The 36-year-old Canadian was even-par through 16 holes before making a double on the par-3 17th hole. His drive on the 18th almost went into the water, forcing him to stand on a bulkhead for his approach shot.
Then, as he was hitting his approach, he hit a low pull that trickled into the water.
That’s when Hadwin’s frustration got to him.
He chucked, and I mean stepped into it and threw with all his might, his iron, which came helicoptering out of his hands and toward the water left of the 18th hole.
Splash.
The video is so good, you’ll have to watch it again and again.
Here’s the cool part that no one has talked about yet: Hadwin missed the cut on Saturday morning.
LOS ANGELES – Adam Hadwin learned his lesson. He wore his PGA Tour badge and didn’t go running on the green with a bottle of champagne to spray Nick Taylor when he holed the winning putt to win the WM Phoenix Open in a sudden-death playoff on Sunday.
On Sunday, Hadwin wore the same green hoodie and jeans he was wearing in Canada on that fateful day as Taylor battled it out with Charley Hoffman. Hadwin said he sported the same outfit that morning for good luck for Taylor, who shared the 54-hole lead. As one social media commentator noted, “It’s like he wants it to happen.”
This time, Hadwin watched the tying putt from a bridge between 18 green and the clubhouse at TPC Scottsdale along with fellow Canadian Corey Conners. Then he moved greenside with Conners, his wife, Taylor’s wife, Andie, and pro Kevin Streelman during the two-hole playoff.
“I wore my badge this time. At least this time they knew who I was,” he said.
Here’s the cool part that no one has talked about yet: Hadwin missed the cut on Saturday morning. He was part of the wrong end of the wave that shot about three strokes higher and he carded 75-71 and had Sunday off. He had no reason to be at TPC Scottsdale. It wasn’t as if he finished a few groups before and had time to kill. Most of the country was busy watching the first half of the Super Bowl. But Hadwin lives nearby and told Golfweek he was watching the golf on TV that afternoon rooting for his buddy.
“I live only like 12 minutes away,” he said downplaying the fact that he headed over to TPC Scottsdale on the chance that Taylor rallied from three strokes back of Hoffman with four holes to play. Still, as Dionne Warwick once sang, “That’s what friends are for.” We’re giving a golf clap to Hadwin for being there for his buddy’s win again – and we’re glad he didn’t get pummeled this time.
I asked him during the playoff @WMPhoenixOpen if he had checked that security know who he is this time? He said he’s wearing his credential specifically and not risking it with a bottle of champagne! https://t.co/PBKFc9U4yk
It’s one of the hardest things to achieve in the game.
The first one came in 1977.
It was another 14 years before someone did it again.
It was then eight years after that before it happened a third time.
Breaking 60 has always held mythical status in golf.
Al Geiberger (1977), Chip Beck (1991) and David Duval (1999) were the first three to pull it off.
Since 2010, there have been eight more PGA Tour golfers who shot a 59, including Jim Furyk, who also shot a record-setting 58 from in 2016. He remains the only golfer to shoot a 58 on Tour and he’s the only golfer to break 60 twice.
Bryson DeChambeau joined the 58 Club after his 12-under round in a LIV Golf event.
Scottie Scheffler is the latest to break 60 on the PGA Tour, shooting a 59 in the second round of the 2020 Northern Trust. It’s the 12th time that a Tour golfer broke 60.
On the LPGA, there has only been one 59. It came in 2001 and was accomplished by Annika Sorenstam.
Joaquinn Niemann’s 59 in the 2024 LIV opener made him the second on that circuit to do it.
And in 2024, a golfer on the Korn Ferry Tour became the first to shoot 57 in a PGA Tour-sanctioned event.
Here’s a closer look at the sub-60 rounds in pro golf.
The second signature event of the PGA Tour’s 2024 season is here as a loaded field of 80 pros has descended upon Pebble Beach Golf Links and Spyglass Hill for the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am on the Monterey Peninsula.
The amateurs in the field will play alongside their partners for the first two rounds — one at Pebble Beach, one at Spyglass Hill — before it’s just the pros at Pebble Beach over the weekend.
Among the world’s best in the field are Scottie Scheffler, Rory McIlroy, Viktor Hovland, Xander Schauffele, Patrick Cantlay, Jordan Spieth, Justin Thomas and Collin Morikawa.
The AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am is going to look a lot different this week. The amateurs will play the first two rounds at Pebble Beach and Spyglass Hill — Monterey Peninsula Country Club was removed from the rotation — before it’s just the pros at Pebble over the weekend.
And thanks to its elevated status to a signature event, the field is absolutely loaded with star power. World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler will be joined by Rory McIlroy, Viktor Hovland, Xander Schauffele, Patrick Cantlay, Max Homa, Collin Morikawa, Jordan Spieth and Justin Thomas, just to name a few.
Despite the big names, there are a few sleepers to keep an eye on.
For players eligible for the Masters, it’s the most wonderful time of the year.
It’s that wonderful time of year again when players start to share their Masters invitations. Augusta National will host the year’s first major in 2024 and there will surely be some drama when the week comes.
Defending champion Jon Rahm caused waves through the sporting world when he announced his move to LIV Golf on Dec. 7. The Green Jackets in Georgia have been clear that any player who qualifies for the Masters is welcome to participate. With his win, Rahm can play in the historic tournament as long as he wants.
The Masters teased the invitations on Dec. 21 and players around the game have begun to share photos of their Masters invitations. See them all below.
Nick Taylor’s drought-ending eagle putt on the fourth playoff hole in Canada claimed our Shot of the Year.
Nick Taylor’s ball travelled more than a foot for every year Canadian golf fans had waited for one of their own to win the RBC Canadian Open.
North of the border they refer to it simply as “The Putt.” Amid a steady rain, the 72-foot eagle bomb at Toronto’s Oakdale Golf and Country Club by Abbotsford’s own Nick Taylor on the fourth hole of a sudden-death playoff ended a 69-year drought of a Canadian not winning its national open.
CBS’s Jim Nantz delivered the exclamation on the TV call: “Glorious and free,” he said.
Quite simply, it was Golfweek’s Shot of the Year for 2023.
“Do it, Do it, DO IT!,” shouted Adam Hadwin, kneeling greenside and holding a bottle of champagne, as the ball neared the hole.
It DID IT!
Canadian Mark Zecchino calling the action on Sirius/XM’s PGA Tour Network lost his mind as he went on repeat: “The drought is over, the drought is over…History! History!”
Taylor tossed his putter into the air and leaped into the arms of caddie Dave Markle, a former teammate on Canada’s amateur team, after the longest made putt of his PGA Tour career. Out of the corner of his eye, Taylor recalled seeing Hadwin, who grew up at the same course, Ledgeview Golf Club, get tackled by a security card as he attempted spraying Taylor with champagne in what became an even more viral moment than the winning putt.
Fellow Canadian players Mike Weir, who left the property and returned to witness history, and Corey Conners were among those who ran onto the green to congratulate Taylor. The partisan crowd was so loud – they had serenaded Taylor with a rendition of its “O Canada” national anthem during the day – that CBS’s Amanda Renner had to delay the post-round interview because she couldn’t hear.
“This is for all the guys that are here. This is for my family at home,” Taylor said with tears in his eyes. “This is the most incredible feeling.”
Nick Taylor celebrates with his caddie after making an eagle putt on the 4th playoff hole to win the RBC Canadian Open at Oakdale Golf & Country Club on June 11, 2023 in Toronto, Ontario. (Photo by Minas Panagiotakis/Getty Images)
The last player from Canada to win the Canadian Open had been Pat Fletcher in 1954 at Point Grey in Vancouver. Technically, Fletcher was born in England; Carl Keffer had been the only Canadian-born champion, winning in 1909 and 1914. Weir had come close, losing a playoff to Vijay Singh in 2004. The 35-year-old Taylor, who was born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, won for the third time on the PGA Tour. He did so despite shooting 75 in Thursday’s opening round.
“I was just hoping to make the cut,” Taylor said.
Wife Andie, who was back home tending to the couple’s second child, a daughter named Harper, who they had welcomed just five weeks earlier, gave him a much-needed pep talk via phone between rounds.
