He was the Florida Times-Union’s high school player of the year in 2013 when he led Ponte Vedra to a state championship.
Taylor Funk posted four rounds in the 60s to tie Davis Lamb for medalist in a PGA Tour first-stage qualifier last week at the Bermuda Run Country Club in North Carolina.
Funk, the Florida Times-Union’s high school player of the year in 2013 when he led Ponte Vedra to a state championship, opened with a 68, had middle rounds of 67-67 and finished with a 69 for a 13-under 271 final score.
Funk is the son of 8-time PGA Tour winner Fred Funk.
Funk, a former University of Texas player and Lamb, a former Notre Dame player, advanced to one of five second-stage qualifiers beginning in late November. Players in those qualifiers will be vying for the final step, the PGA Tour Q-School presented by Korn Ferry Dec. 12-15 at the TPC Sawgrass Dye’s Valley and Sawgrass Country Club.
Funk played in the final stage last year and tied for 97th.
For the second straight year, PGA Tour cards will be available at the PGA Tour Q-School presented by Korn Ferry, which will be held Dec. 12-15 at TPC Sawgrass’ Dye’s Valley Course and Sawgrass Country Club in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida. The top five and ties will earn an immediate promotion to golf’s highest level, with the remaining finishers at Final Stage earning varying levels of Korn Ferry Tour and PGA Tour Americas membership based on finish.
Q-School consists of four stages: pre-qualifying, First Stage, Second Stage and Final Stage. Some players begin at pre-qualifying, while others are directly exempt into First Stage, Second Stage or Final Stage based on prior merit.
One first-stage qualifier remains, at the Country Club of Ocala Oct. 29-Nov. 1. It was postponed due to Hurricane Milton.
Heartache and jubilation both made an appearance on Monday at PGA Tour Q-School.
PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – Heartache and jubilation both made an appearance Monday at PGA Tour Q-School.
For one week at host courses Dye’s Valley at TPC Sawgrass and Sawgrass Country Club the greed that has consumed professional golf gave way to job seekers desperate to improve their status for next season. Money took such a backseat that on the walk to scoring veteran pro Erik Compton asked his caddie after finishing T-38, “Did I make anything?”
“You made enough for extra guac and double barbacoa at Chipotle tonight,” he said.<
For the record, Compton banked $6,214.28 from a purse of $550,000, which should cover that Chipotle order but the purse equaled what Nick Taylor made for finishing 25th out of 30th at the Tour Championship in August. Here’s the rub: what Compton really cared about was hanging on to the top 40 and eight guaranteed Korn Ferry Tour starts to begin the 2024 season.
Loved every bit of covering Pgatour Qschool Presented by Korn Ferry. Real life drama that wasn’t created by Money but pure opportunity. Q school is back baby! @PGATOUR@KornFerryTour
“If I get eight starts at the beginning of the year and don’t have to stress about it, I can get a (full) card back,” said Compton, breaking into a smile and with renewed hope of a clear path back to the PGA Tour for 2025.
Julian Suri, who grew up in Jacksonville before going to Duke, needed a par at the last hole at Dye’s Valley to earn eight starts too. But he made triple bogey and is relegated to conditional status and uncertainty over how many starts are in his future on KFT.
More Monday meltdowns
Wesley Bryan was in the hunt for one of the five full Tour cards but shot 79 and will have to rely primarily on past champions status next season instead. Spencer Levin, 39, entered the final day T-3 and played in the last group, but he airmailed the ninth green and pitched 12 feet past the hole. There were 28 spectators ringing the green and as Levin’s par putt stopped short of the hole, one fan clapped. With that few fans, Levin heard it and he glared daggers at the spectator.
It was Levin’s fifth bogey of the day but he seemed more enraged about the clap. As one of his playing partner’s lined up his putt, Levin continued to express his disgust at the fan. He shot 73 and fell to T-10, which did him no good as he already had full status for next season on KFT.
There would be no one clapping for him at 18.
