Johnson registered two eagles and four birdies on the back nine, notching his seventh APGA Tour win.
If the name Kamaiu Johnson rings a bell, it may be because of a rule mishap at the 2023 Arnold Palmer Invitational when he was DQ’d for signing an incorrect scorecard. The situation made waves and was widely talked about.
However, what Johnson did Tuesday at TPC Scottsdale will also have people talking, as he set a new APGA Tour record for the lowest round in the tour’s history and tied the course record at the Champions Course.
Johnson fired a final-round 10-under 61 to win the APGA at TPC Scottsdale event. He broke loose from a four-way tie after the first round and finished with a four-stroke victory. Johnson registered two eagles and four birdies on the back nine, notching his seventh APGA Tour win.
“I was just trying to stay in the moment down the stretch. Wasn’t sure where I was, but I was comfortable because the other leaders were in my group,” Johnson said. “Last week, I was 13 over after two days on the Latinoamerica tour, and today 16 under. I’ve never experienced anything like that. It just shows you what kind of a funny game it is that we play.”
He also takes home the first-place prize of $7,500 from the $25,000 purse.
By Wednesday morning, Johnson was teeing it up across the country in Gainesville, Florida, at a U.S. Open local qualifier at Mark Bostic Golf Course.
Next up on the APGA Tour is APGA at TPC Deere Run May 28-30 in Silvis, Illinois, with APGA at Valhalla to follow July 23-25 in Louisville, Kentucky.
Did Kamaiu Johnson commit one of the unforgivable sins in golf and deliberately sign for a lower score?
PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – Did Kamaiu Johnson commit one of the unforgivable sins in golf and deliberately sign for a lower score than he made on a hole? It depends on who you ask.
Johnson, 29, violated Rule 3.3b for signing an incorrect scorecard after the second round of the 2023 Arnold Palmer Invitational, and was disqualified. Johnson, a multiple-time winner on the APGA Tour, was playing on a sponsor exemption. He would have missed the cut anyway, but that is beside the point to Nick Hardy, who was in the group with Johnson along with Kyle Westmoreland, who kept his scorecard.
In Johnson’s account of things, he made a double-bogey six at the par-4 ninth hole, not a seven, en route to shooting 5-over 77 on Friday at Arnold Palmer’s Bay Hill Club & Lodge, missing the cut by six strokes. ShotLink data shows Johnson had a 22½ par putt from the fringe and took four putts, missing putts of three and four feet for bogey and double bogey before tapping in a 20-inch putt for his 7.
“The amount of chances that he had to say he made a six is unfortunate because it looks like there may have been a cheating situation,” Hardy told Golfweek on Wednesday, ahead of his debut in the Players Championship. “I know that especially when I’m in a tournament atmosphere, that whenever I’m playing golf there is never a time where I forget what I shot.”
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Westmoreland told Golfweek on Sunday that he didn’t see Johnson finish the hole because the group had been put on the clock.
“We were on the clock, so I walked off,” Westmoreland said after his third round on Saturday. “I assumed he made the one after he missed.”
Hardy echoed that sentiment.
“We were warned (for slow play) the day before and warned when we came off the tee box on nine (Friday). It was very fresh,” Hardy said. “When you get a warning, you get penalized as a member but there’s no penalty for non-members for pace of play. I have an issue when I get penalized for pace of play and I believe it isn’t me. I’ve been paired with non-members the last three weeks and I’ve gotten five or six warnings. When you get 25 warnings, you get fined $50,000. That’s a lot of money for anybody.”
In short, Hardy, who wasn’t keeping Johnson’s score, had a legitimate reason for walking ahead before Johnson finished in an effort to catch up.
“I’m going to get penalized even though I know I didn’t do anything wrong,” Hardy said. “If we hadn’t been warned, I wouldn’t have walked off the green and the situation would have been different and Kamaiu might have known I’d seen it. There was good reason for me not to be there.”
After the round, the group’s walking scorer confirmed that Johnson made a triple-bogey 7. A ShotLink official used video taken at the hole that showed the four putts, including the first from the fringe.
“I’ll say this, they gave him many opportunities after the round, even after he signed his card, a couple more opportunities to maybe say he made a 7. I think they knew they had video evidence from the running camera on 9. ShotLink said he had a 7, the walking scorer said he had a 7 and he insisted he had a 6. They hinted to him that, hey, we just want to make sure you’ve got this right, and he still said he made a 6. That was the troubling issue I had,” Hardy said. “The Tour gave him multiple chances to come to grips with it. I know this for a fact because I was getting calls from the scoring officials for the next hour after we signed the card inside. I saw Montana [Thompson] and Casey Jones outside the locker room when they were talking to Kamaiu. It’s definitely concerning.”
