The 66-year-old PGA Tour Champions stalware tore his Achilles on Feb. 1 of this year. He had already announced plans to make the 2024 Masters his last trip down Magnolia Lane but later said he’d make the 2025 one his last, after his recovery. Langer made the cut at Augusta National Golf Club as recently as 2020.
Well, his recovery is coming right along, as Langer has announced he is planning to make his Champions Tour return next week, right at the three-month mark of his injury.
In a video posted on X, Langer said recounted how he got hurt.
Two months after tearing his achilles, @BernhardLanger6 is making a return.
In the video, Langer said the Achilles tear happened when he was playing pickleball. He went in for surgery the next day and has been wearing a walking boot for several weeks since then.
But if you thought that type of injury was going to be the end of his career, think again.
“I think I can still be productive for a few more years,” he said. “I still think I have a lot of good golf in me.”
The PGA Tour Champions’ Insperity Invitational is at The Woodlands Country Club in The Woodlands, Texas, outside Houston. Two of his record-setting 46 victories on the senior circuit came in the Insperity, in 2014 and 2018.
“I don’t give up. I am determined one time to get these guys”
Annika Sorenstam has done it all in professional golf. She’s the GOAT, the winner of 72 LPGA Tour events but there is at least one accomplishment that has eluded her – winning her first celebrity golf title.
Sorenstam is winless in 10 previous attempts. She has come oh-so-close, finishing second three times, third three times, and never outside the top 10. Asked why she still is competing in events such as this week’s Invited Classic on the PGA Tour Champions as one of the contenders in the Celebrity Division, she said, “Because I don’t give up.”
Sorenstam gets her latest chance to win against the likes of Hall of Fame pitcher John Smoltz, at Las Colinas Country Club in Irving, Texas, from April 19-21.
“I am determined one time to get these guys,” she said. “That’s the main reason. But I also enjoy it. I have a lot of fun. As you know, I don’t play much nowadays, and this makes me practice a little bit, makes me still kind of stay within the game.
“I am competitive and I do enjoy playing and I’m still determined, so I’m going to keep trying.”
Sorenstam finished second to New York Mets infielder Jeff McNeil in January at the LPGA’s Hilton Grand Vacations Tournament of Champions. She has finished third the last two years at the Invited Celebrity Classic. Former tennis star Mardy Fish won in 2022 and former Dallas Cowboys quarterback Tony Romo is the defending champion.
“I’ve had a few chances, but I really haven’t been able to put either three rounds, good rounds together or four rounds together. I think that’s kind of been my, my thing nowadays,” she said. “I really feel welcome at these tournaments, and it’s fun and I want the guys to have to fight for something. I appreciate the invites every time.”
“We pulled up the archives and we got some brutal pictures,” Izzi told her dad.
There isn’t much to critique Steve Stricker in his golf game over his career. Twelve-time PGA Tour winner. Seven-time major winner on the PGA Tour Champions. Ryder Cup captain in his home state of Wisconsin. Winner of many prestigious awards for his work on and off the golf course. The list goes on.
But his fashion?
That’s another story.
And his daughter Izzi, who’s spending more time with Dad on the golf course these days, did what any good teenager would do: Roasted him on social media in the most adorable way.
Izzi spent the weekend with Steve, serving as his caddie at the PGA Tour Champions’ The Galleri Classic in Rancho Mirage, California. During the event, she took a break to grade his wardrobe choices over the years. This included his hairstyle back in the day.
“We pulled up the archives and we got some brutal pictures,” Izzi, a Waunakee High School senior and Wisconsin Badgers golf recruit, told him at the beginning of the video.
First up was a picture of Steve sporting a mullet — likely from the 1990s.
“Is that a mullet?” she asked. “If you zoom in, you got a lot of hair back there.”
Apparently, Stricker’s good friend, Tiger Woods, was wondering the same thing.
“Tiger just texted me this last week and asked if I had a mullet,” Steve said.
Izzi likes that look, though.
“He still gels his hair like this in the morning and I think he gets memories of flashbacks,” Izzi said, as they both laughed. “That’s a good hairstyle. Overall, slick back, nice.”
At 57 years old, Steve said, “I wish I had it back there. Not much there.”
The hairstyle must have run in the family during this time. A photo of Steve with his wife, Nicki — who has served as his caddie for years — popped up.