Q-School will mess with your head
It makes your palms sweaty and your stomach turn. Kevin Velo, who recorded just two top-25s on KFT this season and finished dead last at the Nationwide Championship to end his regular season, had to go back to First Stage but fought his way back to Final Stage and finished T-21. It wasn’t enough to earn a PGA Tour card but it beat the alternative.
“Losing your job is one of the worst things in the world that can happen to you,” said Velo.
Imagine having to wait an extra day for the final round after a storm washed out play Sunday. Velo tossed and turned at night and turned to YouTube around 3 a.m., scrolling videos of a guy who unclogs drains for a living and of others mowing lawns.
“They’re super-satisfying,” he said.
Whatever gets you through the night.
Q-School is a perfect golf tournament. There is nothing like playing with your childhood dreams on the line. It isn’t about money. It isn’t about sponsors. Q-School is an internal battle with yourself. “Am I good enough to be my best in the most stressful environment?”
The five PGA Tour cards, which were offered to top finishers for the first time since 2012, were the carrots dangled to attract a field of 165, who were guaranteed at least conditional KFT status by making it this far. As Sam Saunders said, “We’d have been there if there was one PGA Tour card.”
Harrison Endycott gets to go back to the PGA Tour with full status
Trace Crowe finished 38th on Korn Ferry Tour
Hayden Springer topped the money list on PGA Tour Canada
Raul Pereda spent the season on PGA Tour Latinoamerica and showed he had game at the Mexico Open
Blaine Hale Jr. toiled on the mini tours
Each had an emotional story of their journey to the big leagues but none struck the chords like that of Springer, whose 3-year-old daughter Sage died on Nov. 13. How he kept it together to perform the way he did at Q-School, we’ll never know. His caddie, Michael Burns? Not so much. He burst into tears on 18.
“My heart has never beated faster in my entire life,” Burns said.
Springer’s story ranks with Erik van Rooyen winning in Cabo for his dying friend and Camilo Villegas’s win in Bermuda, his first since his young daughter died, as the feel-good story of the year in golf.
Ecstasy and agony, Cinderella stories and nightmare finishes. Q-School had it all — except for talk about money.
The final stage of the 2023 PGA Tour Q-School marks the first time since 2012 there were tour cards on the line.
PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – Emma Springer held 1-year-old daughter Annie aloft as if she was Simba in “The Lion King,” smiled and said, “Baby, we’re celebrating tonight and you have no idea why!”
The reason is quite simple: husband Hayden Springer is PGA Tour bound for the first time. The 26-year-old, who played on PGA Tour Canada this season, shot 1-under 69 at Dye’s Valley at TPC Sawgrass on Monday. That was good enough to finish at 8-under 272 and T-4 and earn one of five PGA Tour cards for the 2024 season.
After a decade of solely awarding varying levels of Korn Ferry Tour membership, final stage of the 2023 PGA Tour Q-School marks the first time since 2012 there were tour cards on the line. The next 40 finishers and ties are exempt for multiple reshuffles of the 2024 Korn Ferry Tour season, guaranteeing them between eight to 12 starts depending on their finish. The next 20 finishers and ties earned exempt status for the Latin America Swing of the 2024 PGA Tour Americas season in addition to conditional Korn Ferry Tour status. All remaining finishers outside the aforementioned categories earned conditional Korn Ferry Tour and PGA Tour Americas membership for 2024.
Springer entered the week with full Korn Ferry Tour status after topping the 2023 PGA Tour Canada’s season-long Fortinet Cup, but he’s skipping straight to the big leagues along with Mexico’s Raul Pereda, Trace Crowe, Blaine Hale Jr., and medalist Harrison Endycott.
Springer’s story was all the more remarkable because just over a month ago, on Nov. 13, his oldest daughter, Sage, died at age 3. She was prenatally diagnosed with Trisomy 18, a developmental disorder stemming from an extra chromosome.
What a moment for Hayden Springer ❤️
On Nov. 13, his 3-year-old daughter, Sage, passed away after battling Trisomy 18.
