Forget the celebrities — Justin Thomas was the breakout star of ‘The Match’

Justin Thomas served as the on-course correspondent, and ended up being one of the best parts of the entire event.

The Match: Champions for Charity was a revelation on Sunday, as Tiger Woods, Peyton Manning, Phil Mickelson and Tom Brady battled it out in a golf match that started silly and charming and, by the end, was actually riveting television.

Woods and Manning ended up holding off a fantastic comeback charge from Mickelson and Brady to win the event on the 18th hole, but that was irrelevant. We were all winners for an event that could have been canned and dumb and ended up being fantastic.

With names like Woods, Brady, Manning and Mickelson, the event had an impressive marquee. Throw in Charles Barkley on the call, add in call-ins from JJ Watt, Russell Wilson, Alex Rodriguez, and Brooks Koepka, and it was clear this event was not lacking in star power.

Yet it was Justin Thomas who stole the show.

JT, as he was affectionately called throughout the program, is certainly a famous golfer, but not at the level of the names previously listed. And his role could have been minor — he donned a backpack and served as an on-course correspondent during the match.

Yet Thomas consistently made the event more fun, more personable. When the trash talk was lacking with the four competitors on the course, Thomas would interject something, almost becoming a fifth member of the party.

And delightfully, Thomas found real chemistry with Barkley, who he razzed throughout the match. Their beef gave us one of the best moments of the entire broadcast, when JT told Barkley “Chuck, I’d love to see your fat ass try to dunk a basketball right now.”

Chuck paused, and you weren’t sure if he was offended … then said: “Hey JT. You can’t call me fat on TV, that’s bullying,” as the rest of the broadcast booth broke into laughter.

Thomas also successfully got Tiger involved, referring to him as “T Dub” and working to get him to open up as the famously focused Woods would sometimes drift out of the broadcast to, you know, focus on golf.

In essence: Thomas was perfect for the event, and I can imagine every golf TV executive in the world right now is counting down the days until he retires and they can get him in the broadcast booth. He was that good, that natural, that charming. He’s got a lot of golf ahead of him, but I can’t wait for Thomas to be behind a microphone full time, or at least more of the time.

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