News

Morning 9: Match 3 details announced | The New York Yankee who nearly won the Masters | Good news for golf card collectors

Published

6 years ago

Oct 20, 2020

Ben Alberstadt

By Ben Alberstadt

Email me at ben.alberstadt@golfwrx.com

October 20, 2020

Good Tuesday morning, golf fans.

1. The Match 3 details announced

PGATour.com staff report…“Turner Sports will present Capital One’s The Match: Champions for Change, a premier golf event with the World Golf Hall of Famer and crossover legends competing – Phil Mickelson, Charles Barkley, Stephen Curry and Peyton Manning. TNT will exclusively televise the event, to be held Friday, Nov. 27, at 3 p.m. ET at Stone Canyon Golf Club in Oro Valley, Ariz. Bleacher Report will also provide exclusive live content leading up to and during the event on the B/R app.”

“Capital One’s The Match: Champions for Change will uniquely contribute toward and highlight diversity, equality and inclusion through donations to Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), while raising awareness and spotlighting opportunities for diversity and equality in sports. All four players have previously supported diversity and inclusion initiatives throughout their careers, which has led to them teaming up for this event. Additional information on these elements, among others, will be announced at a later date.”

Full piece.

2. DJ out of ZOZO

ESPN’s Bob Harig…“Dustin Johnson has withdrawn from this week’s Zozo Championship at Sherwood after missing last week’s CJ Cup due to a positive COVID-19 test.”

“Johnson, the No. 1-ranked player in the world, was eligible to return Thursday because he would have been 10 days past the onset of symptoms.”

“Unfortunately, Dustin just made the decision to withdraw from Zozo,” said David Winkle, Johnson’s agent, in a text “While he is feeling much better, he is still a bit low on energy and feels it would be best to wait and resume his schedule in Houston. “

Full piece.

3. Hero World Challenge canceled

PGATour.com staff report…“Amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic and associated travel restrictions, Tiger Woods’ TGR Foundation announced on social channels today the cancellation of this season’s Hero World Challenge at Albany, Bahamas.”

“The unofficial 18-player event was to have taken place Dec. 3-6.”

…”Here is the statement…Given the current global restrictions and ongoing developments resulting from COVID-19, the 2020 Hero World Challenge will not be played this year. This decision was made with the health and well-being of all tournament constituents and the Albany community in mind. We look forward to hosting 18 of the top players in the world and welcoming tournament guests to Albany, Bahamas next year.”

Full piece.

4. Solheim Cup: 2023 event to take place in mid-September in Spain

BBC Sport report…“The 2023 Solheim Cup in Spain will take place from 18-24 September.”

“Andalucia’s Finca Cortesin was already confirmed as host of the event – the first time Spain has staged the match between Europe and the United States.”

“Spain will be the sixth European nation to host the biggest team event in women’s golf.”

Full piece.

GolfWRX Recommends

We think a quarterly journal is the best complement to a website that publishes dozens of articles daily. And while that might not make sense to you now, it certainly will once you subscribe to The Golfer’s Journal and dive into some of the best golf writing and photography around. If you haven’t subscribed, do.

Check it out.

GolfWRX may earn a commission on sales of “GolfWRX Recommends” products.

5. Good news for golf card collectors

Adam Woodard for Golfweek…”Come next spring, a new set of trading cards will be available for golf fans thanks to Upper Deck. The sports and entertainment collectibles company announced a new set of cards that will feature golf’s current stars like Tiger Woods, Justin Thomas, Bryson DeChambeau, Matthew Wolff, Danielle Kang and Lexi Thompson alongside legends like Arnold Palmer and Annika Sorenstam.”

“Collectors have been begging us to bring golf cards back for years,” said Upper Deck’s Sports Brand Manager, Paul Zickler”
….”The release will be Upper Deck’s first golf cards since 2014 and feature a 50-card base set, a 30-card rookie set, a multi-major winners subset and rare signed memorabilia cards.”

Full piece.