Springer said he thought of Sage several times during the final round.
“It’s happy thoughts,” he said. “It’s kind of one of those things that I think about her, and I just think about her smile. Like that’s the thing that I can just close my eyes and think about her smiling, and it’s kind of a grounding, kind of gets you back to neutral.”
Springer’s wife was greenside at 18 with Annie in her stroller but when she started crying, Emma wheeled her away. Hayden’s dad took over so Emma, who played on the women’s team at Texas Tech, could witness him seal the deal with a 2-putt par at 18. Three front-nine birdies lifted Springer into solid position to finish in the top 5. But he made bogeys at Nos. 11 and 12 to move into shakier ground. A birdie at the par-3 14th gave him a cushio again.
“Bouncing back and making birdie there definitely kind of got me back into it, got me back on the right track,” he said.
But he drove into the water at 17 and made bogey, which meant he needed to avoid the water off the tee at 18. As his father put it, “Can you make it any harder?”
“I’ve worked essentially my whole life to get into this position, and you dream about it,” said Springer, who began playing U.S. Kids events at age 8. “It’s like you don’t know exactly when that day will come, but today is the day.”
Here’s the story of the four other newly minted PGA Tour members.
The field in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, started with 165 golfers. After 16 withdrawals, there are now 149 remaining fighting for a 2024 PGA Tour card.
Only the top five and ties will earn those precious rewards.
More than four inches of rain pounded the area Saturday night into Sunday morning and left Dye’s Valley at TPC Sawgrass and Sawgrass Country Club, the two host courses, unplayable.
The final round will finally start at 8:45 a.m. ET on Monday.
The viewing options are Golf Channel (TV) and Peacock (streaming) starting at 12:30 p.m. ET.
What else is at stake
After the top five and ties is determined, the next 40 finishers and ties are exempt for multiple reshuffles of the 2024 Korn Ferry Tour season, guaranteeing them between eight to 12 starts depending on their finish. The next 20 finishers and ties earn exempt status for the Latin America Swing of the 2024 PGA Tour Americas season in addition to conditional Korn Ferry Tour status. All remaining finishers outside the aforementioned categories earn conditional Korn Ferry Tour and PGA Tour Americas membership for 2024.
Golfweek’s Adam Schupak contributed to this article.
According to the PGA Tour’s meteorologist, 4.3 inches of rain fell since 3 p.m. ET on Saturday.
PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. — The final round of PGA Tour Q-School has been postponed to Monday.
More than four inches of rain pounded the area on Saturday night into Sunday morning and left Dye’s Valley at TPC Sawgrass and Sawgrass Country Club, the two host courses, unplayable.
“Unfortunately, both golf courses are currently unplayable and require extensive maintenance work due to overnight rainfall,” PGA Tour chief referee Harold Geyer said. “Due to expected playing conditions and the anticipation of further delays, the decision to postpone the final round was made within the rules and regulations, which allow us to finish on Monday.”
In fact, it will be the third straight year that Q-School concludes on a Monday (although last year it was scheduled to do so). All starting times are officially delayed until Monday at their original posted times (between 8:45-11 a.m. ET) in their original groupings as announced for the final round.
Ponte Vedra received nearly 5 inches of rain overnight 😳🌧️
The agronomy team was out as early as 5 a.m. to help get the courses ready for a Monday finish at PGA TOUR Q-School presented by Korn Ferry. pic.twitter.com/M9l6UuTjK3
Mother Nature has played a big role all week, first serving up high winds and cool temperatures. On Saturday, the game plan to move tee times up one hour worked to perfection as the last group finished as the rain started to fall. Preferred lies were utilized in the third round at both courses so that all players would play one round on each course under the same conditions of play.
According to the Tour’s meteorologist, 4.3 inches of rain fell since 3 p.m. ET on Saturday with levels closer to 4 inches at Sawgrass, which is known for its good drainage, and closer to 5 inches in some areas of the Dye Course, where the drainage at the former swampland isn’t as good.
