Why TPC Sawgrass might be the perfect tournament venue
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Hello and welcome to this edition of the Golf Show Podcast with Rex and Lav. Rex, I thought you'd be out staking out the influencers, the creator classic. Instead, you're stuck here with me recording this podcast. What are your thoughts? What are you thinking on the eve of the Players' Championship? I think I'm thinking, why does it look like I'm locked in a cell right now? Because the actual...

TPC Sawgrass Media Room. Oh, wow. That's a good shot of your thumb. The media room is actually very nice and they actually have these podcasts, little cubies. But now that I look at myself on camera, I'm not being held here against my will. No one has to worry about it. I'm not blinking SOS to everyone. I think I'm looking forward to, well, a couple of things. I love this golf course. It's really grown on me over the years. I feel like and I did this report earlier.

on live from today about Brian Harman kind of explained this to me on Sunday at Bay Hill that he feels like it's the fairest golf course on the PGA Tour. Didn't say it was the easiest. Pointing out there's plenty of challenges out there. There's plenty of ways you can get sideways and get into trouble. But there isn't a rhyme or reason to a champion here. And I always go back to the stat that Webb Simpson won one year.

Roy McIlroy won the next year here at TPC Sawgrass. And there's nothing about those two games that you would ever confuse. So I love that there is a meritocracy to this golf course that you don't always get at major championships or in a week in and week out basis on the PGA Tour. And the stars are aligning for the biggest names to deliver. I mean, we're going to get into Scotty Scheffler. What he did last week at Bay Hill, I think, was a step in the right direction. Certainly with Colin Morgawa.

Coming up short, but playing really well. I mean, I think everybody wants to kind of see where Xander's game is at right now, coming off that injury. So I think there's a bunch of different storylines. So I think I've settled on the fact that I hate playing this golf course at TBC Sawgrass. But it actually might be the perfect tournament venue. And I say that, Rex, for a couple of reasons. But if you cover the PGA Tour on a week-in, week-out basis, as we do,

What you don't hear often is that the golf course is a, quote, test of execution. And how many players, like literally dozens of players, have mentioned that very attribute about TPC Sawgrass? I think PGA Tour courses, by and large, can be somewhat mindless. You know, players don't put much thought into the practice rounds. They're kind of going through the motions. They show up Tuesday. Sometimes they show up Wednesday. They'll play just nine holes and then just go out and get after it. And look, their scores are still going to be plenty good.

the PGA tour and I just made this point on live from has always like pandered to the lowest common denominator of fan. And by that, I mean, they've, they've thought that low scores birdies and long drives equates to entertainment and that that's what everyone wants to see. But in their fan forward research over the past year and a half, what the PGA tour has actually discovered is that fans want to challenge fans.

Fans want the best players in the world to be challenged. And you can do that by having more strategic golf courses or risk reward elements, bringing shot values, sort of altering trajectories and shot shapes. And that is TBC Sawgrass to a T. And, you know, I think earlier in my career when I was covering this, when it was played in May,

I think a lot of players thought it was tricked up. A lot of players thought it was unfair. I think the move to March, the move to the overseed out of Bermuda has presented a more fair test, a more strategic test. And it's really now a a test of execution, which is somewhat of a rarity on the PGA Tour these days.

I'll give you a motor come of credit because you just had to spend two hours and 10 minutes on a desk and you had a lot of things you had to talk about, but there is no way I'm going to allow you to throw a recycle take. I just heard you do that. Take on live from, I believe it's not what we're going to do here. No, I believe it. That's fine. You can believe it, but our listeners of the, but that's why, that's why I love, that's why I deserve better than a recycled take. But I, that's why I love this golf tournament. Like, I,

I don't disagree with you. And I tend to, I always leaned into, I liked it better in May. I thought it actually played, I liked it as a test better because it was firmer, it was faster, and you just ended up with more challenging. It's different. It's not better or worse. I think it's different.