“It happens, I guess,” Westmoreland told Golfweek. “At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter. He missed the cut. It doesn’t look great, I guess, for some people, but I don’t have much to comment on. It was a non-factor. I think the Tour handled it well.”
But Hardy disagreed with Westmoreland’s assessment that “it doesn’t matter; he missed the cut.”
“That’s unfair because when he played that hole he was right on the cut line. If he had gotten away with a 6, he only needed to shoot 2 under. It mattered, it mattered big time,” Hardy said. “I think you should be responsible. For people who think a player should get away with making a mistake like that because of a caddie’s fault or because the walking scorer should be in charge is wrong. The player should be 100 percent in charge of their score. The game is amazing because it taught me so many things about life. It’s like a true meritocracy in the sense that in life you need to be honest, you need to take responsibility, take ownership, have integrity for others; that’s the name of the game and to violate that is very concerning.”
On Saturday, Johnson took to social media to issue an apology, tweeting, “I take the integrity of the game very seriously and I’m sorry this happened. I got a little overwhelmed in the moment with the group on the clock and lost count of my missed putts from 3 feet. I’ll do better.”
Johnson, 29, was deemed to have been in violation of Rule 3.3b, which means he signed an incorrect scorecard.
ORLANDO – The record will show that Kamaiu Johnson was disqualified from the Arnold Palmer Invitational. It will be a small footnote when the history of this week’s annual PGA Tour stop at Arnie’s Place is recalled, but what it will mean for Johnson’s reputation and how long it will linger with him is another story entirely.
Johnson, 29, was deemed to have been in violation of Rule 3.3b, which means he signed an incorrect scorecard.
In Johnson’s accounting of things, he made a double-bogey six at the par-4 ninth hole, not a seven, on Friday en route to shooting 5-over 77 at Arnold Palmer’s Bay Hill Club and Lodge and missing the cut by six strokes.
As first reported by Ryan French, AKA Monday Q Info on Twitter, Johnson told Kyle Westmoreland, who was keeping his card, on the 10th tee that he had made a six, but that score was questioned later in the scoring tent.
Westmoreland told Golfweek he didn’t see Johnson, who plays primarily on the APGA Tour and was competing this week on a sponsor exemption, finish the hole because the group had been put on the clock. Nick Hardy, the third player in the grouping, also reportedly had started to head to the 10th tee and didn’t see Johnson clean up after missing a 22-foot par putt from the fringe.
“We were on the clock, so I walked off,” Westmoreland said after his third round on Saturday. “I assumed he made the one after he missed.”
ShotLink data shows Johnson missed the par putt from 22½ feet, and followed by missing putts of three and four feet for bogey and double bogey before tapping in a 20-inch putt for his 7.
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After the round, Tour rules official Orlando Pope was called in to handle the disputed score. The discrepancy was resolved by the group’s walking scorer, who confirmed that Johnson made a triple-bogey 7 as well as by a ShotLink official, who used video from cameras around the green that showed visual proof of the three putts. Johnson would have missed the cut by six strokes, and has yet to make the cut in five career starts on the PGA Tour.
“It happens, I guess,” Westmoreland said. “At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter. He missed the cut. It doesn’t look great, I guess, for some people, but I don’t have much to comment on. It was a non-factor. I think the Tour handled it well.”
On Saturday, Johnson took to social media to issue an apology, tweeting that he had lost count of his score in the moment: “I take the integrity of the game very seriously and I’m sorry this happened. I got a little overwhelmed in the moment with the group on the clock and lost count of my missed putts from 3 feet. I’ll do better.”
I take the integrity of the game very seriously and I’m sorry this happened. I got a little overwhelmed in the moment with the group on the clock and lost count of my missed putts from from 3 feet. I’ll do better.
— Kamaiu "My My" Johnson (@KamaiuJohnson) March 4, 2023
Along with the $50,000 prize, Kamaiu Johnson earned some other perks as well.
Kamaiu Johnson as won the APGA Tour Championship for the second time in three years. Along with the $50,000 first-place check, Johnson as earned some other perks as well.
His final-round 67 on Tuesday at TPC San Antonio was punctuated by a birdie on the final hole and the prize money is the biggest to date on the APGA Tour, whose core mission is to bring greater diversity to golf.
Marcus Byrd and Daniel Augustus faced birdie putts on 18 that would have forced a playoff but neither was able to convert.