6. Barkley guarantees victory in “Match”

We’ll see, Chuck…

Adam Schupak for Golfweek…“The competition format will be modified alternate-shot match play with five-time major winner Mickelson teaming with Barkley, a Naismith Memorial Hall of Famer, in facing Curry, a three-time NBA Champion and near scratch golfer, and two-time Super Bowl champion Peyton Manning, who played a pivotal role in his team winning the last edition of Capital One’s The Match.”

“I’m excited to return for the third edition of Capital One’s The Match and get out on the course with these three legendary athletes,” Mickelson said. “While we may need a handicap for Chuck, I’m looking forward to playing with Peyton and Stephen and to help raise money for another important cause. It’s also going to give fans and viewers an up-close look at Stone Canyon Golf Club, a place that I’m extremely proud of and excited to show how special it is.”
…”Barkley added: “Capital One’s The Match has been a lot of fun to be a part of over the past few years and I’m excited to finally show off my skills on the course. Phil and I got this, I GUARR-AAAN-TEEEE!!!”

Full piece.

7. The New York Yankee who nearly won the Masters

Ashamed to say this is first I’ve heard of Sammy Byrd. Excellent stuff from John Fischer for the Morning Read…”it earned him much more than that: an invitation to play in the 1940 Masters. The Masters, which debuted in 1934, originally was known as the Augusta National Invitation Tournament, and the name change, beginning in 1939 and over club co-founder Jones’ initial objection, didn’t alter the “invitation” aspect. All players were invited by Jones to participate. There were no automatic entries based on prize money or other measurements of standing in the golf world.”

“It didn’t hurt that Byrd had played golf with Jones in 1933 and impressed him with his ball-striking ability, nor did it hurt that Byrd’s boss, Dudley, was the head professional at Augusta National Golf Club during the winter. In his first Masters, Byrd finished a respectable 14th, but the best was yet to come.”

“The next year, Byrd finished third at the Masters with a score of 3-under 285, behind Craig Wood’s winning 280 and runner-up Byron Nelson’s 283. Byrd finished one stroke ahead of Ben Hogan and four ahead of Sam Snead. Byrd was right in the mix of a major golf tournament.”

“In 1942, Byrd started the Masters with back-to-back rounds of 68, putting him one stroke behind the leader, Nelson. Byrd’s last two rounds of 75 and 74 put him at 285 and in fourth place, behind Nelson, the winner in a playoff with Hogan, and third-place Paul Runyan.”

Full piece.

8. How Kokrak got it done

Golf Digest’s Dave Shedloski…“For the first time in his career, Kokrak led the field in stroke gained/putting, gaining 2.573 strokes on the field. He made a little more than 401 feet of putts. A putter switch, to a club with a longer, stiffer shaft, that he made late last season has made a huge difference for a guy who ranked 151st in strokes gained/putting in the just completed campaign.”

“Experience on the tricky greens didn’t hurt. And reliance on his caddie, former tour player David Robinson, to help read those greens was another ace in the hole, so to speak.”

“Jason Kokrak praised his caddie, former tour pro David Robinson, for his assistance throughout Sunday’s closing 64.”

“I would characterize it more D-Rob’s work,” Kokrak said, magnanimously. “I mean, he reads them pretty dang good. I did a good job of hitting the spots where we were trying to putt it to. Very happy with how I’ve been putting and kind of paying off with all the work I’ve been putting in.”

Full piece.

News

Testing Lorem Ipsum

Published

6 hours ago

May 13, 2026

Pro Shop

What is Lorem Ipsum?

Lorem Ipsum is simply dummy text of the printing and typesetting industry. Lorem Ipsum has been the industry’s standard dummy text ever since the 1500s, when an unknown printer took a galley of type and scrambled it to make a type specimen book. It has survived not only five centuries, but also the leap into electronic typesetting, remaining essentially unchanged. It was popularised in the 1960s with the release of Letraset sheets containing Lorem Ipsum passages, and more recently with desktop publishing software like Aldus PageMaker including versions of Lorem Ipsum.

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.