However, you can show up here this week and you're right. It's not my favorite course to play at all. I think most people who play the game where you and I play it, they probably don't go out to enjoy it very much because it's very much you have to hit it to this spot and then you have to hit it to that spot. There's no deviation. There's not a lot of room for bailing out on this golf course. So I see what you're saying. And I guess I tend to agree with your take when the first time I heard it, which was about an hour and a half ago. And now that I can hear it again, maybe I agree with it a little bit more that yes,

I think the general move over the course of the PGA Tour in recent years was to dumb down golf courses.

where if the fans just want 2025 under par, we can make that happen. We can play the American Express every week if that's what you want. I don't think that's what we want because we can go back just a few weeks of PGA National. There was even players, Billy Horschel, not to name any names, who were saying that, oh, this is the softer side of PGA National. We don't want this. Like, where's the real test? And then the teeth came out, the wind came up, and we saw the harder side of PGA National. There are plenty of courses out there.

on the PGA tour over the course of a year, that's going to test players. I don't mind the occasional American Express or Zurich Classic or whatever it is you want to use. But I do tend to agree with you. This one in particular, and again, I go back to the conversation I had with Brian Harmon. It does not identify a certain type of player. What we want to always get to is the cliche. It identifies the best player. Yeah.

Yeah, and like I don't even want to get into a score discussion because, look, it's soft after they had an inch or two of rain on a Monday. I'll have to consult with Steve Rakowski, our resident meteorologist, to find out just how much rain we experienced on Sunday and Monday. But but like.

the winning score is in all likelihood going to be 15 to 20 on the part. There are still very gettable stretches of this golf course. I'm talking about the shot value that you have to see. More mid-irons, working the ball both ways. It's indisputable that it's testing everyone. And I think that's why you see some particularly stat winners, particularly since it came back to March in 2019. How about some of the news, Rex, of the early part of the week? I want to start with Tiger Woods, who is not going to be in the field anyway today.

at the Players' Championship. Then we get the news late on Tuesday afternoon that Tiger actually ruptured his left Achilles while training and presumably ramping up for a potential appearance next month at the Masters. What was your reaction to that news? Stephen A called him a recreational golfer now.

That's a recreational. Does he mean ceremonial? Does it mean ceremonial? Just mean recreational. You and I are recreational golfers. Ceremony for something entirely different. No, no. Stephen A called him a recreational golfer. So that is a hot take that I don't think I'm going to match on that one. I think I'm going to echo what Rory said early this morning when we talked to him about it. It sucks.

Like just point blank. It just sucks because you sit around and you wait for him. And I kind of knew he wasn't going to play this week after his mother died. He didn't play at the Genesis Invitational, but everything seemed to be angling towards the Masters. And there is always a level of curiosity. And I had lunch with one of our colleagues today, Bob Herrick, who covers Tiger probably closer than you and I. In the commissioner's lounge where some of us can get in and some of us cannot.

Yeah, yeah, that's pretty amazing. That's shocking to me that some people cannot get in there. I will say that I tend to agree with what Bob says. And as from a workload, it makes the week harder for people like you and I, because we do have to work a little bit harder, but it does make it more enjoyable, I would argue, because it's never boring. Like there's always something going on. I will say there was a moment.

right after he posted his statement on social media where I reached out to someone in his camp because I don't know much about anything apparently. And my question was, hey, just so I'm not out of bounds here, like the Masters is pretty much out of the question. And the response was, buddy, this is a year recovery and maybe it's less. I mean, I kind of went online afterwards. And from what I found, it's a six to nine month recovery. You could start walking in about three months or I'm sorry, a month later.

And so maybe it moves along faster. He certainly knows how to wade through rehab. He's done it enough. And they ran a graphic this morning on ESPN. That was the busiest graphic that I've ever seen in my entire life. And essentially they didn't have a choice. I'm not being just the injury timeline. Yes. It just went on forever. It looked like one of your stories from a major championship Sunday. It just kept going on and on. It looked like a Russian novel.

And you start to understand recreational golfer. He absolutely is not. But I picked up on the tone and you did as well of Rory this morning where he was kind of asked, do you think he'll keep grinding away? Do you think he'll return to competition? And Rory's response was, he'll keep trying. He didn't say yes. He didn't say absolutely. We'll see him next year at the Masters or whatever the case may be. It was he'll keep trying.

