News

Morning 9: Charles Schwab Challenge ratings | Phil at 50 | PGA Championship officially on | Will Bryson change golf?

Published

6 years ago

Jun 16, 2020

Ben Alberstadt

By Ben Alberstadt

Email me at ben.alberstadt@golfwrx.com

June 16, 2020

Good Tuesday morning, golf fans. Happy 50th, Phil!

1. Charles Schwab Challenge ratings are in…

Nobody parses a ratings press release like Geoff Shackelford! Don’t underestimate the magnetic pull of re-airings of the Beverly Hills Dog Show…

Anyway, of the final-round 2.1 rating, Shackelford writes…”CBS did not make any ratings predictions for the “Return to Golf”, but the Charles Schwab Challenge tournament director predicted a final round rating of a 6, which would have been equal to a lot of majors. “

“The rating is dismal when you consider:

-This was the first live, official PGA Tour event since mid-March.

-Network competition was non-existent. Fox’s presentation of NASCAR was delayed by rain (eventually airing in prime time). NBC was airing the Beverly Hills Dog Show (again). And ABC wheeled out Last Dance (still!).

-Heading into the final round, the leaderboard featured star players and the promise of a close finish…

You can read CBS full 50-percent-increase-YoY-emphasizing press release…full piece.

2. Workday Charity Open

PGATour.com staff report… “The PGA TOUR has announced that a full-field tournament has been scheduled for July 6-12 at Muirfield Golf Club in Dublin, Ohio, through a partnership with Workday, Inc. a leader in enterprise cloud applications for finance and human resources.”

“Featuring a 156-player field and $6.2 million purse, the Workday Charity Open will be held without the general public attendance the week prior to the Memorial Tournament presented by Nationwide, filling the week vacated when the 2020 John Deere Classic was cancelled on May 28. Domestically, the event will include Thursday-Friday afternoon coverage and early Saturday-Sunday coverage on Golf Channel, with CBS Sports anchoring the weekend coverage”

Full piece.

3. PGA OK’d for no fans play

Golf Channel’s Will Gray…”The first major championship of 2020 will be conducted without fans, according to a report from the San Francisco Chronicle.”

“The PGA Championship has already been postponed from its original May dates at TPC Harding Park in San Francisco to Aug. 6-9 because of the COVID-19 pandemic. While officials maintained hope that fans would be able to attend the event in some capacity, the decision has reportedly been made that no fans will be allowed on property during tournament week, with an announcement from the PGA of America expected on Tuesday. A GolfChannel.com request for comment from the PGA of America was not immediately returned.”

“According to the report, PGA officials had hoped to host up to 40,000 fans per day at Harding Park, which has never before hosted a major championship and which last hosted a PGA Tour event in 2015 when Rory McIlroy won the WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play. Fans who had purchased tickets to the tournament will reportedly receive a refund.”

Full piece…See the paywalled SF Chronicle story here

4. Tour template?

Bill Pennington for the New York Times…“More than 100 other pro golfers did line up on Saturday to take the saliva test for the coronavirus, since a negative result was required in order to board the charter after the tournament. There were no evident objections to undergoing another test, an about-face among players who had done plenty of grumbling when the invasive swab test was administered earlier in the week upon their arrival in Fort Worth.”

“The malleability of highly compensated golfers in the span of a few days might also be noteworthy for other sports organizing their returns to play. Elaborate testing – PGA Tour players were also screened daily for fever and had to fill out tracing questionnaires – was not viewed as an imposition but instead may have instilled a welcomed sense of security. In the end, after a lengthy time in some form of quarantine at home, some players considered the environment almost liberating.”

Full piece.

5. Monty calls for tournament ball

BBC report quoting Colin Montgomerie…“It’s great to see athleticism in the game but this is a whole new game we are beginning to witness.

“On Friday, Bryson had 10 holes on which he was within 100 yards of the green for his approach. And if you include the four par threes that means there were only four holes on which Bryson was more than 100 yards away for his approach.

“The game has changed dramatically. It’s now brute force and a sand wedge.”

…”I’m an advocate of what Jack Nicklaus proposes – a tournament ball for professionals, that goes only 80-85% as far,” Montgomerie said.

Full piece.

6. Beefier Bryson = gamechanger for Tour pros?

Michael Bamberger for Golf.com…”DeChambeau, over the course of this three-month Covid-19 pause, got bigger (20 pounds bigger, by his estimate) and better. Yes, it would be easy to read too much into his four solid rounds at Colonial (65, 65, 70, 66). But when you hit it 20 and 30 and 40 yards past the game’s longest hitters, and in play, with sound mechanics, that’s not a one-off. That’s repeatable. It’s a recipe.”

