Tag: East Lake Golf Club

Photos: Best merchandise at the 2023 Tour Championship in Atlanta

East Lake’s merch tent is loaded this week.

ATLANTA — The merchandise tent is one of the coolest places on property this week at East Lake Golf Club, home of the Tour Championship and the finale of the FedEx Cup.

Fans are literally hanging out there for the air conditioning. With temperatures expected to be in the upper 90s every day and the heat index to hit triple digits, I bumped into some friends on Wednesday who were doing just that — a veteran move if I’ve ever seen one.

But while fans are enjoying some cooler climes, they are also shopping with a plethora of brands to choose from —Peter Millar, Nike, Puma, Under Armour and adidas among the big names as well as Lululemon, Johnnie-O, Bobby Jones, Levelwear, TASC, Barstool Sports, Trap Golf, Ahead and Pukka. All your usual favorites can be found. Check out some of our favorites here.

Jon Rahm or Scottie Scheffler? FedEx Cup finale may tip scales in PGA Tour Player of the Year race

“I’ve got to go with the guy who is winning more than the guy who is consistent,” Tony Finau said.

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ATLANTA – Tony Finau took a deep breath.

The question posed to him demanded some deep thought. Who would he be voting for as the PGA Tour Player of the Year? Some years, like when Tiger Woods wins three of four majors or 10 titles, it’s a cinch, but not this go-round.

“Man, I think that’s really hard,” Finau said. “This year, is it Jon Rahm or is it Scottie Scheffler?”

Finau wore a perplexed expression and it was evident that his mind was working double time to break it down.

“Scottie’s been unbelievable. He hasn’t finished outside the top 12 ever, right, and that’s an amazing accomplishment,” Finau said. “But because Rahm won a major and how hot Rahm’s year was, winning four alone in the calendar year and in the first four months, this year it’s got to be Rahmbo.”

Finau isn’t the only player who is torn in determining who will garner his vote for the Jack Nicklaus Award, which is voted on by the players. (The PGA of America gives its own Player of the Year award, which is based on a points system, and the Golf Writers Association of America chooses its own winner at the end of the calendar year.)

“It depends what you value,” Rory McIlroy said Wednesday during his pre-tournament press conference ahead of the Tour Championship at East Lake. “I think Scottie’s won twice this year, Jon’s won four times, Jon’s won the Masters, Scottie’s won the Players. If you go on total wins — it’s hard because how can you not — it’s going to be really difficult because Scottie’s had — he could end up with the best ball-striking season of all time. He’s hit the ball as good, if not better, than Tiger hit it in 2000, which is the benchmark for all of us. But I think Jon probably has a little more to show for his year. But I think it could come down to this week and who performs. But it’s a two-horse race between Jon and Scottie.”

Tour Championship: Picks to win | Thursday tee times, how to watch

Brian Harman, the Champion Golfer of the Year, agreed with that sentiment and predicted it would come down to the wire and depend on who wins the FedEx Cup. For Rahm, it could be déjà vu all over again. He narrowly lost the Player of the Year in 2021 to Patrick Cantlay, who won the FedEx Cup by a stroke over Rahm, but Rahm had captured the U.S. Open that season.

“Gosh, yeah, it’s so close,” Harman said. “Scottie’s had one of the most incredible stretches of ball striking that we’ve maybe ever seen in golf. And then Jon Rahm, especially at the beginning of the year, he just seemed almost unbeatable. They’re two incredible players and I don’t think there’s a bad choice for Player of the Year. I don’t have a specific opinion, no. They’re both really, really good. I certainly wouldn’t want to make one of ’em mad before I have to play against them week, so I’ll refrain.”

Xander Schauffele played Switzerland too.

“I think this week will be pretty important in determining who may win that,” he said.

Let’s go back to Finau, who came to his final answer on a difficult decision with the following logic: “I still believe the hardest thing to do on Tour is win; the second hardest thing is consistency,” he said. “I’ve got to go with the guy who is winning more than the guy who is consistent.”

But Finau left himself an out in case he changed his mind.

“If Scottie wins the FedEx Cup on Sunday,” he said, “I might be voting differently.”