You mentioned Stephen A. and the recreational golfer. I'll go to the 6 p.m. Sports Center on Tuesday. And again, keep in mind, Sports Center is sort of a catch-all for all sports. It would have been unimaginable a couple years ago if Tiger Woods ruptured his Achilles and is most likely going to be out for all of 2025 that that would have not led to

sports center especially this time of year instead it made a mention at the nine or ten minute mark of the 6 p.m broadcast which i think is sort of an indication of how the general sports audience feels about this tiger woods news you mentioned it sucks i would mention it's just sort of sad

You know, this is a player who we already had sort of questions about his physical and mental fitness. He wasn't going to be sharp enough to play early in 2025. Then he was dealing with the emotional toll of losing his mother and so he didn't really have even the motivation to practice. And until that changed,

he wasn't going to be playing competitive golf. Now he has yet another injury to add to the laundry list that he's already experienced. When you think about the physical standpoint, Rex, like he already had a mangled right foot that has now been fused at the car accident in 2021. So that's sort of stable in its essence. But look, if you're putting more weight

on your right foot to make compensations. That is probably going to, with the kinetic chain, have some ramifications as well. Left is bad for a golfer. I talked to Aaron Oberholzer, who has dealt with his share of injuries over the course of his career. The left side of this week. Over the course of this week. Yes, he also is suffering from bad back. But like knee, hip,

ankle, foot, shoulder, all of those areas are absorbing the most energy during the weight transfer. And as it relates to Tiger Woods, who is going to be entering his age 50 season in 2026, transferring from your right foot, which has already been fused and already has a myriad of issues,

to transfer your weight into your left side, which is going to be rebuilt with the Achilles, which is a very tricky injury. As you mentioned, a very lengthy recovery period. It just, the prospects are not good. I'm not saying he's going to give it up, but it does increase the probability of life on the PGA Tour champions with the aid of a cart.

Well, and again, I'll go back to this morning's interview with Rory about this. And he was asked in a moment that's not apropos to Tiger Woods' situation about, you know, when would he know, Rory himself, know that maybe he was approaching the end? And he had such an interesting take. It was impossible to.

not to sort of project that onto Tiger because, and he probably has learned this through watching Tiger throughout the years, but Rory's take essentially was, I want to leave before it's too late. I want to leave before my time is up. Like you always want to get the next one. He's a competitor. I get it. And he also had the scorching hot take that, would you ever play the Champions Tour, PGA Tour Champions? And he came in fiery that absolutely not.

And if I play, if you catch me playing the Champions Tour, something has gone horribly wrong was the actual quote. Terribly wrong. Something would have gone terribly wrong in my life that over the next 15 years in which I'd have to be in a position to play the PGA Tour champions. And I think there was a little context when I wrote it this morning for NBCSports.com slash Goff. I have to do a little bit of context. He was asking sort of about the end of his career and how would you embrace that as a player? We're not saying that Rory's towards the end of his career at all.

But the context was he sort of just talked about there were other things that interest him. He

He's an investor in SSG. He's the co-founder of TGL. Clearly, he has interest off the golf course. And when the time comes, it's probably going to be easier for him to walk away. I don't know if I could put Tiger Woods in that category. I mean, if I told you right now that, okay, this is the end, he just can't compete anymore. We'll see him in the par three contest. Maybe the next time the Open Championship goes to St. Andrews, he'll take the walk across the Swilkin Bridge. But

Other than that, that's fine. You and I both would probably be a little dubious of that because we have seen it time and time again that he's going to start grinding. He started grinding today. He had the surgery yesterday. He started grinding today, getting ready for whatever it is he wants to play next. And I'm guessing it's either the PNC or next year's Masters or next year's Genesis Invitational. He just doesn't have that gear that Rory has.

And look, we talked about this in the live from pre-production meeting. We never actually made it to the show. So this will not be a recycled take. But Ayo's point was that this is an indication to him that Roy doesn't have a true love of the game like Tiger Woods did. And my counter to that was no. I think this speaks to the myriad other interests of

that Roy McRoy has in his life. Like no one's, no one's questioning Lydia Coe's love of the game when she came out a decade ago and said that she's hoping to wrap up her playing career by the age of 30. You know, her point, and I think Roy's point is that there's other things to, to, to this life than just playing golf. And that's perfectly okay. You know, maybe as Roy's 35 now, maybe as he gets into his late thirties,

or late 30s, early 40s. Maybe he'll have like a newfound appreciation for competition and sort of re-spark the love of the game. But if not, that's okay too. You know, the purses these days in the PGA Tour are so much greater that you don't need the lifeline of extending your playing career and having other earning opportunities. He's constantly busy. He has other interests in his life. And I think that's perfectly okay. Yeah.

