How did Wyndham Clark celebrate his AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am win during a shelter-in-place edict? He did it in style

Social media was abuzz with the photo of Clark enjoying an ice cream sundae.

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — With power and wifi out in much of the Monterey Peninsula, and trees downed and roads closed around Pebble Beach, Wyndham Clark still managed to have himself a celebration after being informed late Sunday that he final round of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am had been canceled due to dangerous conditions and he had been declared the champion of the 54-hole shortened signature event.

Social media was abuzz with the photo of Clark enjoying an ice cream sundae.

“He enjoyed his evening,” CBS’s Colt Knost said on his podcast “Subpar.”

After Clark got word that it was official that he had won for the third time on the PGA Tour, he called his caddie John Ellis, who came over to the house where Clark was staying near the course. Visalia pistachio magnate, Chuck Nichols, has hosted Clark in his home for the last four AT&Ts.

Nichols was having dinner at his neighbor’s house when Clark found out he had won. Clark knocked on the door and insisted they all go with him and his girlfriend to celebrate, as their guests, at Pebble Beach Resort’s famous Tap Room.

Off they all went in the rain and wind and dark, dodging felled trees and downed power lines while scofflawing the county’s shelter-in-place edict. Knost noted that Ellis got there first.

The Tap Room was jammed and raucous and included CBS’s Jim Nantz, Dottie Pepper and executive producer Sellers Shy.

“My table was right by the door,” Knost recounted. “I started clapping, the whole place went nuts, standing ovation for him. He signed a thousand autographs.”

Despite canceled final round at Pebble Beach (and no NFL playoffs), LIV Golf still struggles in TV ratings

LIV Golf’s event still drew a rating well below that registered by the PGA Tour.

With a number of factors lining up during the opening weekend of the LIV Golf season, the fledgling circuit had all the pieces in place to capture a significant TV audience.

However, a playoff between a pair of big names did little to draw viewers to the CW Network, according to reports.

Joaquin Niemann went wire-to-wire to claim his first win on the Saudi-backed circuit at the league’s 2024 opener at Mayakoba’s El Camaleon Golf Course in Mexico following a four-hole playoff in the dark against Sergio Garcia on Sunday. Niemann, who shot a blistering 12-under 59 in the first round, made one final clutch putt to seal the deal for his first win since joining the league. Also, Jon Rahm made his LIV Golf debut, and his newly formed expansion team, Legion XIII, won the team title by four shots at 24 under.

But despite the impressive leaderboard, the cancellation of the final round at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am and no NFL playoffs on the schedule, LIV Golf’s event still drew a rating well below that of the PGA Tour, according to Sports TV Ratings.

Although the head-to-head numbers on Saturday were strongly in favor of the PGA Tour (168K to 1.91M), the Sunday number for LIV Golf did show a significant year-over-year improvement.

LIV’s first event in 2023 received 291K viewers on Sunday, according to Josh Carpenter of the Sports Business Journal. The 2023 Honda Classic, on the other hand, reeled in 2.38 million.

The numbers do not include streaming, which is available on LIV Golf Plus as well as via a pay-per-view YouTube option.

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Why did AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am get reduced to 54 holes? These dramatic images illustrate

Sustained winds of 35-40 miles per hour and gusts of more than 60 mph forced the hand of organizers.

The final round of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am was canceled due to inclement weather and safety concerns. Rain fell Sunday morning and although it slowed a little later in the day, sustained winds of 35-40 miles per hour and gusts of more than 60 mph forced the hand of organizers. Wyndham Clark was given the trophy after his 54-hole effort.

Due to moderate rain, preferred lies were in effect during all three rounds of the tournament. All week long, the weather forecast called for high winds on Sunday that threatened to push the tournament to a Monday finish and so Clark approached Saturday’s third round as if it could be the final round and with a sense of now-or-never to make a move.

The signature event, which consisted of an 80-man field with no cut, guaranteed money and a $20 million purse, is the first 54-hole tournament on Tour since the 2016 Zurich Classic of New Orleans; the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am was also shortened to 54 holes in 2009.

