to Friday’s opening four-ball session at the Ryder Cup isn’t who will play the morning matches, it’s who is not playing.”

“For Europe, captain Thomas Bjorn decided to sit Alex Noren, Henrik Stenson, Ian Poulter and Sergio Garcia, the final three serving as anchors of the Continent’s team for over a decade.”

“For the United States, Phil Mickelson, Bryson DeChambeau, Webb Simpson and Bubba Watson will watch the Day 1 morning session from the sidelines.”

“Sitting Mickelson – who has played the week’s first session every match since 1995 when he was a rookie – is particularly interesting considering he has an 8-8-2 record in four-ball play (compared to a 5-7-4 foursomes record) and is likely playing his final overseas Ryder Cup.”

2. Highlights

If you’re in the mood for highlights from the 3-1 U.S. victory in the morning four-ball session, check out this piece on GolfWRX.

3. All quiet on the first tee?

Potentially worthless information, but interesting, given the literal build up of the area around the first tee (which holds 7,000 fans), and the figurative ratcheting of excitement. Subjectively, the crowd seems more subdued than expected, but that will assuredly change.

Golf Channel’s Ryan Lavner…”Eager fans streamed through the gates at 6:30 a.m. local time and headed toward the massive stands behind the first tee. Built to seat more than 6,800 – easily the largest in tournament history – it’s an impressive structure that gave the Ryder Cup an even grander feel. But the late-arriving fans, either because of too many reserved corporate areas or heavy traffic in the area, didn’t even completely fill up the grandstand by the time the first fourball made its way to the tee.”

“In fact, the entire hour lead-in was surprisingly flat. The first loud cheer came at 7:37 a.m. – about a half hour before the first ball was in the air – as Ian Poulter ambled down the path to the left of the tee. He waved to the crowd, then apparently decided to join them – a few minutes later, he reappeared at the top of the grandstand, flinging hats and taking selfies as electronic dance music pumped through the speakers.”

4. More tales of first tee nerves

ESPN’s Tom Hamilton with a roundup of player remarks on the difficulty of the opening tee shot at the Ryder Cup.

Ian Poulter…“I’ve tried to explain to a number of people through the years what that tee shot means and what the feeling is in your body when you’re walking down. And as a player that’s played in multiple majors now, it’s different [from those]. Walking to the first tee at Augusta, walking to the first tee at St. Andrews, walking to the first tee in The Ryder Cup is that different. That’s very hard to explain.”

Justin Rose…”You never get comfortable with it. I don’t think you can ever really walk on to that first tee Friday and go, ‘yeah, this feels good,’ or ‘this feels normal’. “You feel alive. I think José Maria Olazábal gave us a little memento one year, and it says, ‘All men die but not all men live.’ I think what he meant by that is feeling that adrenaline, that emotion, I think that is what it’s all about.

More.

5. A course fit for a king

Entertaining stuff from John Leicester at the AP looking at the history of Le Golf National.

“Although this won’t be uppermost on the players’ minds as they negotiate the artificial hills and lakes, the venue can quite literally claim to be fit for a king: It’s built, Chesneau said, on land that used to feed France’s royals before they lost their heads to the guillotine in the French revolution.”

“When queen Marie Antoinette, who was put to death in 1793, used to hanker for cake, the wheat for her flour may very well have been harvested from around here. The erstwhile fields now peppered with golf holes and lush greens served the nearby Chateau de Versailles , where King Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette, his wife, lived before the revolution of 1789 forced them to Paris…Left of the fairway on No. 14 is a squat stone tower that dates back to that time; one of what used to be 12 gateways to the cereal fields that supplied the royal household.”

Full piece.

6. Further commentary on the Tiger Effect

A few morsels from an AP Report…”The immediate beneficiary is the NBC Sports Group, which has this weekend’s Ryder Cup on Golf Channel and NBC. It also had last weekend’s Tour Championship and saw a ratings increase of 178 percent. Sunday’s final round had a 4.45 Nielsen rating. The round also had 18.4 million minutes streamed across NBC’s digital platforms according to the network.”