How about Rex with the state of the PGA Tour? And Commissioner Jay Monahan met with the media on Tuesday. We've heard plenty from Jay Monahan. You've heard plenty from Jay Monahan over the past couple weeks. Saw him at Torrey Pines. Just come with reporters again a few weeks later at Bay Hill. And now the 52-minute address to the assembled media here at the Players' Championship. Anything stand out to you that you either weren't expecting or hadn't heard over the past month and a half?

No, that's a good way to tackle this because you're right. We have heard a lot from Jay over the last few weeks, if not months. And it seems to me that's the new way the tour is going, that instead of being June 6, 2023, all over again, where he's just going to drop something out of the air and everyone's just going to have to accept it with the framework agreement. It seems as if he wants everyone to

to be on board with what's going on. And the takeaway from that press conference, he had a very pre-prepared statement that was supposed to go 12 minutes. It ended up going 14 and a half minutes, which for Jay is actually pretty good, if we're being honest. I mean, he has a tendency to go a little long, so he was closer to being on script than what he normally is. And I will say,

That this was there was a clarity to this that I haven't seen in the last few weeks. He didn't seem to get flustered by any of the questions that came at him. He kept going back to the idea that I have made the statement and he is he didn't say this.

this week, but he certainly clung to the notion that he's not going to negotiate in public. My takeaway was there was a very clear message in that 12 slash 14 and a half minute opening statement. And it wasn't directed at me. It wasn't directed at you or the players or the fans. It was directed at the governor of the public investment fund of Saudi Arabia. There was one sentence that I pulled out and I put in my column that was very telling where he said that the president of the United States wants a reunification of the game.

The PGA Tour wants a reunification of the game. That's it. The statement stopped after that. And you don't have to dig too deep to realize that, oh, there is one person missing from that statement. And it was the Public Investment Fund. And I don't think go back to last week. Rory said that it takes two to tango when it comes to negotiations. I don't think we're stepping out of bounds when you point out the obvious that the tone coming from the tour, which is the only side we're getting in all of this.

has changed dramatically since the first White House meeting last month and the second White House meeting last month. That meeting clearly did not go well, and that included the governor of the public investment fund, Yasser Ahrar Mayan. And it's clear that they've reached an impasse. It's team golf. It seems like that's where they're stuck. The vision of what the future of professional golf is not the same for both sides. And I think the message is everyone needs to wrap their mind around the idea that there might not be a deal.

And Rex, there was something in Monahan's opening statement that I certainly underlined, and that was him saying that he could see a day in which not only Yasser was part of the PG Tour policy board, but that they could incorporate some aspects of live golf. He did not say what those aspects of live golf would be. I'm having a hard time wrapping my mind around what

those could be if it's team golf, if it's franchises, if it's sort of the global nature of live golf they're playing this week in Singapore. But you and I have a lot of golf-adjacent friends. If we're at a social event, hey, what's up with that deal? What's the holdup? What's taking so long? And I think Jay Monahan, if you're reading the tea leaves, outlined it very clearly for us. When

when he talked about what is the essence of the PGA Tour and the PGA Tour's platform and what the PGA Tour is all about. And he said the PGA Tour is 72 whole stroke play tournaments at iconic venues with meaning.

If you're reading the tea leaves, that sounds like a clear indication that the tour has some pretty serious reservations about team golf, about how it could be incorporated, how it could become profitable. And so, you know, that's why he didn't necessarily say it takes two to tango as Roy McIlroy did last year.

Last week at Bay Hill. But it's clear that the PGA Tour is in a position now where they're just trying to control what they can what they can control. And he talked repeatedly about the demonstrable growth and innovation that the PGA Tour is experiencing now that they will in the future, because I think they have to sort of come to grips with the reality like this deal may not come to fruition. And so let's make this PGA Tour product as good as we possibly can.

