The ’25 U.S. Ryder Cup captain added intrigue to the idea that he could be the first American playing captain since Arnold Palmer in 1963.
The last man into the field at the BMW Championship was the last man standing when it was all said and done on Sunday.
Keegan Bradley shot a final-round even-par 72 at Castle Pines Golf Club to win his seventh career PGA Tour title in Castle Rock, Colorado. Sam Burns closed in 7-under 65, the low round of the day, to finish second along with Ludvig Aberg (71) and Adam Scott (72), one stroke back.
“Oh, man, I was shaking over that last putt,” Bradley said. “We did it. It was a battle all day.”
Bradley called last Sunday’s final round of the FedEx St. Jude Championship “one of the toughest afternoons of my PGA Tour career,” after sneaking into the BMW’s field as the 50th and final player to qualify for the second leg of the playoffs. After struggling to a T-59 finish in the first leg of the playoffs, he returned to his Memphis hotel room, packed his bags and paced back and forth hitting refresh of the scores on his phone as he waited for his flight home in what he described as “a state of shock” that he wasn’t going to get to play in the BMW, his favorite tournament, which he’d never missed during his 14-year career on Tour. Thanks to Tom Kim’s 6-6-6 finish, Bradley finished 17 points ahead of Kim for the 50th spot.
“It just shows you why you have to grind it out every week because you never know how fast it can switch,” he said. “I had to have a lot of magical things happen for me to just play in this tournament, and when I got here, I was so grateful just to be here. I played with a real sense of calm all week, which is not the norm for me.” He added: “Now I go to Atlanta with a chance to win the FedExCup. I can’t believe it.”
Bradley, who won the BMW in 2018, took the title for the second time, and won for the first time with his father, Mark, a PGA professional in attendance.
Bradley opened with 66 to take the lead and trailed Scott by three strokes at the midway point after a 68. Bradley shot a roller-coaster ride 2-under 70 on Saturday with eight birdies mixed with six bogeys. He sank a 9-foot birdie putt at 18 and pumped his fist as he grabbed the 54-hole lead.
On Sunday, he wedged from 94 yards to 3 feet at the first for a birdie but lost his solo lead as Scott tied him with an eagle. But Scott, who was looking to end more than a four-year winless stretch, made three bogeys in a row beginning at the 10th to give Bradley as big as a three-stroke cushion. Bradley reeled off 13 straight pars until making a bogey at No. 15. With his lead cut to one, Bradley lofted his second shot from 227 yards over the front green side bunker at the par-5 17th to 16 feet and made birdie.
“I was a little jacked up,” Bradley said of his 5-iron into the thin mountain air. “One of the best shots of my life.”
The birdie restored his lead to two and made a three-putt bogey at the last uneventful in the final accounting. He finished with a 72-hole aggregate of 12-under 276 and vaulted to fourth in the playoffs heading into next week’s Tour Championship.
Bradley, who was named the 2025 U.S. Ryder Cup captain in July, added intrigue to the idea that he could be the first American playing captain since Arnold Palmer in 1963.
“To be named Ryder Cup captain and still be a full-time player is strange. I don’t know anyone knows how to handle this situation,” Bradley said. “So I’m doing the best I can. The only thing I can keep doing is play my best golf and maybe play my way on to some of these teams.”
Bradley, who was recently named an assistant captain for the U.S. Presidents Cup team in September, also made a convincing case for one of six captain’s picks to the biennial team competition scheduled for Montreal.
“I hope I didn’t throw a huge wrench in everybody’s plans, but I’m proud to be in consideration,” he said.
In the tournament within a tournament, Bradley, Scott, Tommy Fleetwood and Chris Kirk moved into the top 30 in the season-long FedEx Cup points standings and advanced to the FedEx Cup finale next week in Atlanta at East Lake Golf Club. In doing so, Brian Harman, Jason Day, Davis Thompson and Denny McCarthy were bumped out and their playoffs are over. Justin Thomas was the Bubble Boy at No. 30, flipping to the right side of the cutline by 30 points when Harman double-bogeyed the 18th hole to fall to 31st.
World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler shot 72 on Sunday and finished T-33 but held on to the top spot in the FedEx Cup, which means for the third straight year he’ll begin at 10 under in next week’s staggered start and with a lead ranging from two strokes better than Xander Schauffele to four better than Bradley and as many as 10 better than Thomas.
“Scottie starting ahead,” Burns said. “He doesn’t need any more help than how good he already is.”