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Photos: 2023 Tour Championship at East Lake Golf Club

Check out some of the best photos from East Lake here.

The final event of the 2022-23 PGA Tour season is here as the top 30 in the FedEx Cup point standings are in Atlanta for the Tour Championship at East Lake Golf Club.

Under the Starting Strokes format, World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler will begin the event at 10 under, two shots clear of Viktor Hovland, who is fresh off a win at the BMW Championship.

Three back of the Texan will be Rory McIlroy, the only three-time FedEx Cup winner. The Northern Irishman has now finished T-9 or better in nine straight starts thanks to his solo fourth at the BMW.

First place this week is worth a whopping $18 million in bonus money.

Here are some of the best photos from the week in the ATL.

Scottie Scheffler has unfinished business at the 2023 Tour Championship

Scheffler is hoping to get his revenge this week at East Lake.

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ATLANTA – Scottie Scheffler has unfinished business this week at the Tour Championship.

A year ago, the world No. 1 squandered a six-stroke lead as Rory McIlroy mounted the largest final-round comeback in tournament history, shooting 66 to win the FedEx Cup by a stroke.

Scheffler helped McIlroy’s cause by making three bogeys in the first five holes.

“I don’t know if impatient is the right word, in the final round, but I just didn’t get off to a good start,” Scheffler recalled. “I remember walking down No. 8 and kind of just having a talk with myself about, you know, ‘This is why you practice, this is why you prepare,’ just kind of give yourself a little pump-up speech, and then after that I snapped right back in.”

Asked what he learned about that defeat, he said, “how much I like to fight out there.”

Tour Championship: Picks to win | Thursday tee times, how to watch

Scheffler returns to East Lake Golf Club this week feeling the sting of another close call on another Sunday. Scheffler looked poised to notch his third PGA Tour win of the season, and first since March, at the BMW Championship until Viktor Hovland closed with seven birdies in his final nine holes to race by him.

“I think it’s just quite difficult to win out here. I mean, like, last week I think is a great example, going into Sunday tied for the lead, and I think I was 5 under on 17 tee for the day on a golf course that’s hosted the U.S. Open and I got bypassed,” he said.

Scheffler has been a model of consistency all season, winning the WM Phoenix Open and the Players Championship and finishing T-12 or better in 19 of 22 starts. Stats guru Justin Ray noted on social media that if Scheffler hits 62 or more greens in regulation this week, he will be the first player to finish a Tour season with a greens-in-regulation percentage of 75 percent or higher since Tiger Woods in 2000.

“He could end up with the best ball-striking season of all time,” McIlroy noted on Wednesday. “He’s hit the ball as good, if not better, than Tiger hit it in 2000, which is the benchmark for all of us.”

Despite his otherworldly ball striking, Scheffler’s putter has kept him out of visiting the winner’s circle more often. Sunday will mark 168 days since Scheffler’s last win, during which he’s reeled off nine top-5 finishes in his last 12 starts.

“Any time I don’t win a tournament I’m disappointed, but being a professional golfer I think you try to find a way to live with that disappointment, because you just, you can’t win that often,” he said. “But I’m trying my best to do it every week.”

Don’t feel too bad for Scheffler – he’s earned more than $20 million this season, setting a Tour record and became the first player to enter the Tour Championship with the lead in the FedEx Cup two years in a row. He enters the tournament at 10 under in the staggered start, two strokes better than his closest pursuer Viktor Hovland. At the conclusion of the Tour Championship, the player with the lowest stroke total over 72 holes when combined with FedEx Cup starting strokes will be crowned the FedEx Cup champion.

“I feel like I’ve joked a decent amount about being No. 1, you don’t get any extra strokes and you show up this week and I do get some extra strokes. So it’s a bit strange, but it should be a fun week,” Scheffler said.

But starting in front is no guarantee of victory. As McIlroy noted, he fell as many as 11 strokes behind Scheffler after two holes of the opening round last year before completing his improbable comeback.

“If I can come back from 11 shots, I feel like everyone in this field should feel like they have a chance to win,” McIlroy said.