Here’s a look at some images from our USA Today photo team (and others) from Sunday as the storms rolled through:

Josh Allen excited to beat Tom Brady: ‘It feels pretty good’

Josh Allen excited to beat Tom Brady: ‘It feels pretty good’:

Josh Allen and Tom Brady have gone head-to-head multiple times and at more than one activity.

On the football field, Brady bested Allen both while with the Patriots and Buccaneers. Then during their first public golf round at “The Match,” Brady won that one too.

Finally, during the 2024 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, the Bills QB got his victory.

And even  he had to admit it… he was happy to come out on top for once.

“It feels pretty good,” Allen said.

Check out his full post-match interview with the PGA in the clip below:

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Wyndham Clark dishes on why he rejected LIV payday: ‘I chose my legacy over LIV’

Clark confirmed rumors that he had met with LIV officials.

PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. – Wyndham Clark’s decision to stay with the PGA Tour and reject an enormous payday from LIV bore quick fruit with his victory at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, and $3.6 million deposited into his bank account.

Clark confirmed rumors that he had met with LIV officials and “did his due diligence,” speaking with representatives from both sides.

“I wanted to see what they could bring to the table,” he said Sunday during a virtual press conference after the AT&T was shortened to 54 holes and he was declared the champion. “I ultimately declined going to LIV because I felt like I still have a lot of things left in the tank on the PGA Tour and I wanted to chase records, I wanted to chase world ranking. My dream is to try to be one of the top players in the world if not the top player. I just grew up always imagining winning PGA Tour events. So I ultimately, I chose my legacy over LIV. … that’s really what it came down to.”

Clark, 30, won the U.S. Open in June, which makes him eligible for that major for the next 10 years and the other three majors for the next five. Like major winners Jon Rahm, Cameron Smith and Bryson DeChambeau before him, Clark didn’t have to worry about his world ranking falling outside of the cut off for an automatic exemption into the majors.

He was rumored to be in line to join Rahm’s new team for this season and give LIV three of the four reigning major winners.

“I felt like if I was going to make a life-changing decision, I wanted to make sure I did all the right things and call the right people, get the right information, understand what both tours are doing, what I should do, et cetera,” he explained.

He credited player directors Adam Scott, Patrick Cantlay and Jordan Spieth on the PGA Tour policy board with helping him come to the conclusion that the Tour was the right place for him – at least for the time being.

2023 WM Phoenix Open
Wyndham Clark and Jordan Spieth walk across the 18th green during the third round of the 2023 WM Phoenix Open at TPC Scottsdale in Scottsdale, Arizona. (Photo: Sarah Stier/Getty Images)

“And Tiger Woods, sorry, and Tiger Woods, please put that in there,” Clark said of the oversight while failing to mention player directors Webb Simpson and Peter Malnati. “They put so much effort in making sure that the PGA Tour is going to make the right moves to continue to try to be the best tour.

“And they also really gave me some great advice and some counsel. I didn’t want them to sway me in a certain way, but I definitely wanted their counsel and I just wanted to honor them and the amount of time and work and effort they have put into this agreement now with SSG (Strategic Sports Group) and where the Tour is going.”

Clark seemed to leave the door slightly ajar that his commitment to the Tour could change in the future. He wouldn’t be the first pro to make the jump after proclaiming their fealty to the Tour.

“You know, I don’t know what the future holds with my career and what the PGA Tour and LIV is going to do, but at least for this season I am 100 percent set on the PGA Tour and I want to try to get to as high in the world as I possibly can.”

Clark, who entered the AT&T at a career-best No. 10 and leaped to No. 6 with his win on the Monterey Peninsula, is off to a great start.

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2024 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am prize money payouts for each PGA Tour player

Clark is just shy of $20 million in career earnings after the win.

Wyndham Clark won his first signature event on the PGA Tour on Sunday and even though it was weather-shortened to 54 holes, he still banked a cool $3.6 million for his work.

The 2024 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-am, which went to a Monday finish a year ago, was set to do so once again after the field woke up to brutal winds and rain.

After a couple of delays, the PGA Tour eventually decided to declare Clark the winner due to the prospect of more of the same Monday. He is the first winner of the event after 54 holes since Dustin Johnson in 2009.