After a decade of solely awarding varying levels of Korn Ferry Tour membership, final stage of PGA Tour Q-School marks the first time since 2012 there are PGA Tour cards on the line. Upon conclusion of the 72-hole tournament, which will see the field play two 18-hole rounds – at both Valley and Sawgrass – the top five finishers and ties will earn PGA Tour membership for 2024.
The next 40 finishers and ties are exempt for multiple reshuffles of the 2024 Korn Ferry Tour season, guaranteeing them between eight to 12 starts depending on their finish. The next 20 finishers and ties earn exempt status for the Latin America Swing of the 2024 PGA Tour Americas season in addition to conditional Korn Ferry Tour status. All remaining finishers outside the aforementioned categories earn conditional Korn Ferry Tour and PGA Tour Americas membership for 2024. Several players who already have secured some level of status for next season and realized their hopes of improving it were doubtful withdrew. There were 16 withdrawals as of Sunday morning out of a 165-man field that started on Thursday. Now, the waiting game begins for players whose future hangs in the balance — at least for next year.
“You have a full year to look back on what could’ve been,” said Ryan Gerard on what’s at stake. “Someone’s going to miss their card by a shot and have to live with it forever and someone is going to make it because they did something ridiculous coming down the stretch and they could make a ton of money next year and change their life forever because of 72 holes in December.”
But the field will have to wait until Monday to find out who is headed to the PGA Tour and who will have to spend another year on the Korn Ferry Tour.
Harrison Endycott of Australia leads at 12-under 198. Blaine Hale Jr. is solo second at 10 under and PGA Tour veteran Spencer Levin and Trace Crowe are tied for third at 8 under. Hayden Springer and Raul Pereda are tied for fifth. Here are 5 Things to Know from the third round of Q-School.
Here’s what you need to know with PGA Tour cards on the line.
PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. — Hayden Springer reached into his black Chrysler Voyager minivan and grabbed his 1-year-old daughter Annie. He smiled the smile of a father who missed holding his child all day and gave her a good squeeze.
But just over a month ago, on Nov. 13, his oldest daughter Sage died at age 3. She was prenatally diagnosed with Trisomy 18, a developmental disorder stemming from an extra chromosome.
“She’s a very special girl, and we miss her a lot,” Springer said. “She brought an immense amount of joy to our family and the people around her.”
In the midst of what has to be an incredibly difficult grieving process, Springer has managed to play some impressive golf this week at PGA Tour Q-School despite hardly playing for the last month. On Saturday, he shot 2-under 68 at Sawgrass Country Club to improve to 7-under 203, which has him T-5 and right on the cutline for one of the Tour cards being given for the top five and ties this week.
Springer entered the week with full Korn Ferry Tour status after topping the 2023 PGA Tour Canada’s season-long Fortinet Cup, but he’s well aware of what is at stake on Sunday.
“It’s life-changing,” said Springer, who began playing U.S. Kids events at age 8. “I’ve spent most of my life dreaming of playing on the PGA Tour. It’s a special opportunity to be here and have a chance.”
Here are four more things to know after the third round of the 2023 Q-School.
“We’ll see what happens,” he said. “They might fine me.”
PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. — Martin Trainer knew the risk of playing in the recent LIV Golf Promotions events but went for it anyway.
“We’ll see what happens,” he said. “They might fine me.”
By ‘they,’ he meant the PGA Tour. Initially, the Tour confirmed it didn’t view LIV Golf Promotions as an “unauthorized tournament” due to its status as a qualifying event. But there was a wrinkle that led many players to pass on the opportunity – namely the need for a media release from the Tour. Members still needed to apply for and be granted media releases by the proper deadlines: 15 days in advance for Korn Ferry Tour players and 45 days in advance for PGA Tour players. Despite the LIV Golf Promotions having been announced in February, it wasn’t officially announced until Oct. 26, less than 45 days before the first round on Dec. 8.