And he referenced the Fan Forward Initiative, which you and I both have talked about. We've both written about it. 50,000 fans sort of weighed in on what they want to see and what they don't want to see when it comes to the PGA Tour. And there's a lot of really interesting information in there. And I think there's going to be a lot of interesting programs that come out of that. But the one number that he did not pluck conveniently, I would say, out of that Fan Forward survey was that 70 percent,

of the people surveyed, of those 50,000, said they want reunification. You can't be specific about what that means because you don't really know. That's a super majority. And so there is still movement, and I'm not even...

I would never try to dismiss the idea that there's not going to be a deal because I think eventually one side or the other is going to not necessarily cave, but it's going to have to make concessions that maybe they're not willing to do right now. And then I've been told by multiple sources, you have knowledge of these negotiations that this is about team golf. And from the tourist perspective, they're not a hundred percent sure they can make team golf profitable. Like clearly what they have as their model is what they want to stay with. But even if,

team golf becomes something that is shoulder programming additive, much like TGL, they're still not a hundred percent sure it can be profitable because TGL, I mean, TGL live is not, has not proven that it can yet. I think you're exactly right on that point. Compromise. It's going to have to come down to one side compromising, most likely both sides compromising for the good of the game, for the good of the PGA tour, the good of live golf as well. Plenty more of that. NBC sports.com slash golf. Rex, I already know,

which featured group has your attention on Thursday is the super group of the top three players in the world ranking. Scotty Scheffler, Xander Shoffley, Roy McIlroy expectations for them, who among that three ball you think will be in the best position heading into the weekend.

I'm going to say Scotty just because he's back to back here and I don't want Pat Riley to sue me, but he's going for the three Pete. So I think there's certainly a lot to watch there. And we go back to what happened Sunday. And we talked about this in the podcast there. And that was the stats stat line that we're used to seeing from Scotty Scheffler, where I think he was first in the field strokes, gain T to green second, the field off the T and 40 something and strokes game putting. So that is very quintessential. Scotty spent a lot of time over the last couple of days working on his putting. He,

obviously knows how to play this golf course. It is a ball strikers golf course. This place was made for someone like him. So I'm going to put him ahead of Rory, but not by a whole heck of a lot.

Because I think you can point to Rory in his last two starts after winning at Pebble Beach. And there's been things, Torrey Pines probably doesn't seem to be his cup of tea. And then last week we talked about the idea that he decided to experiment with his woods when he probably shouldn't be experimenting with his woods. And he has also had success here. I guess the one I'm most curious about would be Zanduil.

Coming off the injury, coming off of last week where he didn't do anything to blow either one of us away other than stay upright for 72 holes. He made the cut, didn't seem to have any setbacks, came into this week with a little bit of momentum. Does he pick up where he left off or is there still some rust?

Yeah, I think you make a lot of good points there with, in regards to Scotty, we showed a video at like the end of live from where he was working on the practice putting green with Phil Kenyon. And as the time progressed, Scotty got more and more frustrated. And I don't know if there were bad strokes. I don't know if there were bad reads, but the,

but the putts were not going in and he started like hitting his shoe with his putter. You know, he's, he's sort of gesticulating with his hands. Like it was clearly a sense of frustration. If you go back to Bay Hill, you know, he was nearly last in the field and putting in the second round.

And in the final round and afterward, I think you're probably in the scrum. He he sort of brushed it off and he putted well. Bay Hills Greens are really challenging. They're sort of dead on the weekend. You know, he's not going to put a whole lot of stock into it. It's clearly a different frame of mind for Scottie in regards to his putting than it was a year ago.

where he won at Bay Hill, but there was sort of, was that just an anomaly on the greens? Had he sort of had some sort of revelation? I don't think it's the crisis of confidence that he was experiencing a year ago. We have at least seen Scottie putt well with this claw method that he adopted. He blew out the field at the Hero World Challenge. Once again, the early returns, at least in his comeback, have been pretty promising. So I think that's going to be something to watch. I think we know what to expect.