The winner of the U.S. Open in Los Angeles last summer, Clark now has three PGA Tour wins. The first-place check brings his career on-course earnings to just shy of $20 million at $19,454,055, good for 92nd on the PGA Tour’s all-time money list, just ahead of Tim Herron and past Jeff Maggert and David Duval among others.

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Position Player Score Payout
1 Wyndham Clark -17 $3,600,000
2 Ludvig Abger -16 $2,180,000
3 Matthieu Pavon -15 $1,380,000
T4 Mark Hubbard -14 $877,500
T4 Thomas Detry -14 $877,500
T6 Jason Day -13 $642,500
T6 Justin Thomas -13 $642,500
T6 Tom Hoge -13 $642,500
T6 Scottie Scheffler -13 $642,500
10 Sam Burns -12 $545,000
T11 Justin Rose -11 $465,000
T11 Keegan Bradley -11 $465,000
T11 Patrick Cantlay -11 $465,000
T14 Eric Cole -10 $322,500
T14 Si Woo Kim -10 $322,500
T14 Peter Malnati -10 $322,500
T14 Beau Hossler -10 $322,500
T14 Collin Morikawa -10 $322,500
T14 Emiliano Grillo -10 $322,500
T20 Adam Scott -9 $210,333
T20 Christiaan Bezuidenhout -9 $210,333
T20 Erik van Rooyen -9 $210,333
T20 Cam Davis -9 $210,333
T20 Sahith Theegala -9 $210,333
T20 J.T. Poston -9 $210,333
T26 Chris Kirk -8 $143,800
T26 Sepp Straka -8 $143,800
T26 Luke List -8 $143,800
T26 Alex Noren -8 $143,800
T26 Denny McCarthy -8 $143,800
T31 Seamus Power -7 $106,625
T31 Tommy Fleetwood -7 $106,625
T31 S.H. Kim -7 $106,625
T31 Corey Conners -7 $106,625
T31 Byeong Hun An -7 $106,625
T31 Nicolai Hojgaard -7 $106,625
T31 Tom Kim -7 $106,625
T31 Sam Ryder -7 $106,625
T39 Adam Hadwin -6 $70,125
T39 Jordan Spieth -6 $70,125
T39 Taylor Montgomery -6 $70,125
T39 Andrew Putnam -6 $70,125
T39 Maverick McNealy -6 $70,125
T39 Webb Simpson -6 $70,125
T39 Matt Kuchar -6 $70,125
T39 Kurt Kitayama -6 $70,125
T47 Taylor Moore -5 $48,857
T47 Adam Svensson -5 $48,857
T47 Brandon Wu -5 $48,857
T47 Nick Hardy -5 $48,857
T47 Tony Finau -5 $48,857
T47 Rickie Fowler -5 $48,857
T47 Adam Schenk -5 $48,857
T54 Keith Mitchell -4 $42,500
T54 Brian Harman -4 $42,500
T54 Xander Schauffele -4 $42,500
T54 J.J. Spaun -4 $42,500
T58 Kevin Yu -3 $38,250
T58 Ben Griffin -3 $38,250
T58 Viktor Hovland -3 $38,250
T58 Brendon Todd -3 $38,250
T58 Russell Henley -3 $38,250
T58 Lee Hodges -3 $38,250
T58 Matt Fitzpatrick -3 $38,250
T58 Lucas Glover -3 $38,250
T66 Grayson Murray -2 $35,312
T66 Max Homa -2 $35,312
T66 Rory McIlroy -2 $35,312
T66 Sungjae Im -2 $35,312
70 Cameron Young -1 $41,000
T71 Hideki Matsuyama E $33,875
T71 Mackenzie Hughes E $33,875
T71 Stephan Jaeger E $33,875
T71 Nick Taylor E $33,875
75 Alex Smalley 1 $39,000
76 Harris English 2 $38,600
77 Hayden Buckley 3 $38,200
78 Davis Riley 4 $37,800
79 Patrick Rodgers 5 $37,400
80 Nick Dunlap 7 $37,000

 

PGA Tour shortens AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am to 54 holes, Wyndham Clark named winner

It’s the third PGA Tour win, and second in the state of California, for Clark.

PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. – Having grown up in the Golden State down Highway 101 in San Jose, caddie John Ellis always dreamed of winning at famed Pebble Beach Golf Links, home of six U.S. Opens. He had his chances, playing in the PGA Tour’s AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am four times as a player and considers it to be his favorite golf course. Ever since he became a caddie for Wyndham Clark, he told him that if there’s one thing he achieved in his career — he didn’t care if Clark won a hundred times or just once —he just hoped one of them would be at Pebble.

“I always told him I’m going to make it happen,” Clark said on Sunday.

Clark, 30, probably never imagined winning at Pebble Beach in this fashion – shooting a course-record 12-under 60 on Saturday to erase a six-shot deficit and surge one-stroke ahead of Ludvig Aberg with a 54-hole total of 17-under 199. Then he had to wait almost all of Sunday for the final round to be canceled due to inclement weather and to be declared the champion.

“For us to pull it off and in the fashion that we did was pretty awesome,” Clark said.

Due to moderate rain, preferred lies were in effect during all three rounds of the tournament. All week long, the weather forecast called for high winds on Sunday that threatened to push the tournament to a Monday finish and so Clark approached Saturday’s third round as if it could be the final round and  with a sense of now-or-never to make a move.

Clark made two eagles on the front nine and shot 8-under 28 to climb to the top of the leaderboard. He needed oven mitts for his putter, holing a career-high 189 feet, 9 inches of putts. He missed a 26-foot eagle putt at 18 to shoot 59 but tapped in for the lowest round ever shot on the famed links. He walked off the 18th green with a sheepish grin on his face and a round of applause from fans who appreciate seeing history made at one of golf’s great cathedrals.

“I feel like I won the tournament with how much media I was doing, yet I had another round to play,” he mused. “That was a little unique and weird.”

Sleeping on the lead proved to be difficult too. It was warm in the house where Clark was staying and he woke up at about 2:00 a.m., poked his head out the door and determined the weather wasn’t too bad. It took him about 45 minutes to fall back to sleep. His 5:15 alarm, which he set to coincide with the Tour’s first scheduled update on the final round, woke him to news that the earliest play would begin would be at noon. He went back to sleep yet again, and when he finally rose he made some breakfast, watched a movie and played gin with friends. Around 9:30 a.m., the Tour announced that the final round was postponed until Monday.

As the day dragged on, he walked around the neighborhood where he was staying just to assess some of the damage until he realized that wasn’t the safest place to be with trees downed and the wind howling. He tried his best to get his mind ready for playing the final round but he conceded that it was hard to stay focused.

“Because there was that small ounce of thinking that hey, there’s a chance this might be called, my mind started wandering and it was so hard for me to not think about it, that there’s a chance that it could be canceled.”

The Tour pulled the plug on a Monday finish, sending an official statement at 6:17 p.m. PT. Clark had been playing ping-pong for more than an hour with Brian Kettler, his former high school English teacher who was visiting, when their match paused for a phone call with the news that due to dangerous weather conditions, the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-am had been reduced to 54 holes and the trophy and winner’s check for $3.6 million belonged to him. The decision to call it handed Clark his third win and first since the 2023 U.S. Open in June.

“We both kind of broke out in tears a little bit and hugged each other and embraced each other,” Clark said. “It kind of caught us off guard.”

The signature event, which consisted of an 80-man field with no cut, guaranteed money and a $20 million purse, is the first 54-hole tournament on Tour since the 2016 Zurich Classic of New Orleans; the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am was also shortened to 54 holes in 2009.

Clark shared the good news with Ellis.

“We were kind of crying and laughing and celebrating on the phone. Then he quickly rushed over to where I’m staying to see me and we’ve just been hugging and talking about all the great things and the shots and how amazing the last, you know, 36 hours have been,” he said.

Clark described it as a whirlwind and despite not getting the chance to earn the title over 72 holes, he still felt like a deserving winner.

“When I shook hands and waved to the crowd, it really felt like I’d just won the tournament, so I don’t feel like I got cheated at all,” he said.

As the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am was in a delay, Ben Griffin pitched a closest-to-the-pin contest on the famous 7th hole

Griffin posted a selfie video outside in an attempt to show how hard it was blowing.