“Fox is hoping that the Tiger Effect will be at its best in June, when the U.S. Open returns to Pebble Beach. With the tournament being on the West Coast, that means most of the coverage will be in prime time in the Eastern and Central time zones.”

“The 2015 U.S. Open, which was the last time it was held out West, averaged 3.5 million viewers. By comparison, last year’s coverage on Fox and Fox Sports 1 averaged 2.85 million viewers, which was an improvement from 2017 (2.67 million) when Woods did not compete.”

7. U.S. Mid-Am

Meanwhile, at the Mid-Am…sorry, Boner.

AP Report...”Kevin O’Connell won an all-North Carolina final in the U.S. Mid-Amateur, beating Brett Boner 4 and 3 on Thursday at Charlotte Country Club for a likely Masters invitation.”

“O’Connell, a 30-year-old former golf equipment representative from Cary, also earned spots in the U.S. Open next year at Pebble Beach and the next two U.S. Amateurs.”

“You will be hard-pressed to find a bigger fan of the game than me and I certainly understand the importance of the USGA, and how great their championships are,” O’Connell said. “To be the champion right now is probably what I am most proud of and focused on. Just simply being a champion. All the stuff that comes along with it, I think that will hit me a little big later on.”

8. Ro-no

Tony Romo, as you know, advanced through Web.com pre-qualifying. Now, he’s having a tougher time in the real deal.

AP Report…”Tony Romo was 11 over par for 27 holes Thursday in the first stage of the Web.com Tour’s Qualifying Tournament.”

‘The former Dallas Cowboys quarterback opened with an 8-over 79 at Firewheel at Garland Bridges, and had a 3-over 39 on the Masters Nine. He was 74th in the 76-player field, with the top 22 and ties advancing to the second stage.”

“I’ve felt pressure with playing (tournament golf) before, but I just didn’t play well today,” Romo said. “Off the tee I struggled and made everything very difficult. I made way too many high numbers. Like anything in golf, you have to go back and see what the reasons were and then subtly work on them.”

Best of luck with the subtle work!

9. A message from the GOAT

Staying with the quarterback theme, Tom Brady posted the below to Instagram.

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Testing Lorem Ipsum

Published

1 hour ago

May 13, 2026

Pro Shop

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News

2026 PGA Championship betting odds

Published

1 day ago

May 12, 2026

Gianni Magliocco

Scottie Scheffler leads the betting ahead of the second major championship of the year, with the World Number One a +345 favorite to get his hands on a second PGA Championship.

Rory McIlroy who won the Masters back in April is a +800 shot to complete half of the calendar slam at Aronimink Golf Club this week, while Jordan Spieth can be backed at +5900 to become a career grand slam winner.

Here is the full betting board for the 2026 PGA Championship courtesy of DraftKings.

Scottie Scheffler +345 – (Check 0ut his WITB here)

Rory McIlroy +800 – (Check out his WITB here)