“Now that’s a mullet,” Steve chimed in, as he and his daughter shared a good laugh.
Izzi approved. “Mom looks good,” she said. “She looks different, but she looks good.”
Izzi, who won the WIAA Division 1 high school state golf championship as a junior and senior, rated his shirts on the next two photos. She gave them a “five” and a “two” on a 1-10 scale.
“Oh, God. Oh,” she said about one polo.
“What is that? Looks like a curtain,” Izzi said laughing.
A photo of the family, including a younger Izzi, was next, from a golf tournament. Izzi was in her mom’s arms.
Steve Stricker of the United States and daughter Izzi Stricker look on from the 18th green during the first round of the PNC Championship at The Ritz-Carlton Golf Club on December 16, 2023, in Orlando, Florida. (Photo by Mike Mulholland/Getty Images)
“She was definitely a momma’s girl,” Steve said. “I could never hold her. But now look at us today (as they hugged). But back then, I couldn’t touch Izzi.”
The two are inseparable these days and Izzi has been part of her dad’s biggest moments on the golf course the last two years.
She was there when Steve was an assistant captain of the US’ Presidents Cup victory in 2022 at Quail Hollow Club in Charlotte, North Carolina. She approved of his look at that event as they viewed a photo of the family together.
“You had some good outfits there, I remember,” Izzi said. “That was fun. Ten out of 10.”
Then a photo appeared of the two posing with the huge trophy that Steve won at the KitchenAid Senior PGA Championship last May, his sixth major championship at the time. Izzi had a role in the win as well. She caddied for Steve for the first time at the tournament.
“We matched that day, too. Remember?” Izzi reminded him.
“Definitely 10 out of 10,” Steve said.
Izzi one-upped him.
“Eleven out of 10,” Izzi said, smiling.
“Great memories of that one,” Steve said.
This past weekend at The Galleri Classic offered more memories for Wisconsin’s first family of golf. Stricker tied for sixth with Izzi on the bag.
With the exception of Tiger, Couples might have the most famous bad back in golf.
RANCHO MIRAGE, Calif. — With the notable exception of Tiger Woods, Fred Couples might have the most famous bad back in the history of golf. And right now, that back is not cooperating.
Thursday, Couples was sounding like a man who might not get to the first tee on Friday at the Galleri Classic. Turns out, Couples was right.
“I can get it around. Last week part of the problem was there were a couple times in the group where I’m playing with guys on a par-3 and they’re hitting a 6-iron and I have a 4-iron out just trying to dink it up there,” Couples said Thursday. “I tried to hit a 5 on one hole and it just didn’t work out well, but that would have happened the next hole or the next day. On Saturday I just couldn’t even swing.”
Couples ended up withdrawing from the Hoag Classic in Newport Beach in the second round, and he admitted the back hadn’t improved much as the Galleri Classic began this week. But with the Galleri being played on Couples’ old home course at Mission Hills Country Club, Couples wanted to do everything he could to play this week. Instead, it was a second withdrawal in two weeks.
“It was raining and freezing (in Newport Beach) and I couldn’t get loose, and it was just a waste of time even to continue to play,” Couples said. “So I tried to rest a little bit. The weather’s awesome (Thursday). I know it’s not supposed to be great Saturday and Sunday, but that’s the way it goes. I’ll get it around today and I’ll see what’s going on tonight. I just don’t feel very good.”
The Galleri Classic is important to Couples for several reasons. First, he lived at Mission Hills for years and continues to live in the Coachella Valley. Second, he played the Dinah Shore Tournament Course for many years with friend and fellow PGA Tour pro John Cook and George Brett of the Kansas City Royals. The tournament last year marked the return of the PGA Tour Champions to the desert, something the 64-year-old Couples had hopes would happen with him still on the tour.
“It’s a great event. A lot of people last year, too,” Couples said. “Again, we’re lucky to play all these tournaments that we have, but I’ll tell you for being a desert rat for 40 years, I’m hoping I’m healthy enough to just get it around. But I’d like to play at least two or three more years here.”
Fred Couples takes his putt on the seventh green during the Pro-Am at The Galleri Classic in Rancho Mirage, Calif., Thursday, March 28, 2024.