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Pair of PGA Tour stars want Tour Championship format to change, but not host East Lake

“Man, I’m a big believer in not changing anything that’s already really great.”

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Xander Schauffele capped his PGA Tour Rookie of the Year season in 2017 with a win at the Tour Championship.

Over the last six years the 29-year-old has made the Tour’s season finale his personal ATM with consecutive finishes of 1-T7-2-T2-T5-4. It’s safe to say Schauffele, 29, knows a thing or two about the event and its esteemed host, East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta, and he didn’t hold back his opinions while discussing both ahead of this week’s 2023 Tour Championship.

As the culmination of a season-long race for the FedEx Cup, the Tour Championship features a staggered start system that aims to reward players for their performance over the season. The top player in the FedEx Cup standings, world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler, will start at 10 under, with Viktor Hovland in second at 8 under, Rory McIlroy in third at 7 under and so on. Schauffele will start 15th at 3 under.

“I can happily say I’ve been on both sides of it. I’ve never won the (FedEx Cup), but I’ve won this event and I was given a trophy and I’ve won it and was not. So I can’t really comment on that, just because I haven’t thought of a way to make it better,” said Schauffele of the staggered start, who also claimed he didn’t “even know how the tournament works” earlier in his pre-tournament press conference.

“I still believe that when I talk to some friends and people they still feel like a little confused on how it all happens,” he continued. “I think this is supposed to be like our most important event all year. It kind of comes down to this moment. And, like, for people to be like a little bit confused, it’s still not a finished product to me in that sense.”

Jon Rahm hasn’t been shy with his opinions on the Tour Championship, and while he admitted the format is easier to understand, he still believes some work needs to be done.

“I don’t think it’s the best we can come up with,” said the world No. 3. “I think I’ve expressed my dislike towards the fact that you can come in ranked No. 1 in the FedEx Cup. You can win every single tournament up until this one. You have a bad week, you finish 30th, and now you’ll forever be known as 30th in the FedEx Cup this season. I don’t think that’s very fair.”

The Spaniard liked the old format because if a player entered the week as No. 1 they rarely fell out of the top three.

“But when you’re in fifth place you are, what, 5 under, so you’re five shots from the lead,” he explained. “But you’re also five shots from 30th place. So that to me just doesn’t make much sense.”

“So if you ask me I think we can come up with something better.”

However, as Schauffele points out, after Thursday and Friday, when the opening rounds even out the scores, everyone is on the same page through to the finish.

“Like it doesn’t even matter anymore how it started, it’s all about how you finish it,” said Schauffele. “And everyone knows what’s going on when guys are coming down this nice final stretch here at East Lake and everyone knows what’s at stake.”

That final stretch will look drastically different this time next year as the club is set to undergo a “dramatic renovation” to everything from the golf course to East Lake’s entire infrastructure, including drainage and irrigation.

“Man, I’m a big believer in not changing anything that’s already really great,” said Schauffele. “When you go to a restaurant and order something that tastes really good, I usually order it over and over and over again … So when this course is set up great and the condition it’s in right now, with really fast greens, rough is up, it’s awesome. It’s hard. You have to golf your ball.

“So the guy that’s going to come, Andrew Green is going to come in and he said he’s going to take out a lot of trees and it’s a little concerning, to be honest,” Schauffele explained. “I’m not a member here. I hear members are excited. But as a Tour pro, we talk about distance and all those things, but the thing that we can’t do is hit it through trees. So when you start taking a bunch of trees off a property it definitely can change how it plays. And I’m hoping that East Lake keeps its teeth. Because when it plays hard you shoot 10- or 12-under you’re going to win this golf tournament.”

Schauffele and Rahm may be competitors this week (and at next month’s Ryder Cup), but the two are in total agreement on both the Tour Championship and its host course.

“So if it was up to me, there’s not much that this golf course needs changing,” said Rahm. “With that said, the golf course does belong to the members, so the members should do whatever the members think is best for the golf course. That’s what I would say. I think it’s great the way it is right now, but if they want to make it member-friendly, I am nobody to object against that.”

Just like the PGA Tour, East Lake serves its members. The club has listened to its constituents, will the Tour?