“How hard is any par-4 when you can cover 480 yards with a driver and a wedge? Name a single par-5 that this guy can’t reach with a driver and some kind of iron? We’re talking about kick-in birdies and low-stress golf.”

….”The last player to really separate himself from the rest of the field by length was Tiger, in his early 20s. Now comes this guy.”

“Tour driving statistics don’t allow for real-world analysis. As Woods has often said about Dustin Johnson’s length, he has another gear – and another 20 yards – when he wants it and needs it, when the conditions are ripe for him. The wind, the shape of the hole, how he’s feeling, where he is on the leaderboard. That’s why DeChambeau, driving it so far past McIlroy, who wasn’t holding back, was so revealing.”

Full piece.

7. Phil turns Phifty

Steve DiMeglio for Golfweek on Phil’s reflections as he hits 5-0…”His thoughts often turned to his family, which has always been his priority – his parents, Phil and Mark, his brother, Tim, and sister, Tina, and his beautiful wife, Amy, and two daughters and one son.”

“His other love has produced a bountiful of memories, as well, from the days he started copying his father’s swing in the back yard and thus turning himself into a left-handed golfer despite being a natural righty.”

“The three NCAA individual titles, becoming the first left-hander to win the U.S. Amateur, winning his first PGA Tour title as an amateur, cashing in on 100s of money games on Tuesdays. Three green jackets, one Claret Jug, one Wanamaker Trophy, a record six silver medals in the U.S. Open. Forty-four PGA Tour wins, numerous Ryder Cup and Presidents Cup wins, a record 25 consecutive years in the top 50 in the official world rankings.”

Full piece.

8. Who’s in?

Our Gianni Magliocco rounds up the players who you’ll be able to play as in PGATour 2K21-exciting news for those desperate for a successor to the Tiger Woods PGA Tour franchise from EA Sports (including me)…”Last month, details emerged on golf’s latest video game PGA Tour 2k21 which features Justin Thomas as the game’s cover star.”

“Since then, PGA Tour 2K21 has been slowly unveiling the other PGA Star’s that golf fans will be able to play with and the list is now complete – with the final man revealed in the lineup being Sergio Garcia.”

Here are the 12 players featured in PGA Tour 2k21:

Justin Thomas

Matt Kuchar

Bryson DeChambeau

Kevin Kisner

Cam Champ

Tony Finau

Ian Poulter

Gary Woodland

Billy Horschel

Patrick Cantlay

Sergio Garcia

Jim Furyk

9. Divergent strategies for Woodland, DeChambeau

Our Ryan Barath…”Since the fall, Bryson has admitted to adding up to 40lbs to his frame and with that also added a big uptick in ball speed-one of the single biggest factors to hitting it longer.”

“On the other hand, Gary Woodland returned to action this week at the Charles Schwab Challenge having dropped 25 pounds during the PGA Tour’s break after hitting the gym and changing his diet too. Woodland, the reigning US Open Champion remains one of the longest players in the game and like Bryson was in contention coming down the stretch.”

“Bryson is not the first golfer to change his swing and his body to pick up distance off the tee, there are many examples of golfers who have tried to search for distance but come up short. Bryson is the first in recent memory to put up big gains and turn them into immediate results.”

“As pointed out by Neil Schuster from No Laying Up, the contrast between DeChambeau and Woodland couldn’t be further apart, and with such a condensed schedule for the rest of the PGA Tour season seeing the sample size grow and how these two play for the rest of the year is going to be interesting to keep an eye on.”

Full piece.

News

Testing Lorem Ipsum

Published

4 hours ago

May 13, 2026

Pro Shop

What is Lorem Ipsum?

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Why do we use it?

It is a long established fact that a reader will be distracted by the readable content of a page when looking at its layout. The point of using Lorem Ipsum is that it has a more-or-less normal distribution of letters, as opposed to using ‘Content here, content here’, making it look like readable English. Many desktop publishing packages and web page editors now use Lorem Ipsum as their default model text, and a search for ‘lorem ipsum’ will uncover many web sites still in their infancy. Various versions have evolved over the years, sometimes by accident, sometimes on purpose (injected humour and the like).

News

2026 PGA Championship betting odds

Published

2 days 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.