Trying to stay on tour
Couples, one of the most popular players among fans and with his fellow players on the PGA Tour Champions, has fought back trouble since his days on the PGA Tour, where he won 15 times including the 1992 Masters. He’s won 14 times on the PGA Tour Champions, the last win at the SAS Championship in 2022. But last year Couples played just 10 senior events, managing just one top-10 finish, something that clearly frustrates him.
“Now that I’m 64 my goal is to not come play a golf tournament and feel bad and finish 45th,” he said. “That’s like not much fun. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with it, but I’m past that. So I’ll play a handful of tournaments and play with my buddies and enjoy golf.”
Officials of the Galleri can be comforted that even as Couples begins picking and choosing select tournaments to play, the desert tournament is high on Couples’ list.
“I have some hand-picked ones. I’ll play in Newport because I can get around there. I’ll play here,” Couples said. “I might go up to Pebble (Beach) and play. But I’m not going to travel around and play. I’ve actually felt okay in Hawaii and in Naples, but I just, I’m so afraid to hurt myself by practicing for a couple hours and I don’t feel well.”
The flat-bellies might dismiss veterans with ‘get off my lawn’ memes, but theirs are important voices.
In the Oscar-winning Indian movie “RRR,” there’s a bleakly comedic scene in which a tyrannical politician berates an officer for training his gun on a woman from the lower orders, telling him that the cost of his ammunition exceeded the value of the life he intended to take with it. Adopting that ghoulish standard, one wonders why the overworked firing squads of social media even bothered taking aim at Chris DiMarco, who this week joined a lengthy list of professional golfers giving voice to unspeakably deluded notions.
“We’re kind of hoping that LIV buys the Champions Tour, to tell you the truth,” DiMarco said on a visit to the Subpar podcast, as he unfavorably compared prize money at the Players Championship with purses on the Toviaz tour. “Let’s play for a little real money out here. This is kind of a joke when we’re getting $2 million. There were like seven guys last week from TPC [Sawgrass] that made more money than our purses.”
He didn’t define the ‘we’ on whose behalf he claimed to speak, but DiMarco’s comments surely had his peers squirming in the Champions Tour locker room, itself a verdant pasture of conspiracy theories so kooky that even a Lyndon LaRouche-ite might think the crazy train had passed his stop.
It’s easy to cite DiMarco’s performances — a T-33 his best finish in 2024, and no better than a T-15 in 23 starts last season — and ask just how much value he thinks he adds to the Champions Tour, beyond being an amiable pro-am companion for a group of middle managers. Doing so would be a disservice to what was a respectable if fleeting career on the PGA Tour, and would overlook the actual point he was making. DiMarco didn’t say he personally deserves more from the cash spigot now watering every lawn in Jupiter, rather that the tour on which he competes does. But that’s an argument not even his most avaricious senior colleagues are making right now, with good reason.
Talk to most any player on the Champions Tour and you’ll find they are pissed at how the PGA Tour they helped build is being treated by the current generation as wholly their asset to remortgage, at how naked greed is trumping any sentiment about the greater good of the game. The flat-bellies might dismiss veterans with ‘get off my lawn’ memes and eye rolls, but theirs are important voices in any conversation about the Tour’s future. Which is why some experienced hands will find it frustrating that one of their own mounted a dumb argument—that senior purses aren’t adequately financed—and chose a dumb time to do it.
The new for-profit entity, PGA Tour Enterprises, is going to reshape men’s professional golf. Along the way, every budget line in the Global Home will be subjected to close scrutiny and value assessments not rooted in sentimentality. That will include all the tours operating under the mothership’s umbrella. The degree to which the Champions Tour is subsidized by headquarters is often exaggerated. According to one source familiar with internal accounting, it’s no more than a few million dollars annually. That’s pennies for an organization now valued at $12 billion, but pennies are snatched back first in pursuit of dollars, and this is not the time to suggest that even bigger handouts might be in order.
There’s an understandable disconnect between what the Champions Tour is commercially and what many of its members imagine it to be competitively. Players see a cutthroat circuit where every buck is hard-earned, which is fair enough. But the business of the Champions Tour is essentially that of an elevated pro-am circuit, with 200-odd amateurs paying to play both Wednesdays and Thursdays, with another 100-ish on Mondays, if there’s demand. Television viewership is meager, worryingly so since a decent percentage of those watching could be in danger of expiring during the broadcast window. The value of the Champions Tour lies in being an on-site entertainment platform that can support itself (albeit in orthopedic shoes), not as a product with a monetizable audience of scale and global growth potential.