with Scottie in terms of a ball striking and his execution and his precision. You look at what he did last year, tops in the field and fairways hit a third in the field of greens and regulation, all while dealing with a nagging neck issue that nearly forced him to the WD. And so it's going to come down to can he get right

on the greens. And so that's sort of a main sticky point for me. I'll be very curious to see how Rory plays. He, in the eight previous appearances that he has played alongside Scotty Scheffler, he's been more than a shot worse on average in those rounds. He has talked repeatedly Rex about his,

Roy's attempt to be more like Scotty and not necessarily in terms of his ball striking excellence, but more in terms of like the game management aspects, the discipline, the patience, you know, it goes against the very essence of Roy McIlroy's golf, which is brand of golf, which is exciting. It's powerful. It's dynamic. It might be a little bit boring, but,

But Rory's point was boring at this stage of my career is going to lead more to more tournament victories. And that's what I need to be focused on.

And that's probably not a bad thing at the danger of recycling a take. However, I did want to ask and I need you to pull back the curtain here a little bit, because if I was listening correctly, there was a moment during today's live from when Mark Rolfing was referring to Jordan Spieth, who we are not talking about now. But I am curious about this. And he made the comment. I think it was something along the lines of he decided not to play last week and you swooped in.

like an eagle and pointed out and it was something along the lines was no he wasn't invited to play last week i think is what you said i said he didn't decide not to play he was bypassed to play jordan speed was not given a sponsor exemption as he had received in the previous uh signature events in 2025 the tournament committee at bay hill went a different direction

They did go a different direction, and it's still a bit of a hot topic. And it's interesting walking down the range the last couple of days. Guys are still talking about it. And I will go back to, I think, what I said when it actually happened. We probably did it on Sunday night following the Cognizant Classic. The idea being that, yes, I understand why Jordan might be a little upset at this. And if you're a tournament director, after Tiger Woods, I think Jordan Spieth is probably the biggest draw in the game right now.

However, he had already gotten two exemptions in the signature events this season. Pebble Beach and the Genesis Invitational. We have talked in the past about guys on the board, and he just rotated off the board two weeks ago, probably should not be getting all of these sponsor exemptions. It sends a very bad message. Why don't you cap him out at two or three or four or whatever the case may be? And Ricky Fowler has been much more loyal and supportive of Bay Hill. That one actually upsets me more than Jordan Spieth.

yeah i don't i don't disagree with that how do you feel about some of the contenders rex this week at the time didn't want to stay on that subject i take it all right really didn't so you can't you can't talk about scotty you can't talk about rory you can't talk about xander who do you want to talk about uh louis oberg he lives here now he's gotten some experience pride of knockety

Pride of Nocatee. Look at you. Does he have a golf cart? Does he tool around in a golf cart that is Texas Tech colors? Did I get that right? Texas Tech, right? Yes, it is Texas Tech. I don't know. He and I both live in Nocatee. We live at different parts of Nocatee. Sure, it's all the same. No, no, no. I'm sure it's all the same. I cannot access his part of Nocatee. Let's just put it that way. But I do think it's interesting to know, and I shouted out Ludwig's Pride of Nocatee status on live. But it is interesting, Rex, because when he moved here last fall,

He's played the golf course now, you know, a couple dozen times. And that's not insignificant for a player who, keep in mind, is making his second tour around the majority of these golf courses. And so, yes, it's not going to be a tournament shape. The greens aren't going to be as fast. The fairways aren't going to be as bouncy. The rough's not going to be as thick. I get that. But being able to see what is one of the most challenging tests of the year is

in varying conditions, varying winds, varying temperatures, I think could only be beneficial for a player who has not had a whole lot of course knowledge on the PGA Tour, and yet he still fared remarkably well.

Absolutely. And this is the second go around on the PGA Tour. So he knows him a little bit better. But you're right. I don't think you can discount the idea that now he has a little bit more institutional knowledge and he's playing well. We've talked about the idea that I think the knee injury probably slowed him down a little bit more last year. Certainly what we have seen this year with the victory on the West Coast. That's what we're used to seeing. And I would be shocked if he doesn't have a good week. And then, of course, more collar.

Carla coming off of what happened on Sunday, coming off of what has been a really good start to the season. And when he did talk to the media, he didn't talk to the media on Sunday. I'm sure he doesn't owe you anything. He doesn't owe any of us anything. And I don't, I want to get into that as well. I want to pull the curtain back on that one as well. Cause I do have some thoughts.