For Johnson, he is now exempt into early-stage events of the PGA Tour Latinoamerica series and he has earned full scholarship into Korn Ferry Tour Qualifying School in September.
“Things have been trending in the right direction and I’m happy that it came together today at the Tour Championship,” Johnson said after his round Tuesday. “My goal was to win twice on the tour this year and take the Lexus Cup. I’ve been working hard with my team and I got it done.”
Willie Mack III, who won $27,500 for claiming the title a year ago, finished fourth this time. Tim O’Neal and Joseph Hooks tied for fifth.
The APGA Tour has grown to 18 events in 2022 with more $800,000 in prize money up for grabs. The Tour Championship was the 12th tournament this year. Next up is the APGA Tour Cisco Invitational at Baltusrol Country Club in Springfield, New Jersey.
Kamaiu Johnson won in Las Vegas for the second year in a row and third time on the APGA Tour.
For Kamaiu Johnson, it was lucky number two in Las Vegas.
Johnson won the Advocates Professional Golf Association’s stop at TPC Las Vegas Tuesday for the second year in a row. It’s also his third win on the circuit.
The two-day, 36-hole event was cut to just a single day of competition after Monday’s first round was called off due to extreme winds that reached 60 MPH in parts of the city.
Johnson shot a 71 Tuesday, two shots ahead of Aaron Beverly, Joseph Hooks, and Willie Mack III.
The key moment for Johnson came on the 591-yard, par-5 15th hole, where he holed out for eagle from 133 yards.
“It bounced a couple of times and then rolled in,” Johnson added. “I saw it the whole way.”
Last week, Johnson and Mack made the trip to Augusta National for the Masters.
Ryan Alford recorded the first professional win in his golf career on Tuesday, taking the APGA Tour Scottsdale at TPC Scottsdale’s Champions Course.
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — Ryan Alford recorded the first professional win in his golf career on Tuesday, taking the APGA Tour Scottsdale at TPC Scottsdale Champions Course.
It’s the third APGA event in a row that someone new came out on top. Alford, of Shreveport, Louisiana, shot a three-under 68 for a two-day, nine-under 133 to beat Marcus Byrd of Knoxville by 3 strokes.
Alford, 24, said the key for his success was his renewed mental state. He was among the leaders last week in Las Vegas before blowing up with a six-over performance on the back nine.
“I changed my mindset,” Alford said. “Told myself to erase the bad and keep going with the good. Talent is not the issue. It’s just a matter of getting it done.”
Alford entered the second round just one stroke ahead of Byrd. But a tap-in birdie on the 17th hole provided a cushion, and he went on to claim the first-place prize of $7,500 from the $25,000 purse that the APGA offers at every event.
The two-day, 36-hole tournament Monday at the Champions Course was the sixth event on the APGA’s 10-tournament season. The tour’s mission is to bring greater diversity to the sport of golf.
The other first-time APGA winners this year are Jarred Garcia, who took the Black History Month Classic at PGA Golf Club in Port St. Lucie, Florida, and Rovonta Young, who won the APGA Tour at World Golf Village in St. Augustine, Florida.
Tim O’Neal, the 2020 APGA Tour Player of the Year, was third at 5 under, with Tommy Schaff of Ridgeland, South Carolina another stroke back in fourth. Willie Mack III of Flint, Michigan, and Aaron Beverly of Fairfield, California, tied for fifth at 3-under. Mack is headed for Korn Ferry Tour’s Huntsville (Alabama) Championship next week.
Phoenix resident Doug Smith led a group of five players tied for seventh at even par. Kamaiu Johnson of Orlando finished in a tie for 12th (1 over) after winning in Las Vegas last week.
The next stop for the APGA Tour is Valhalla Golf Club in Louisville, Kentucky, set for May 23-25.
Kamaiu Johnson, who has competed in two PGA Tour events this season, wins his first APGA Tour event of the 2021 season.
Kamaiu Johnson won his first Advocates Pro Golf Association Tour of the season on Tuesday in Las Vegas.
Johnson shot 68-70 in the 36-hole tournament to finish at 4 under at TPC Las Vegas to edge Nyasha Mauchaza by a shot. Johnson’s final birdie on Tuesday came on the 14th hole and he parred out from there, but it was enough to claim the title and the $7,500 first-place check.
Tommy Schaff was third at at 2 under. Rovonta Young, who won the previous APGA event at the World Golf Village King & Bear Course in St. Augustine, Florida, finished tied with Marcus Manley for fourth at 1 under. Willie Mack III, Landon Lyons and Marcus Byrd tied for sixth at even par.