That might change after December 30, 2025, when Tiger Woods turns 50 years old and becomes eligible to join the circuit. If he can’t or won’t play, then the Champions Tour will never have been less relevant. If he does compete, even sparingly, Woods could boost the Tour’s value well beyond pro-am receipts. But until such times manifest, those who play out there are paid sufficiently within the parameters of what their tour is.
The ‘git me some’ attitude in DiMarco’s comments — which goes in tandem with dismissing fans as an afterthought — is easily derided, but a 55-year-old struggling pro with loose lips, 20-plus years removed from his last win, is a conveniently soft target. If folks want to take aim at professional golfers who express entitlement to greater rewards while adding little to the product or fan experience, there are plenty of Chris DiMarcos on the PGA Tour doing just that.
Professional golf’s growing entitlement problem extends beyond the PGA Tour and LIV Golf.
Professional golf’s growing entitlement problem extends beyond the PGA Tour and LIV Golf. Just listen to Chris DiMarco, who joined the Subpar podcast with Colt Knost and Drew Stoltz this week and his comments came off as anything but humble.
The ongoing discussions between the PGA Tour and Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund – the financial backers of the Tour’s rival, LIV Golf – have hung over the game like a cloud for nearly a year now. When asked about the current state of the professional game, the three-time PGA Tour winner from 2000-2002 didn’t waste any time and unloaded thoughts on the money being thrown around and why the PGA Tour Champions, of all tours, deserve more of it.
“We’re kind of hoping that (LIV Golf) buys the Champions Tour,” DiMarco said. “Let’s play for a little real money out here. I mean this is kind of a joke when we’re getting $2 million. There were like seven guys last week from (TPC Sawgrass at the Players Championship) that made more money than our purses.”
A joke? That’s funny coming from the 55-year-old who hasn’t finished in the top 10 on the senior circuit since 2020. Overall, across 114 starts on the Champions tour, DiMarco has earned 17 top-25 finishes and just four top-10s.
The PGA Tour Champions offers over-the-hill players the chance to still compete for a little scratch on the side once they’re unable to keep up with the young guns on the PGA Tour. The over-50 tour has 28 events on its schedule for 2024, with $67 million up for grabs. That’s not a bad second career for a group of guys who spent their prime earning well more than the national average.
And yes, with more than $400 million on the line across 38 events, the PGA Tour plays for five times more cash than the seniors. And they should. It’s a better product that garners more interest and produces better TV ratings (though ratings for the men’s game have gone down in 2024).
Golf fans are fed up with players, at any level, who demand more when they haven’t done anything to earn it. DiMarco had a few great summers in the early 2000s and hasn’t been heard from since. If he wants to play for more money, maybe he should focus on finding the top half of a Champions tour leaderboard instead of finishing a few scrolls down.
Harrington is now 3-for-3 in closing out 36-hole leads on the Champions tour.
Padraig Harrington was looking to go 3-for-3 in closing out 36-hole leads on the PGA Tour Champions on Sunday at the Hoag Classic Newport Beach.
He started the final round at 12 under, a shot ahead of Thongchai Jaidee, who shot a 62 on Friday. Harrington ran into a big trouble twice but rebounded both times.
Harrington’s first trip-up was a double-bogey on the par-3 fourth hole which was playing 140 yards Sunday. He had a second double bogey on the par-4 16th hole, and that one proved more costly as it dropped him to 12 under and out of the lead a shot back of Jaidee and Miguel Angel Jimenez.
On the 191-yard, par-3 17th, however, Harrington hit his ball pin high and then drained the putt for a bounce-back birdie to tie for the lead once again. On 18, Harrington curled one around seemlingly all sides of the cup before it dropped for a closing birdie, setting off an extended fist pump from the Irishman.
Harrington closed with a 2-under 69 to win for the seventh time in 37 starts on the senior circuit. Jaidee was solo second a shot back. Jimenez was solo third, two shots back. Stephen Ames was solo fourth at 10 under.
Defending tournament champion Ernie Els was tied for 33rd. Jim Furyk made his 2024 season debut after recovering from a back injury and also tied for 33rd. Fred Couples withdrew after nine holes during the second round.
The tour stays in southern California for the Galleri Classic at Mission Hills Country Club in Rancho Mirage.