“It was a strange situation because I was trying to keep my card and then I didn’t and weighing options, and so that’s how I got stuck in that pickle,” Trainer said. “I don’t think it will be a suspension, probably a fine.”
So, why do it?
“It was just an opportunity,” said Trainer, the winner of the 2019 Puerto Rico Open. The 32-year-old pro finished 178th this season in the FedEx Cup and is competing this week at PGA Tour Q-School. “I have a little status on Korn Ferry, I’ll get into some PGA Tour events, I can play a few European Tour events. Between that and this week, it was two chances to try and have full status on a major tour.”
Trainer failed to earn one of the three spots available to join LIV Golf in Abu Dhabi, and he’ll need an incredible final round at Q-School to finish in the top five and ties. He shot 72 on Saturday and is T-54 at even-par 210.
Trainer, who once missed 23 cuts in 28 starts on Tour, said he feels as if he’s starting to turn a corner with his game and still wants to chase the Tour, but he has already contemplated life without golf.
“I don’t want to struggle on the mini tours,” he told NCGA Golf in its fall issue. “If I can’t make it on Tour, I want to go back to school and become a therapist.” Not sports psychology but the real deal. “I find the human condition and human challenges much more fascinating,” Trainer said. With a nod to his checkered career, he lets out a little laugh and said, “Obviously there is plenty to analyze in myself.”
In 2021, he “took a break” from alcohol. One week turned into two, and two weeks turned into more than two years.
PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. — Spencer Levin planned on sleeping on a college buddy’s couch for one night ahead of the Monday qualifier for the Korn Ferry Tour’s Veritex Bank Championship in April, and if he didn’t make it, he’d fly home. He ended up sleeping on the couch all week, not only qualifying by sinking a decisive birdie putt on the final hole but winning the tournament six days later for his first victory in a PGA Tour-sanctioned event after 17 years and 10 months of trying.
It might be the most under-appreciated victory of 2023 – his first since 2008 on the Canadian Tour, not long after Tiger Woods won the U.S. Open at Torrey Pines on one leg and back when Katy Perry’s “I Kissed a Girl” was the No. 1 song on the charts and Swede sensation Ludvig Aberg was all of eight years old.
Levin, 39, began the final round in Dallas trailing leader Brett Drewitt by six shots. He caught the Aussie on the 71st hole, then birdied the last for a 63 at Texas Rangers Golf Club – and a four-round total of 20-under par.
“I didn’t think I was going to win the tournament until I did,” Levin said.
Spencer Levin had a decorated amateur career and finally won a PGA Tour-sanctioned event on the Korn Ferry Tour in 2023 after nearly 18 years of trying.
What a long, strange trip it had been to the winner’s circle. Levin already was the definition of cocky growing up in Sacramento and his confidence grew during the summer of 2004, when he finished second in the Pacific Coast Amateur (losing in a playoff); tied for 13th place at the U.S. Open (the best finish by an amateur in 33 years) at Shinnecock Hills; reached the third round of the U.S. Amateur at Winged Foot; and won the California Amateur, Scratch Players Amateur, and Porter Cup. Greatness was predicted for him.
While his pro career never reached those lofty heights, he’s earned close to $10 million over 17 seasons and climbed to 60th in the Official World Golf Ranking in early 2012. He came close to winning a handful of times, most notably losing a playoff against Johnson Wagner at the 2011 Mayakoba Golf Classic. Levin averaged 28 starts a year, making 139 cuts, but when he lost his card after the 2016-17 season, he took the demotion hard. He made only five cuts in 22 starts and lost his exempt status. His playing opportunities were few and far between over the ensuing four seasons, dwindling to zero Korn Ferry starts in 2021 and ’22.
By his own count, Levin fell one shot short in at least five KFT Monday qualifiers in 2022, as well as a spot in the U.S. Open by a single stroke. A bogey on the 72nd hole at Final Stage of the KFT Qualifying Tournament deprived him of guaranteed starts in the first eight events this year.
Yet he never wavered in his belief that he could still compete with the best in the world even if his reality had become “Just trying to find a place to play and get into tournaments,” he said.
