Connect with us

News

Morning 9: Koepka is king | How Brooks got it done | Chamblee eats crow

Published

7 years ago

on
By Ben Alberstadt (ben.alberstadt@golfwrx.com)

May 20, 2019

Good Monday morning, golf fans.
1. Koepka is king
What can you say? Unless you feel our reaction to Brooks Koepka finishing the round he began with a seven-stroke lead just two in front (rather than, say, 10), Sunday was a mere polishing of the crown of the greatest major championship golfer since early 2000s Tiger Woods.
  • A few good takes from Sports Nation’s Brendan Porath…”Koepka did what he does at the majors and became the first player in the history of golf to hold back-to-back U.S. Opens and back-to-back PGA Championships. He’s now won four of his last nine major starts and even when he’s not winning, he’s around rattling the cage of the leaders. Like Tiger coming at you in his peak, Brooksy coming will only continue to be the most nerve-wracking of chaser options if you happen to be a leader at a major.”
  • “…We’ve seen him now win majors on soft courses, windy courses, firm courses, bomber’s courses, and courses considered strategic masterpieces. We’ve seen him come from behind on the weekend and win from in front on the weekend. We’ve seen him hold on under the pressure of this vanishing margin and in the mania of Tiger whipping St. Louis crowds into a frenzy while making at charge at him.”
2. The near turning point
Golf.com’s Dylan Dethier on the scene after Brooks Koepka made bogey at 11, 12, and 13 and what it was like on the ground…
  • A morsel…”Koepka may have thought the same thing, and attempted to play his iron shot past the front pin. But whether from adrenaline, miscalculation or just pure smash factor, Koepka’s ball pierced through the wind and airmailed over the back, nearly 30 yards long of the pin.”
  • “It’s hard to say with certainty why the Long Island mobs had suddenly turned on Koepka. He’s hardly the most popular Tour star, but crowds generally favor chaos, too. The combination of factors turned them boorish as Koepka approached his ball.”
3. Shane Ryan’s Sunday BK diary
I could pick any entry from Ryan’s singular minute-by-minute format, so here’s a taste…
  • “6:31 p.m.: I am far from the first one to make this observation, but it bears repeating: Feels like a really, really bad idea to let the people of Long Island host a Ryder Cup. This is going to be a madhouse in 2024. And now it’s time for Koepka hit his drive on 18, which can’t lose the tournament for him, but could probably win it…but that’s not happening. It’s in the sand left, and there’s still some juice in this orange.”
  • “6:35 p.m.: This may be too reactionary right now, but it feels like, at the very least, this is going to chip away at Koepka’s facade of invulnerability. Because this was a little ugly, even considering the course. And now he’s on the downslope of the bunker, and though he makes a good out, he still has to hit a good wedge to give himself two putts for the win.”
4. How long will the major reign of Brooks last?
Cameron Morfit (with an assist from Padraig Harrington) examines the question
  • “Brooks is young; he might get to double figures,” three-time major winner Padraig Harrington said after missing the cut earlier this week. “It’s a numbers game. He’s young enough that he could do it. Why wouldn’t you talk about getting to 18? He’s cracking them out at a fair pace.”
  • “Koepka, 29, put the lie to his own prediction that the winning score would be around even or a bit better. But he may prove himself right in suggesting before the tournament that he could perhaps get to double digits in major wins. If he keeps this up, he could get there quickly.”
  • “Players drift in and out,” said Harrington, a six-time PGA TOUR winner who won his three majors, the 2007 Open Championship and ’08 Open Championship and PGA Championship, in just 13 months. “Pretty much if you watch everybody’s career, they get about 18 months where they truly peak. Whether they’re 100th in the world and they become 50th, or 50th and it becomes 20th, or 20th and it becomes 10, or 10 becomes 1, I don’t know.”
5. Chamblee eats crow
On Sunday night’s edition of “Live From the PGA Championship,
  • “He’s made a believer out of me,” Chamblee said. “I don’t know that anybody saw this coming,” Chamblee said, referring to Koepka’s four major championship wins in two years. “We saw his talent. We knew how good he was. We knew how far he hit it. We knew that he had good touch around and on the greens. But how is it that a man who’s only won twice in regular Tour events shows up at the events with the thickest pressure, that mean the most, with the most mental hurdles that everybody else trips over, and he just glides right over them, one by one by one? That’s miraculous, is what it is.”
6. Runner-up slam
AFP report…”Back-to-back major runner-up efforts have given Dustin Johnson confidence in his game even as he settled for a career Runner-up Grand Slam by finishing second Sunday at the PGA Championship”
  • “…Johnson, whose only major win came at the 2016 US Open, has runner-up major finishes at the 2011 British Open, 2015 US Open, last month’s Masters and the PGA.”
  • “But he’s in good company with the “Second-place Slam” alongside Jack Nicklaus, Arnold Palmer, Greg Norman, Phil Mickelson, Louis Oosthuizen, Tom Watson and Craig Wood.”
7. How Koepka avoided collapse
The New York Post’s Mark Cannizzaro…
  • “Surely, after the way he’d manhandled the brutal Black Course for the first 3.5 rounds, the steely Koepka would be as rock solid as anyone to complete the job.”
  • “Until it looked like he wasn’t.”
  • “With Johnson hanging around, Koepka started skidding out of control like a car with bald tires in a rainstorm on the LIE, carding four consecutive bogeys on Nos. 11, 12, 13 and – of all places – the par-3 14th, the shortest hole on the course, where he shocked himself by airmailing the green.”
  • “Those gaffes, along with a Johnson birdie on No. 15 (he was the only player in the field to make birdie on 15 in all four rounds), turned what was once a seven-shot lead into a throat-drying, one-shot differential.”
8. Meanwhile, at the U.S. Senior Women’s Open…
John Strege at Golf Digest…
  • “Helen Alfredsson predominantly is a recreational golfer these days, better than most recreational golfers, of course, but Nassaus and skins games with friends, however spirited, don’t remotely replicate tournament golf.”
  • “Yet Alfredsson, always competitive, often fiery so, somehow cobbled together a game better than good enough to compete, good enough to win a national championship.”
  • “Alfredsson, a 54-year-old Swede, won the second U.S. Senior Women’s Open at Pine Needles Lodge and Golf Club in Southern Pines, N.C., on Sunday, defeating Juli Inkster and England’s Trish Johnson by two strokes. She received $180,000 for the victory.”
9. Jena Sims: Denied
Important, no? But an awkward moment plenty are talking out…and sure to be a meme if it isn’t already.
  • Rod Ardehali for the Daily Mail…”The pair are filmed walking together with Koepka deep in thought as his rivals, including fellow champion Dustin Johnson, mounted a charge on his lead.”
  • “Sims gets close to him twice and tries to give him a kiss but he shrugs it off and continues walking. When she goes back in again, the golfer pulls back – to the ire of his girlfriend, who folds her arms and walks ahead of him.”