Jon Rahm +1300
Cameron Young +1500
Bryson DeChambeau +1700
Xander Schauffele +1850
Matt Fitzpatrick +1950
Ludvig Aberg +2000
Tommy Fleetwood +2600
Collin Morikawa +3500
Brooks Koepka +3900
Justin Rose +4300
Russell Henley +4600
Si Woo Kim +4700
Justin Thomas +4800
Robert MacIntyre +5300
Patrick Cantlay +5300
Viktor Hovland +5400
Tyrrell Hatton +5500
Jordan Spieth +5900
Sam Burns +6000
Hideki Matsuyama +6200
Adam Scott +6400
Rickie Fowler +7000
Chris Gotterup +7400
Patrick Reed +7400
Min Woo Lee +7800
Ben Griffin +8000
Sepp Straka +8400
Shane Lowry +9000
Akshay Bhatia +9200
Maverick McNealy +9200
Joaquin Niemann +9200
Jake Knapp +9200
Jason Day +9600
Kurt Kitayama +10000
J.J. Spaun +10000
Harris English +10500
Nicolai Hojgaard +11000
Gary Woodland +11000
David Puig +11000
Michael Thorbjornsen +12000
Jacob Bridgeman +12000
Keegan Bradley +12500
Corey Conners +14000
Alex Fitzpatrick +15000
Sungjae Im +15500
Sahith Theegala +15500
Harry Hall +15500
Alex Noren +16000
Thomas Detry +16500
Marco Penge +16500
Kristoffer Reitan +17000
Alex Smalley +17000
Wyndham Clark +17500
Sam Stevens +17500
Keith Mitchell +17500
Daniel Berger +18500
Ryan Gerard +20000
Nick Taylor +20000
Rasmus Hojgaard +21000
Dustin Johnson +21000
Pierceson Coody +23000
Aaron Rai +24000
Jordan Smith +24000
Angel Ayora +24000
Bud Cauley +25000
Matt McCarty +26000
Jayden Schaper +26000
Brian Harman +27000
Taylor Pendrith +27000
Ryan Fox +27000
J.T. Poston +27000
Cameron Smith +29000
Ryo Hisatsune +29000
Michael Kim +29000
Max Homa +29000
Denny McCarthy +29000
Tom McKibbin +30000
Rico Hoey +32000
Matt Wallace +32500
Ricky Castillo +33000
Haotong Li +33000
Michael Brennan +34000
Max Greyserman +36000
Stephan Jaeger +37500
Christiaan Bezuidenhout +37500
Rasmus Neergaard-Petersen +39000
Aldrich Potgieter +40000
Andrew Novak +42000
Patrick Rodgers +42500
Daniel Hillier +42500
Max McGreevy +46000
Billy Horschel +48000
Chris Kirk +48000
Ian Holt +49000
Casey Jarvis +49000
William Mouw +50000
Steven Fisk +50000
John Parry +50000
Nico Echavarria +52500
Garrick Higgo +52500
John Keefer+55000
Matthias Schmid +57500
Austin Smotherman +57500
Sami Valimaki +60000
Andrew Putnam +60000
Lucas Glover +62500
Daniel Brown +62500
Jhonattan Vegas +75000
Emiliano Grillo +80000
Mikael Lindberg +85000
Adrien Saddier +100000
Bernd Wiesberger +100000
Elvis Smylie +110000
Stewart Cink +130000
Kota Kaneko +130000
David Lipsky +150000
Chandler Blanchet +150000
Andy Sullivan +150000
Joe Highsmith +180000
Adam Schenk +200000
Travis Smyth +200000
Davis Riley +225000
Martin Kaymer +400000
Brian Campbell +400000
Padraig Harrington +450000
Kazuki Higa +450000
Jordan Gumberg +450000
Ryan Vermeer +500000
Austin Hurt +500000
Tyler Collet +500000
Timothy Wiseman +500000
Shaun Micheel +500000
Y.E. Yang +500000
Michael Block+500000
Mark Geddes+500000
Luke Donald+500000
Bryce Fisher+500000
Jimmy Walker +500000
Jason Dufner +500000
Jesse Droemer +500000
Jared Jones +500000
Garrett Sapp +500000
Francisco Bide +500000
Zach Haynes +500000
Paul McClure+500000
Derek Berg +500000
Chris Gabriele +500000
Braden Shattuck +500000
Ben Polland +500000
Ben Kern +50000

Tour Photo Galleries

Photos from the 2026 PGA Championship

Published

2 days ago

May 11, 2026

GolfWRX Staff

GolfWRX is on site for the second major of 2026: The PGA Championship from Aronimink in Newtown Square, Pennsylvania.

The tournament’s location, just outside Philadelphia, and its status as a major championship mean GolfWRXers are in for a treat: WITBs from a strong field, custom gear celebrating the PGA Championship, and the rich culture of the City of Brotherly Love — we have noted a relative absence of cheesesteak-themed items thus far this week, but most of the rest of the usual suspects are well represented.

Check out links to all our photos below.