“He never, ever thought it (pro golf career) was done,” Don Levin, Spencer’s father, swing coach, and confidante told NCGA Golf Magazine in its fall 2023 issue. “He never entertained the thought of that.”
Levin’s victory in April secured him a KFT card for 2024. However, he was unable to remain in the top 30 on the season-long money list and earn an automatic promotion to the PGA Tour, so he’s back at the final stage of Q-School this week chasing a top-5 finish (and ties), which is what it will take to be awarded a Tour card.
“Once you’ve had a taste of it, you want to keep doing it,” he said of playing on the PGA Tour again.
But Levin isn’t the same cocky kid with the visor, popped collar and dangling cigarette who first took the golf world by storm. He crushed out his last cigarette in 2017, the day after his paternal grandfather died of emphysema. In February of 2021, he “took a break” from alcohol. One week turned into two, and two weeks has turned into more than two years.
Spencer Levin watches his drive on the second hole during the final round of the 2017 Quicken Loans National at TPC Potomac at Avenel Farm. (Peter Casey-USA TODAY Sports)
“It was just something I did to improve my life,” he said. “I was at home, I didn’t really have a tour to play on, and I thought, well, how can I just try to at least improve myself.”
He’s filled the void by hitting the gym regularly, which he had never done before. He’s also prioritized family – he’s the father of three. He’d like to earn his card this week – he’ll play two rounds each at TPC Sawgrass Dye’s Valley and Sawgrass Country Club – and have another shot at the big time and some unfinished business trying to win. He’s planning to putt conventionally at Q-School with an old Odyssey putter, a grip he began practicing with last month after his wacky Happy Gilmore style of holding the putter much like one would grip a hockey stick cooled off.
Levin’s got nothing to lose and everything to gain and the perspective of a grizzled veteran.
“When I was 23-24, my whole career and life hinged on this week,” Levin said. “I still want to make it, don’t get me wrong, but it’s no longer life or death.”
PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. — When PGA Tour Q-School begins Thursday, expect there to be stories of heartache and jubilation at golf’s ultimate pressure-cooker. Arguably the best Q-School story of all time involves Mac O’Grady, and comes courtesy of Gary McCord.
McCord played a major role in rallying support for the Tour’s move in 1983 to the top 125 All-Exempt Tour. Previously, the magic number was top 60. In some sort of poetic justice, McCord lost his card by a matter of a few thousand dollars and had to go back to Q-School, held at TPC Sawgrass and Sawgrass CC, in late 1982, just as it will be this week. (One of the primary differences is that only top 5 and ties will get a card this time.)
McCord made it. So did O’Grady, who, despite opening with rounds of 79-76, earned his card for the first time in 17 attempts. Recounting the story to Golfweek, McCord said, “I invited him to dinner. I said, ‘Let’s go celebrate.’ He said, ‘No, I’ve got something to do.’ ”
Save Ballesteros (left) is given a lesson by Mac O”Grady (holding video camera) as caddie Billy Foster shelters him from rain during a practice round before the start of the 1994 Masters. (Steve Munday/ALLSPORT)
Months passed and McCord sees O’Grady and, out of curiosity, asked him what he did that night after making his card at last.
“He told me he went down to the sporting goods store and bought 17 Louisville Slugger baseball bats, got a Sharpie, and wrote the date and location of every time he failed (Q-School), then waited until dark and went behind the second green at the TPC and broke all 17 of those bats against a pine tree,” McCord recalled. “He said, ‘I got rid of the demons.’ I just went ‘OK.’ Whether he did it or not, I don’t know. But I bet he probably did.”
“I can’t imagine he wouldn’t be disappointed because I know I am.”
PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. – Growing up as the grandson of Arnold Palmer, Sam Saunders brings a perspective on one of the all-time legends of the game. It was Palmer who was his guiding light in the game and whose words of wisdom still serve as the foundation he goes back to.