Related Topics:

Ben Alberstadt is the Editor-in-Chief at GolfWRX, where he’s led editorial direction and gear coverage since 2018. He first joined the site as a freelance writer in 2012 after years spent working in pro shops and bag rooms at both public and private golf courses, experiences that laid the foundation for his deep knowledge of equipment and all facets of this maddening game. Based in Philadelphia, Ben’s byline has also appeared on PGATour.com, Bleacher Report...and across numerous PGA DFS and fantasy golf platforms. Off the course, Ben is a committed cat rescuer and, of course, a passionate Philadelphia sports fan. Follow him on Instagram @benalberstadt.

3 Comments

3 Comments

  1. Speedy

    May 21, 2019 at 1:05 pm

    Rumor has it, Brandel (56) got hurt jumping off The Tiger Bandwagon.

    Reply Report comment

  2. Tom Intihar

    May 20, 2019 at 2:49 pm

    Chamblee has, for several years as an “analyst,” ripped on players with his insight into the game. This “insight” includes no major titles during his career. He seems to relish in controversy. He’s got an ego bigger than Bethpage Black. I kinda feel sorry for him in a way. It’s obvious that he must feel slighted to not have been a major champion and the fact that golf giants such as Todd Hamilton and Shawn Micheel have a major and he doesn’t. So, he uses his analyst job to show everyone how much he knows about golf and how low his self esteem is. By the way, Mr. Analyst, Brooks has won now defended two majors. Any idea how difficult that is? I hope he wins a third US Open next month too.

    Reply Report comment

    • Johnny Penso

      May 20, 2019 at 11:07 pm

      Chamblee’s goal and indeed his job, is to generate clicks and views and it seems to me he’s doing a pretty fine job. If you polled golf fans I’d bet there are few that don’t have an opinion on him one way or the other, but the point is, he’s not just another faceless, unknown analyst on tv.

      Reply Report comment

Leave a Reply

Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

News

2026 PGA Championship betting odds

Published

1 day ago

on

May 12, 2026

By

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

Continue Reading

Tour Photo Galleries

Photos from the 2026 PGA Championship

Published

2 days ago

on

May 11, 2026

By

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.

General Albums

WITB Albums

Pullout Albums

Continue Reading

News

How much each player won at the 2026 Truist Championship

Published

2 days ago

on

May 11, 2026

By

Kristoffer Reitan held his nerve at Quail Hollow on Sunday to claim his first PGA Tour victory and the $3.6 million winner’s check that came with it. The Norwegian fended off a packed leaderboard on a dramatic final day, with Rickie Fowler and Nicolai Højgaard both taking home $1.76 million for their runner-up finishes.