However, when he did talk to us, I like the way he processed this. I think his line was, nope, I'm back on two feet, which meant that that's behind me. Once I got out of Orlando, which I tend to agree with him, I want to get out of Orlando a lot of times too, that that was in my rearview mirror. And he shows up here regardless of what happened on Sunday. And he did not have his best stuff. I still think he should probably be in those top five of favorites this week. I agree with you. He does not have a great record.

at TPC Sawgrass has never finished inside the top 10 talking to a couple of players. The theory there is that you really, ideally most beneficially have to work the ball both ways.

to get around here. Some of the tee shots are just unavoidable. And Kyle Morikawa, though he probably can play a draw, he certainly prefers not to. Sort of has the patented fade shot. So I'll be curious to see. He's clearly in great form, better form than he's arrived here at the Players' Championship in a number of years since he's sort of gotten himself out of the swing funk. Be curious to see if that can translate to a good week at TBC Sawgrass. You mentioned Rex. Actually, I asked you last Sunday. You covered the tournament. I said, how would you describe...

Colin Morikawa afterward. I said grumpy. Grumpy. He did not talk to the media. And apparently that became a huge story on Tuesday. I think probably because of a couple words that he used in a question that was posed by golfics Adam Shupak. But he said, quote, I don't owe it to you or anyone else. Do you agree with that sentiment? And was Colin Morikawa right to blow off you and the other scrum of reporters and address it a couple of days later?

Yes and no. Two-parter question. So yes and no. No, he doesn't owe us anything. And look, if you want to take a deeper dive, I encourage everyone to go onto YouTube and look at last night's live from that went on for 25 minutes.

Exacting minutes. And it included Brando Chambly and Rich Lerner and the great Jaime Diaz and Paul McGinley. And they seem to disagree with, I think, what you and I are probably going to say here. They feel they argue that, yes, players like Morikawa do owe something to the game, not necessarily the media.

but to the game, to the fans, to try to let the fans in to what you're actually thinking after this heartbreaking loss. And I don't disagree with that. And I don't want to see this become the norm. Like we immediately went back to last year's U.S. Open when Rory blew off the press and skidded out of town. And I think you and I spent a lot of time talking about it and breaking it down. I understand how difficult that is. And certainly there's going to be times when I'm not going to get upset about

about a star who just triple bogeyed the last hole. However, the one good thing that I really liked about last night's segment is they ran sound from what I would consider one of the best press conferences I've ever been a part of. And that was Phil Mickelson at Wingfoot after blowing that U.S. Open. And the honesty and the pain that just came pouring out of him like a severed vein, it is something that I'm never going to forget because he wasn't holding anything back.

And there is one thing that came out of last night that I remember from that wing foot that that Phil actually did do a lot in his career when he was on the PGA Tour. There was always a cool down period after a good round or a bad round. He would sit and scoring for 15, 20 minutes maybe. And look, we would get aggravated about it. But if that actually might be the best method that puts him more in line with other sports where there's a cooling off period.

Exactly. If Morikawa would have sat in scoring for 15 or 20 minutes, I think maybe he would have come out and had a different headspace and would have talked to us. And I wouldn't even anticipate he says anything revelatory in that instance. I'm not even quite sure Rory would have said anything revelatory after losing the U.S. Open. But no, they don't owe anything to us as the media. Absolutely not. But I also don't want this to become the norm.

Yeah, I don't want it to become the norm. I think Paul McGinley made a couple of good points Tuesday night on live from about how there's sort of this –

there might be a culture problem on the PGA tour where there's maybe a little bit of greed. There's maybe a little bit of entitlement. There's maybe a little bit of a disrespect from the players, maybe talking down to the media and thinking I can just do it myself on Instagram. If I put out a statement with a picture, that's going to suffice for me sort of being more fan friendly and being more open face. And Paul McGinley's point,

because that might be translating with there being a disconnect between fans and players and that there's not really a player of this generation who is universally beloved, probably outside Jordan Spieth's, among the players because there's not a level of accountability or personal responsibility that's undertaken. Yes, we don't want to see this be the norm. We don't want this to become a habit, which it probably has over the past couple years on the PGA Tour. I think my point, Rex, was that I didn't necessarily have

a problem with him blowing off the media on Sunday because all you were going to get in that scrum was just emotion. And that's fine, and it's great for a sound bit, but it doesn't explain anything. And if you listen to Kyle Morikawa's 30-minute press conference Tuesday at TPC Sawgrass, we learned more about him and sort of his career arc and how he processes things than we ever could have.