Johnson has competed in two PGA Tour events this season—the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am and the Honda Classic—on sponsor exemptions. He won the APGA Tour Championship last season.
Upcoming APGA tournaments
April 18-20 – APGA Tour Scottsdale, TPC Scottsdale
May 23-25 – APGA Tour Louisville, Valhalla Golf Club, Louisville, Kentucky
May 31-June 2 – APGA Tour New Orleans, TPC Louisiana, New Orleans
July 18-20 – APGA Tour Deere Run, TPC Deere Run, Silvis, Illinois
Aug. 8-10 – APGA Tour Championship, TPC Sugarloaf, Duluth, Georgia
Check out the notable PGA Tour players who didn’t make the cut and won’t be playing the weekend at the Honda Classic in Florida.
Golf fans and tournament officials let out a sigh of relief as an event that started out missing some star power will actually have its marquee players advance to the weekend.
Phil Mickelson and Rickie Fowler are among those who survived the Bear Trap and made the cut at the Honda Classic this week at PGA National in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida.
Several other big names, however, were not so fortunate and were slamming trunks on Friday evening, including the biggest headline maker from the last two weekends to not win. Check out the most notable players who missed the cut this week at the Honda.
Kamaiu Johnson spent the past week at Pebble Beach surveying the course ahead of his PGA Tour debut.
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Kamaiu Johnson finally got a taste for life on Tour.
He’s not looking back.
The 27-year-old Advocates Pro Golf Association Tour golfer from Tallahassee, Florida, had several successes over the summer, including five straight top-10s and defeating Tim O’Neal and former PGA Tour player Brad Adamonis at the APGA Tour Championship in September. While he’s thankful for his experiences on that tour, geared toward promoting diversity to golf by supporting minorities to pursue careers on and off the course, the past few days at Pebble Beach have opened his eyes.
He’s ready to level up.
“I feel like I belong out here. … It’s very motivating to me, honestly, because this is where I want to be. I don’t want to go back to the mini-tour,” Johnson said Wednesday. “This is where I want to be. So it’s a big point that I take advantage of these opportunities that I’m getting on the PGA Tour and the Korn Ferry Tour because I don’t want to go back to the mini-tour.”
Johnson’s dream of playing on the PGA Tour took a detour in late January when his long-awaited Tour debut at the Farmers Insurance Open was hijacked after he was forced to withdraw on Jan. 26 when he tested positive for COVID-19. Johnson had been looking forward to playing on a sponsor exemption at Torrey Pines as the result of his success on the APGA Tour and partnership between the APGA and Farmers since October.
The situation turned around quickly, however, as news of Johnson’s withdrawal from his debut inspired the Pebble Beach Pro-Am as well as the Honda Classic (March 18-21) to extend sponsor exemptions. Johnson was also given sponsor exemptions to compete in the Korn Ferry Tour’s Emerald Coast Golf Classic at Sandestin in Destin, Florida, in early April.
Thanks so much for this amazing opportunity. I really look forward to teeing it up at pebble. ❤️ https://t.co/UWAbUJXjX5
Any of the disappointment left from the delay of his Tour debut has dissipated.
“I told my buddy the other night, if God made golf courses, he definitely started here on this property with these great golf courses around here,” Johnson said.
Johnson’s had plenty of time to bask in the glory that is Pebble Beach since arriving in Monterey, California, on Feb. 2 — one week after his withdrawal from the Farmers Insurance Open. The eight days spent studying Pebble Beach Golf Links and Spyglass, both of which Johnson had never played before last week, has proved worthwhile based on his knowledge revealed during Wednesday’s presser.
“(The courses) fit my eye pretty well. I cut the golf ball, so this is a cut, these are cutter’s golf courses and pretty generous off the tee, but most of them are second-shot golf courses,” Johnson said. “At Spy, once you hit No. 5 at Spy, you better be golfing your ball. On No. 5 is when the golf course gets real, so you better be golfing your ball when you get to hole 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9, and that’s how I see it.
“And once you get through there, you can cruise a little bit, but then once you hit 15, 16, 17 and 18 you better be golfing your ball again. So, yeah, I’m looking forward to it, man. I’m just happy to be here and I feel comfortable on the golf courses for sure.”
Johnson said he parred Nos. 15-18 on Cypress Point during a round he played Tuesday with Harold Varner III, a day he’ll remember for a while.