With a total prize purse of $20 million up for grabs, here’s a look at how much each player won at the 2026 Truist Championship.

1: Kristoffer Reitan, $3,600,000

T2: Rickie Fowler, $1,760,000

T2: Nicolai Hojgaard, -$1,760,000

4: Alex Fitzpatrick, $960,000

T5: Tommy Fleetwood, $730,000

T5: Sungjae Im, $730,000

T5: J.J. Spaun, $730,000

T8: Ludvig Aberg, $600,000

T8: Harry Hall, $600,000

T10: Patrick Cantlay, $500,000

T10: Matt McCarty, $500,000

T10: Cameron Young, $500,000

13: Justin Thomas, $420,000

T14: Min Woo Lee, $360,000

T14: Chris Gotterup, $360,000

T14: Nick Taylor, $360,000

T17: Alex Smalley, $310,000

T17: Gary Woodland, $310,000

T19: Austin Smotherman, $242,100

T19: Rory McIlroy, $242,100

T19: Keegan Bradley, $242,100

T19: Sudarshan Yellamaraju, $242,100

T19: Kurt Kitayama, $242,100

T24: Patrick Rodgers, $156,643

T24: Pierceson Coody, $156,643

T24: Adam Scott, $156,643

T24: Andrew Novak, $156,643

T24: Harris English, $156,643

T24: J.T. Poston, $156,643

T24: David Lipsky, $156,643

T31: Brian Harman, $114,416.67

T31: Viktor Hovland, $114,416.67

T31: Alex Noren, $114,416.67

T31: Tony Finau, $114,416.67

T31: Nico Echavarria, $114,416.67

T31: Corey Conners, $114,416.67

T37: Sam Burns, $82,187.50

T37: Maverick McNealy, $82,187.50

T37: Akshay Bhatia, $82,187.50

T37: Taylor Pendrith, $82,187.50

T37: Matt Wallace, $82,187.50

T37: Andrew Putnam, $82,187.50

T37: Bud Cauley, $82,187.50

T37: Lucas Glover, $82,187.50

T45: Justin Rose, $60,000

T45: Daniel Berger, $60,000

T45: Ryo Hisatsune, $60,000

T48: Denny McCarthy, $50,000

T48: Aldrich Potgieter, $50,000

T48: Webb Simpson, $50,000

T48: Michael Kim, $50,000

T52: Mackenzie Hughes, $45,187.50

T52: Max Homa, $45,187.50

T52: Brian Campbell, $45,187.50

T52: Jhonattan Vegas, $45,187.50

T52: Matt Fitzpatrick, $45,187.50

T52: Chandler Blanchet, $45,187.50

T52: Jordan Spieth, $45,187.50

T52: Jacob Bridgeman, $45,187.50

T60: Xander Schauffele, $42,500

T60: Robert MacIntyre, $42,500

T60: Ricky Castillo, $42,500

T63: Ben Griffin, $41,250

T63: Sepp Straka, $41,250

T65: Ryan Gerard, $40,250

T65: Si Woo Kim, $40,250

67: Ryan Fox, $39,500

68: Jason Day, $39,000

69: Sahith Theegala, $38,000

70: Sam Stevens, $37,500

71: Hideki Matsuyama, $37,000

72: Tom Hoge, $36,000

Continue Reading

Announcement

Our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use have been updated as of January 29th, 2026. Please review the updated policies here Privacy Policy | Terms of Use. By continuing to use our site after January 29th, 2026, you agree to the changes.

WITB

Whats in the Bag2 days ago

Alex Fitzpatrick WITB 2026 (May)

Driver: Ping G440 LST (9 degrees) Shaft: Fujikura Ventus Black 6 X 3-wood: TaylorMade Qi4D (15 degrees) Shaft: Fujikura Ventus...
Whats in the Bag3 days ago

Kristoffer Reitan’s winning WITB: 2026 Truist Championship

Driver: Ping G440 Max (9 degrees) Shaft: Mitsubishi Tensei 1K White 60 TX 3-wood: Ping G440 Max (15 degrees) Shaft:...
Whats in the Bag1 week ago

WITB Time Machine: Rory McIlroy’s winning WITB, 2021 Truist Championship

Rory McIlroy’s victory at the 2021 Wells Fargo Championship 2021 (now the Truist Championship) marked a significant return to form,...
Whats in the Bag1 week ago

Collin Morikawa WITB 2026 (May)

Driver: TaylorMade Qi4D LS (8 degrees) Shaft: Mitsubishi Diamana D+ Limited 60 TX 3-wood: TaylorMade SIM Tour (14 degrees) Shaft:...

Facebook

Trending