You only get that sort of introspection when you have 24 to 48 hours to process it. It's not humanly possible to be that analytical about one of your failures mere minutes after signing your scorecard and after it just happens on the 18th hole. And so, yeah, ideally, ideally you'd get both, right?

You'd get the emotion, you'd get the sort of rawness of what just transpired on the golf course immediately after. And you can process that as we're as we're media storytellers. And then a couple of days later, once you do have that introspection, then you can sort of button it up and sort of be able to tell a calm or a cow's story more fully. That's fantastic.

half of what we got with Rory McIlroy at the U S open where the pictures told the story, him standing with his hand on his hip in the scoring trailer, watching Bryce DeChambeau make the four footer to deny him a U S open title. That told you plenty fast forward. A couple of weeks later, the Genesis Scottish open where he actually had time to process it. And I thought he was great. And he explained himself in immense detail detail. Again, ideally you get both, but if I had to pick one,

I would take the latter part where you actually do have detail. And now we understand Kamorikawa better than we would have on Sunday night. And I think both of us agreed because you, I think you addressed it a little bit on Tuesday in the early live from, and then of course they, they turned it into a much larger, broader debate during the late live from, but I think both of us agreed. And there was a bit of caution in our voice that this is not the norm for

for a column or a car. He normally just doesn't blow through. Actually, he stops more times than not. And he usually gives you really good answers. Last week being a primary example, I think I sat through two of his scrums last week and both of them were really good. And he's normally very, very insightful. So I don't want to send the impression that yes, this is the regular, this is what happens week in and week out on the PGA tour.

Okay, so it's Colin Morikawa, your pick to win. Are you going elsewhere? It's time for the pick segment on the eve of the Players' Championship. Wasn't really prepared for that. No.

A little busy today. I'm going to go with Scotty. And I know the putting's not great. And I was looking at the coverage as you guys were yapping on about his aggravation about AO screaming about, did he hit a bad putt? Did he have a bad line? I don't know. He's on the practice putting green. I don't know. It does not matter. He does not tee off for 24 more hours.

And he has played this golf course in really difficult conditions and proven that he knows how to do it. I truly believe that he figures it out, that everything falls into place. Last week being the example that the ball striking is back to where he wants it to. Clearly, there was...

there was part of his game that got set back because of the injury during the offseason, and he wasn't on schedule. I think that's certainly understandable. We're probably seeing the same thing right now from Xander Shofflett and Jordan Spieth, who both dealt with injuries during the offseason. But last week, I think, was really good evidence that Hill played so hard and exacting, and the way he hit the ball is what we've come to expect, and we've seen him turn the putting around really quickly.

Since the move back to March in 2019, we've only seen big dogs win this golf tournament. Roy McIlroy, Justin Thomas, Cameron Smith in the midst of his breakout year in 2022, and now Scottie Scheffler in back-to-back years. I'm going, Rex, with another dog in Sepp Straka. Six top 15 finishes in his last eight starts, including the victory at the American Express, and two things that he does particularly well that are of paramount importance here at TPC Sawgrass. One,

Driving accuracy. It's 11th on the PGA Tour in finding the fairway. Second on the PGA Tour in greens and regulation. If you look year in and year out with only a couple of exceptions,

players like Cam Smith and Ricky Fowler who sort of had to scramble their way to victory. You have to ball strike the heck out of it. Sep Strauch playing the best golf of his life right now. I think he could do it. All right. That is going to do it for this edition. Golf show podcast with Rex and lab, just as a reminder, we'll be doing mini pods each and every tournament round, at least through Sunday.

15, 20 minutes of a quick reaction of what just transpired at the Players' Championship. In the meantime, you guys are the drill. NBCSports.com slash golf for all the latest news, notes, and updates. We'll talk to you guys on Thursday night live from TPC Sawgrass. We're back on live from tomorrow, too.

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