So, when asked to comment on how he thinks his grandfather, who died in 2016, would have felt about the friction in the game since the launch of LIV Golf, Saunders is quick to say he can’t speak for “The King,” but that doesn’t mean he can’t offer an educated guess.
“It’s not fair to ever assume what anyone would think, period,” he said. “I can’t tell you I think he would think this, but based on my relationship with him and how I feel about the game of golf and how important it is to keep it accessible and fun, I can’t imagine he wouldn’t be disappointed because I know I am.”
Saunders is 36 and after playing in 158 career events on the PGA Tour has dealt with a myriad of injuries the past few years – cyst on his wrist, broken collarbone, broken left leg, just to name a few – but is healthy again and spent the past season on the Korn Ferry Tour trying to work his way back to the Tour that his grandfather helped build. (The players broke away from the PGA of America in 1968.)
“I don’t judge anyone for decisions they make because I’m not walking in their shoes but no one can buy the game of golf, nobody owns the game of golf. It’s a game that should be available for anyone to play. It’s important that everyone remembers that it should be a game that brings people together, not push them apart,” Saunders said. “Personally, I’d love to see the PGA Tour go back to its roots and stick to a little bit more of the tradition of the game. I won’t candy-coat it at all, I’m not a fan of limited-field, no-cut events. That’s not what the game is about. What makes it unique is there is no guaranteed money, it’s a performance-based sport. I felt like we had it pretty solid for a lot of years. I know that the years I played out there I never could have imagined we were playing for that much money. Purses have gone up to a point that I personally don’t feel are sustainable nor necessary.
“How much money does an individual need to make playing a sport? I think it should be performance-based. I hope that all of this will end in a positive way. Right now, I’ll be honest with you, I’m concerned. I know that 90 percent of players and those involved in the game are quite concerned and it’s justified to feel a little confused as to what’s going on. All I can do is hope that something good will prevail.”
Arnold Palmer and Sam Saunders pose for a Golfweek print story. (Photo by Allan Henry)
Saunders said he wasn’t pleased last year when it was initially proposed that the Arnold Palmer Invitational would become a small-field, no-cut signature event. (Later, the Tour reversed the decision and API, the Genesis Invitational and Memorial will all have a small cut.) Saunders, who grew up at the host course, Bay Hill Club & Lodge, and has played in the tournament 10 times, said he met with PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan over lunch during the tournament in March and voiced his concerns, while noting, “I didn’t have anything to do in that decision.”
“That was something my grandfather would have been very passionate about, I think he would’ve always wanted to have a competitive event with a cut in it. Personally, I’m disappointed that it is as small a field as it is but I’m glad there is a cut,” Saunders said.
While he needs to take care of business this week at PGA Tour Q-School, which begins Thursday at TPC Sawgrass Dye’s Valley Course and Sawgrass Country Club with five Tour cards available, Saunders already is targeting getting back into the Arnold Palmer Invitational, which he last played in March 2020.
Sam Saunders tees off at the 2015 Arnold Palmer Invitational.
“I don’t want to play in it because it’s a limited field, I want to play in it because it’s a great event,” he said. “I don’t like that we are identifying events as good ones and bad ones. They should all be great events. Every single event on the PGA Tour should be recognized as the best players in the world competing. It really upsets me when they’re limiting fields and not having cuts because we’re no longer identifying the best player, we’re identifying the best player in a limited circumstance, basically.
“I want to get back and play in the API and I’m very pleased that we’re going to have a cut there this year. I’d love to see all of the non-majors on a more equal level. Whether it’s Tiger’s event at the Genesis or Mr. Nicklaus’s event at Muirfield or my granddad’s event or the Colonial, obviously those events hold certain value on Tour but in no way did I think the Arnold Palmer Invitational was better or more important than any other Tour event. It has a certain history to it, it has my granddad’s name to it, which holds value. I wanted our golf course to be as good as it could possibly be and have it be the best test of golf for the players. That’s the only competitive nature I felt with my involvement in the tournament.”
Spoken like the grandson of one of the all-time greats.