He rallied with a 67 on Friday to make the cut by just one shot. Taylor vaulted into contention by firing a course-record 9-under 63 on Saturday to move within three shots of the lead entering the final round. Five birdies over his first ten holes propelled Taylor to a three-shot lead at 16 under with eight holes to play, but there would be a couple hiccups coming home at Nos. 11 (offset by a bounce-back birdie at 12) and 16, which meant he needed to drain an 11-foot birdie putt on the 18th hole to close in 6-under 66 and finish at 17-under 271, walking backwards with his fist raised as the ball disappeared into the hole.
A putter flip remembered across the country.🏌️♂️
The Canucks honoured RBC Canadian Open champion Nick Taylor before their game against the Sharks tonight. 👏 pic.twitter.com/vbh0dVfJGA
Fleetwood could have played spoiler in regulation, but he missed his tee shot right at the par-5 18th, laid up into an awkward lie in the right rough and two-putted for par to force the playoff.
The players traded birdies on their first time playing No. 18 in the playoff, then both parred 18 on a second playing and the par-3 ninth before heading back to 18 for a third go at it.
Taylor’s tee shot found a divot in the fairway, but he ripped his second shot from 221 yards to the front of the green, while Fleetwood laid up after his drive found a fairway bunker. Fleetwood hit his third shot to 12 feet, but Taylor ended the playoff in dramatic fashion when his uphill eagle putt hit the flagstick and dropped.
“Ever since I’ve been on the PGA Tour this is one that we want to do as well as we can in, and the crowd support was the most unbelievable thing I will probably ever experience in my life,” Taylor said that Sunday. “To break that curse, if you want to call it, is, I’m pretty speechless.”
Following a seemingly endless array of media interviews that night, Taylor was the last player to leave the premises around 10:30 p.m. and his stomach was growling. Jason Logan of Score Golf recounted the scene of Taylor pulling into a McDonald’s just before the Highway 401 on-ramp to load up on Chicken McNuggets. But just as they were about to order, Taylor’s phone, connected to the car’s Bluetooth system, rang and the caller’s name flashed on the display panel was none other than hockey legend Wayne Gretzky.
“I don’t have him in my phone but his name pops up for whatever reason and I look at the guys and I’m like, ‘I should probably take this call,’” Taylor recalled to Score Golf.
As Logan pointed out, that personifies how Taylor authored one of those proud Canadian sporting moments akin to Sidney Crosby’s golden goal, Joe Carter’s World Series-winning home run and Donovan Bailey’s 100-meter Olympic gold medal. It’s such a memorable moment that the RBC Canadian Open changed its logo to reflect Taylor’s histrionics.
It’s why Taylor likely will never have to buy a Molson (or Labatt’s) at a 19th hole in Canada for the rest of his life, Adam Woodard wrote in his lede to the Golfweek game story on Taylor’s triumph.
Taylor told the “Subpar” Podcast, he hadn’t been to a bar much to test this out, but at the U.S. Open the following week in Los Angeles he grabbed drinks with an old college roommate and someone recognized him and bought his round.
“This is going to start happening,” he said. “It’s not so bad.”
Seventy-two feet to win your national open in a playoff? It doesn’t get much better than that and it was an unanimous choice for Golfweek’s Shot of the Year.
What a great day for the players and their families.
Tuesday was Halloween and plenty of PGA Tour professionals celebrated with their families, and had some pretty good costumes to boot.
Max Homa, dressing up with his son, Cam, for the very first time, wore NASA gear while Cam wore an astronaut costume.
Tony Finau and the whole Finau clan were Power Rangers, while Adam Hadwin and his wife, Jessica, may have had the best costumes of the day. Jessica dressed up as Adam, while the Tour pro was dressed as the security guard that tackled him after fellow Canadian Nick Taylor won the RBC Canadian Open.
The rising stars are in contention while some notable names are leaving TPC Deere Run early.
SILVIS, Ill. — As the PGA Tour season begins to wind down with the last major of the season and the FedEx Cup Playoffs on the horizon, the action is heating up at the 2023 John Deere Classic.
The Tour’s annual stop at TPC Deere Run in the Quad Cities is known for putting rising talent into the spotlight and the young stars are shining after the first 36 holes. Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for a handful of PGA Tour winners and fan favorites who will be leaving the tournament before the weekend party begins.
Check out the notable PGA Tour players who missed the cut (4 under) at the 2023 John Deere Classic at TPC Deere Run.