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Check the yardage book: East Lake for the 2023 Tour Championship

StrackaLine offers a hole-by-hole course guide for East Lake Golf Club.

East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta – site of the PGA Tour’s 2023 Tour Championship and the finale in the FedEx Cup Playoffs – originally was designed by Tom Bendelow and opened in 1908. Donald Ross redesigned the layout in 1913, and Rees Jones worked on the course in 1994.

Architect Andrew Green will begin another renovation, with a goal of returning many of the Ross features to East Lake, soon after the last putt drops in the Tour Championship.

East Lake ranks No. 5 on Golfweek’s Best 2023 list of top private clubs in Georgia, and it’s No. 92 on the list of top classic courses built before 1960 in the U.S.

The course will play to 7,346 yards and a par of 70 for the Tour Championship. Nos. 1 and 14 normally play as par 5s for members, but they will be listed as par 4s for the Tour Championship with only Nos. 6 and 18 playing as par 5s.

Thanks to yardage books provided by StrackaLine – the maker of detailed yardage books for thousands of courses around the world – we can see exactly the challenges the players face this week.

Max Homa and Tom Kim face off in hilarious two-hole 1 Club Challenge

Watch the full match here.

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Max Homa and Tom Kim faced off against each other in Sunday singles at the 2022 Presidents Cup. Homa took home the W, 1 up.

Less than a year later, both players are in Atlanta for the 2023 Tour Championship at East Lake Golf Club. Homa will begin the week 4 under, six shots back of Scottie Scheffler (10 under), while Kim will start at 2 under, eight back.

But before play gets underway Thursday, Titleist released a two-hole 1 Club Challenge, pitting Homa and Kim against each other once again. The video is hosted by No Laying Up’s D.J. Piehowski, while NLU’s Kevin Van Valkenburg serves as the player’s caddie.

Can Kim get his revenge, or will Homa come out on top once again? Watch the full video below:

Jon Rahm on disruptive gambling fans: ‘I feel like we hear it every single round’

“It’s very easy, very, very easy in golf if you want to affect somebody,” Rahm said.

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During the third round of last week’s BMW Championship at Olympia Fields, gambling fans yelled at Max Homa and Chris Kirk in an attempt to influence their putting strokes.

Homa had some choice words for the fan after he signed his card: “He was cheering and yelling at Chris (Kirk) for missing his putt short, and he kept yelling that he had – one of them had $3 for me to make mine, and I got to the back of my back stroke, and he yelled, ‘pull it’ pretty loud[ly], and I made it right in the middle, and then I just started yelling at him, and then (caddie) Joe (Greiner) yelled at him.”

During his pre-tournament press conference at East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta, Jon Rahm said that it happens a lot more than we may know.

“I feel like we hear it every single round,” Rahm said Tuesday ahead of this week’s Tour Championship. “That happens way more often than you guys may hear. I mean, it’s very, very present.

“In golf, spectators are very close, and even if they’re not directly talking to you, they’re close enough to where if they say to their buddy, I bet you 10 bucks he’s going to miss it, you hear it.

“So it happens more often than you think, yeah. But not only that, on the tee and down the fairway. I mean, luckily golf fans are pretty good for the most part and you’re hearing the positive, I got 20 bucks you make birdie here, things like that. But no, it’s more often than you think.”

Tour Championship: Picks to win | Thursday tee times, how to watch

When asked if the PGA Tour should step in and attempt to put an end to it, Rahm agreed.

“You know, in a game like this where you’re allowed to have your favorites, but it’s not a team aspect, right, it’s not a home team against a visiting team, I think the Tour maybe should look into it because you don’t want it to get out of hand, right? It’s very easy, very, very easy in golf if you want to affect somebody,” he said. “You’re so close, you can yell at the wrong time, and it’s very easy for that to happen.

“So I think they could look into it, but at the same time, it would be extremely difficult for the Tour to somehow control the 50,000 people scattered around the golf course, right? So it’s a complicated subject. You don’t want it to get out of control, but you also want to have the fans to have the experience they want to have.”