We’ve long become accustomed to JD hitting tape-measure drives, which is what made this swing so startling.
Nerves on the first tee – we’ve all had them. Even two-time major winners such as John Daly.
We’ve long become accustomed to JD hitting tape-measure drives, which is what made the following swing so startling. On Friday, the 57-year-old got off to an inauspicious start, topping his opening tee shot during the first round of the 2024 Hoag Classic, a PGA Tour Champions event held at Newport Beach Country Club in Newport Beach, California.
We’ve pretty much seen it all from The Wild Thing during his rollercoaster career but topping his opening tee shot may have been a first. Daly looked anxious to hit and nearly did so before the first-tee announcer had a chance to call his name. Daly backed off the tee shot when his name was announced and re-started his routine. Daly made “Grip it and Rip it,” a household catchphrase among golfers and led the PGA Tour in driving distance 11 times, but Long John was short of the forward tees with his dribbler off the tee, at least on this occasion.
Daly, who has been struggling with injuries all season, shot 74-75 and was in last place out of the field of 77 heading into Sunday’s final round. Earlier this season, Daly needed an injection in his left hand after his osteoarthritis flared up, and he shot 87 at an event in Morocco. But no matter what, Daly always entertains. The video below shows his one-of-a-kind pre-round warm-up routine. Unfortunately, it turns out he wasn’t ready to roll this week, unless they were referring to his opening topped shot, which is destined for a long future in golf bloopers. Here’s hoping better days are ahead for Big John.
“It doesn’t look like there will be any sort of golfing marriage in the near future,” said Harrington.
TUCSON, Ariz. — There appears to be no end in sight to the PGA Tour-LIV Golf rift and this past weekend was just another example of the prolonged standoff.
It was one of the four weekends in 2024 where a LIV event overlapped a signature event. There are 12 times in all this year where the two leagues will intersect.
Meanwhile, Abraham Ancer hoisted a trophy after winning the LIV Golf Hong Kong event and pocketed $4 million.
“It doesn’t look like there will be any sort of golfing marriage in the near future,” said Padraig Harrington ahead of the 2024 Cologuard Classic on the PGA Tour Champions, who had some general thoughts about what can be done in the meantime.
“Why not have it a little bit like the old European Tour-PGA Tour, where there’s a little bit of competition. Certainly it’s good for the fans when there’s rivalries.”
Harrington played both tours for several years. Nowadays he plays mostly on the Champions tour but does dabble in some PGA Tour events. He’s already played twice on the “regular” tour in 2024 and so he sees firsthand the fallout.
“I go back to the PGA Tour and I’m right in amongst it,” he said. “A lot of my friends went to LIV, so I also have a good few guys out there who I would be friendly with.
“So I can see both sides of it. You know, in the end of the day, I played the majority of my career when there was two strong tours and there was a bit of rivalry and a bit of competition, so I’m not, I wouldn’t be averse to that being in the future where there’s two tours and who doesn’t love a little bit of competition?”
It could be argued that it’s not really a competition. The PGA Tour is a league that had to make its own money to pay its bills, whereas LIV Golf has a seemingly endless cash stream from the Saudi Arabian government’s Public Investment Fund.
“I think the biggest thing going forward for the PGA Tour, there has to be some way of capping, you know, can’t just steal all our players,” he said. “Players will always make a choice individually what’s right for them, but I think the Tour has to, there’s very few businesses in this world where there isn’t some sort of a noncompete sort of clause.
But until things are sorted out, Harrington pondered, why not have some kind of system of player movement.
“I’m not against, you know, some sort of a transfer back and forth,” he said. “I’m not against having a small amount of invites, and that cuts both ways. … maybe an outside team playing every week in LIV, why not. But again, not too sure how they’re going to come together as one tour, so why not have an agreeable two tours where there’s a bit of rivalry.”
La Paloma has three courses and parts of all three were combined to make a composite layout.
TUCSON, Ariz. — The PGA Tour Champions returned to Southern Arizona for the Cologuard Classic but at a new venue.
La Paloma Country Club, a Jack Nicklaus design that opened in 1984, hosted the senior circuit for the first time in 2024 after nine years at Tucson National. Cologuard came on as title sponsor in 2018.
La Paloma has three 9-hole golf courses and parts of all three were combined to make a composite layout for the tournament, which played at 6,856 yards and had a par of 71.