A few delays turned into a postponement to Monday of the final round of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am. Eventually, the PGA Tour called it after 54 holes, declaring Wyndham Clark the winner.

Inclement weather – specifically rain and high winds that were estimated up to 60 mph – wiped out play Sunday and was on track to keep on going into Monday.

Trevor Immelman of CBS Golf posted a video showing sunny skies but heavy winds near the 18th hole at Pebble Beach Golf Links, while Max Homa tweeted “It’s just a little wind.”

Ben Griffin posted a selfie video outside in an attempt to show how hard it was blowing.

He also offered up a suggestion, echoed later by Michael Kim, of what could be an epic display of golf craziness: a closest-to-the-pin contest on the famed 7th hole at Pebble.

There were reports of some damage around the course and clearly safety would be a major concern for such a venture.

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AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am final round postponed until Monday

On Sunday, the PGA Tour decided to rest.

PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. — On Sunday, the PGA Tour decided to rest.

The final round of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am has been postponed to Monday due to inclement weather and safety concerns. Overnight rain continued to fall Sunday morning and although it is expected to dissipate later in the day, the high winds are forecast to remain throughout the day. Due to safety concerns caused by sustained winds of 35-40 miles per hour and gusts expected to be more than 60 mph in the afternoon, there will be no golf played on Sunday.

“Our regulations say we need to make every effort to play 72 holes, which includes playing on Monday,” PGA Tour chief referee Gary Young said after Saturday’s round.

That means Wyndham Clark, who shot a course-record 60 on Saturday at Pebble Beach Golf Links, will sleep on a one-stroke lead over Ludvig Aberg for a second night. Tee times are scheduled for 8 a.m.-10:25 a.m. PT (11 a.m. ET) off Nos. 1 and 10.

There is a scenario where the tournament could be shortened to 54 holes and Clark declared the winner of the $20 million signature event.

“We would not start play on Monday if we knew we couldn’t finish the round on Monday,” Young said. “So, the drop-dead time on that would mean we would have to start play on Monday by 10:15 a.m. at the latest in order to complete play.”

The Monday forecast is for more showers in the morning. The course already is waterlogged from a collection of on-and-off rain all week, leading to concern that balls may plug in the rough.

“We just want to make sure that on Monday, if we get to that point, that the golf course is such that we are conducting a good quality championship, the conditions are of professional standards,” Young said. “We want to make sure that the golf course is of the quality on Monday that we would not want golf balls disappearing into the fairways and losing golf balls.”

There also is a scenario where play could extend to Tuesday.

“Our regulation states that we can’t start play on Monday without knowing that we could finish play on Monday. If we did that and then for some reason weather rolled in on us that caused us to delay again, if more than half the field has finished play, then we would extend play into Tuesday,” he explained. “But we would need more than half of them to have completed their round on Monday.”

This marks the third Monday finish in the last year six year at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, which previously required a Monday finish in 2019 and last year. The AT&T was shortened to 54 holes in 2009; the last time a Tour event was shortened to 54 holes was at the 2016 Zurich Classic of New Orleans.

Fifty-nine of the 80 players in the AT&T field this week are schedule to play in the WM Phoenix Open at TPC Scottsdale, which begins Thursday.

Jason Day’s ‘angry’ 63, Ludvig Aberg’s ‘stress-free’ 67 and Matthieu Pavon turns into a birdie machine among 5 things to know at AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am

Catch up on the action here.

PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. — Wyndham Clark took moving day seriously.

The reigning U.S. Open champion fired a course-record 12-under 60 at Pebble Beach Golf Links on Saturday to erase a six-stroke deficit and grab the 54-hole lead at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am.

Clark missed a 26-foot eagle putt at 18 for 59, but tapped in for a birdie and a total of 17-under 199, one stroke better than Ludvig Aberg.

With high winds and rain predicted for Sunday, the final round may be postponed until Monday and there’s a possibility that the tournament may be shortened to 54 holes.

For more on Clark’s record day and remarkable putting round, click here.

For more on the weather and how it could affect efforts to complete 72 holes, click here.

Here are four more things to know from the third round of the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am.

Pebble Pro-Am: Sunday tee times | Weather update