“Harold and I had a little bet going and I beat him on the front, he beat me on the back,” Johnson said. “So it was fun going around that place with HV3. He talks a lot and so do I, so we hit it off pretty well. We teed off at 7:15 and we were the only ones out there for two hours, and so it was just so special.”
While Johnson won’t have the tournament experience of a PGA Tour pro like Varner and other competitors beginning Thursday, he’s confident in his ability to keep up, especially due to his driving ability and how it translates to the courses.
“I drive it straighter than anybody, for sure,” Johnson said. “I think that’s what you need around these golf courses is to be in the fairway and playing from the fairway and I think if I can just stick to my game plan and do that then I’ll have a good week this week.”
Johnson tees off his first round Thursday at 12:36 p.m. from the 10th tee alongside Roger Sloan and Nelson Ledesma.
APGA Tour star Kamaiu Johnson contracted COVID-19 last week, forcing him to withdraw from the Farmers Insurance Open, his PGA Tour debut.
SAN DIEGO – Since mid-October, Kamaiu Johnson, a standout on the Advocates Professional Golf Association Tour, a circuit created to provide playing opportunities for minority players, has been counting down the days until he fulfilled his dream by making his PGA Tour debut in the Farmers Insurance Open.
Life, however, teed up a vicious blockade as he tested positive for COVID-19 five days before the start of the annual tournament at Torrey Pines. Then he got word his mother was rushed to a hospital in the Orlando area with breathing difficulties caused by contracting COVID-19.
But the sun came up a few days later and Johnson’s future is bright again.
His mother is trending toward a return to good health and his coming days will include playing in the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am and the Honda Classic, as both tournaments granted sponsor exemptions to Johnson this week.
“I really can’t explain the turn of events, it just happened so fast,” Johnson, 27, said Friday in a conference call with reporters. “Starting this week I thought I was going to get my first PGA Tour event this week, but God had other plans.
“I’m just so thankful for the support that I’ve gotten over these past five days. I’m thankful to AT&T and Farmers and Honda for all they are doing for me. It’s been amazing how many people have reached out to me.
“My mom is definitely trending in the right direction. The doctor said she should be able to go home on Sunday, so that’s just amazing. The good news is just absolutely amazing and it’s such a quick turnaround of events that I’m just so grateful and thankful for.
“I have a great team around me and they just told me to stay patient and honestly, good things come to those who wait. It’s amazing what’s happened in the last 48 hours, absolutely amazing.”
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Johnson has been quarantining locally and if all continues to go well, he will be able to leave his quarters on Tuesday. He has kept busy working on his game as much as one can in a hotel room. Farmers Insurance sent him some weight bands, he set up a putting mat in the room, and has been able to swing a golf club.
And other than a rough night a few nights ago, he’s been feeling great – 100 percent, he said.
“I feel absolutely back to normal, more sure,” Johnson said. “I’ve just been trying to stay active and trying to keep my body loose. It’s just absolutely a dream come true honestly to be playing on the PGA Tour at Pebble Beach; that property’s just amazing. I’ve never been on that property before, but I can only imagine what it’s going to feel like when I get there.
“I’ve been doing everything I can just to stay golf ready while in quarantine. I’m just excited, just be out there and competing against the best in the world. It’s everything I ever wanted, it’s everything I ever dreamed of and it’s everything that everyone who’s ever helped me has ever dreamed of for me.”
Johnson’s life, like this past week, has been anything but easy. He has dealt with many ups and downs throughout his life, including being homeless at times and on occasion having to sleep in his mother’s car at tournaments. He picked up the game later in life and has spent much of the past three years on golf’s backroads playing mini-tournaments and the APGA.
Last year, which included a win in the APGA Tour Championship in September, he made about $30,000 – before expenses. But his story – and personality and game – has resonated with some movers and shakers in golf. Farmers Insurance inked him to an endorsement deal for $25,000 per year for two years. A co-founder of Cambridge Mobile Telematics, Bill Powers, gave Johnson another $20,000.
This week, as a non-member of the PGA Tour, Johnson received a stipend of $2,500 this week after he tested positive.
This journey, however, is not Johnson’s alone. He fully embraces representing the APGA as he chases his PGA Tour dream.
“I think golf needs to start looking more like America looks,” Johnson said. “I think that’s just good for golf and I think that’s just good to show that we have a lot of talent. I think that we need to be ready when that opportunity comes and I think that I am ready at this time in my life and my golf career.
“I can’t tell you how excited I am for the APGA Tour. I think it’s important that we play well so that it just shows that we deserve opportunities as well.”