Rahm, who will begin the Tour Championship at 6 under, four back of Scottie Scheffler (10 under), is +800 (8/1) to win the FedEx Cup.

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Thursday tee times, streaming info for the 2023 Tour Championship

Everything you need to know for the first round at East Lake.

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After a long, adventurous season, the final event of the PGA Tour schedule is here as the top-30 players in the standings have descended upon East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta for the 2023 Tour Championship.

After his runner-up finish to Viktor Hovland at the BMW Championship, world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler will tee off Thursday with a two-shot lead (10 under) over the Norwegian (8 under). Three-time FedEx Cup winner Rory McIlroy will begin at 7 under, while world No. 3 Jon Rahm will start at 6 under.

You can find the full staggered-start leaderboard here (with a few picks to win).

From tee times to TV and streaming info, here’s everything you need to know for the first round of the 2023 Tour Championship. All times Eastern.

Thursday tee times

Tee time Players
11:26 a.m.
Jordan Spieth, Sepp Straka
11:37 a.m.
Emiliano Grillo, Tyrrell Hatton
11:48 a.m.
Jason Day, Sam Burns
11:59 a.m.
Adam Schenk, Collin Morikawa
12:10 p.m.
Taylor Moore, Nick Taylor
12:21 p.m.
Corey Conners, Si Woo Kim
12:32 p.m.
Sungjae Im, Tony Finau
12:43 p.m.
Xander Schauffele, Tom Kim
12:54 p.m.
Keegan Bradley, Rickie Fowler
1:05 p.m.
Tommy Fleetwood, Russell Henley
1:16 p.m.
Wyndham Clark, Matt Fitzpatrick
1:27 p.m.
Patrick Cantlay, Brian Harman
1:38 p.m.
Lucas Glover, Max Homa
1:49 p.m.
Rory McIlroy, Jon Rahm
2 p.m.
Scottie Scheffler, Viktor Hovland

How to watch

You can watch Golf Channel for free on fuboTV. ESPN+ is the exclusive home for PGA Tour Live streaming. All times Eastern.

Thursday, August 24

TV

Golf Channel: 1-6 p.m.

Radio

SiriusXM: 12-6 p.m.

STREAM

ESPN+: 11:15 a.m.-6 p.m.
Peacock: 1-6 p.m.

Friday, August 25

TV

Golf Channel: 1-6 p.m.

Radio

SiriusXM: 12-6 p.m.

STREAM

ESPN+: 11:15 a.m.-6 p.m.
Peacock: 1-6 p.m.

Saturday, August 26

TV

Golf Channel: 1-3 p.m.
CBS: 3-7 p.m.

Radio

SiriusXM: 2-7 p.m.

STREAM

ESPN+: 12-7 p.m.
Peacock: 1-3 p.m.

Sunday, August 27

TV

Golf Channel: 12-1:30 p.m.
CBS: 1:30-6 p.m.

Radio

SiriusXM: 1-6 p.m.

STREAM

ESPN+: 11 a.m.-6 p.m.
Peacock: 12-1:30 p.m.

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2023 Tour Championship odds, course history and picks to win

Let’s finish the season with another outright winner.

We’ve arrived at the final event of the 2022-23 PGA Tour season, the Tour Championship at East Lake in Atlanta. The top 30 in the point standings have made their way to the ATL ready to battle for the $18 million FedEx Cup bonus awarded to the winner.

After his co-runner-up finish at the BMW Championship, world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler will begin the tournament at 10 under, two shots clear of the man in the No. 2 spot, Viktor Hovland. Rory McIlroy, who has now finished T-9 or better in nine straight starts after a solo fourth at Olympia Fields, will begin three back at 7 under, while Jon Rahm starts at 6 under.

McIlroy chased down Scheffler last year to claim his third FedEx Cup, the only player who has achieved that feat (Tiger Woods and McIlroy are the only two players to win it more than once).

Golf course

East Lake Golf Club | Par 70 | 7,346 yards

2022 Tour Championship
Xander Schauffele on the 18th hole during the first round of the 2022 Tour Championship at East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta. (Photo: Sam Greenwood/Getty Images)

Course history

Betting preview