This is the 48th year of the “Fifth Major” and the 40th edition at TPC Sawgrass in Ponte Vedra, FL. headquarters of the PGA Tour. One of the big storylines is the weather. Thursday it’s 72 with an 89% chance of T-storms and winds SW 11. Friday, 70, 87% chance of T storms, wind ESE 8. Saturday, AM Wind/Rain, 93% chance, wind WNW 23. Sunday, Mostly Sunny, Wind NE !3. It’s tough, but there’s a $20 million purse, up from $15M a year ago, and $3.6 to the winner, up from $2.7 M last year, so as the band Yes said in 1983, “You’ve got to work to succeed.”

Forty six of the top 50 players in the world are competing. The only ones missing are DeChambeau, with a wrist injury along with being a total head case, Figjam Mickelson, lightning rod on tour and in the sports world right now, so not playing, Harris English and Kevin Neh.

The defending champion is Justin “JT” Thomas. Interestingly, JT played a practice round with Coach Saban at TPC Sawgrass in late February on media day for the Players. JT asked S about defending a championship. S, who knows a lot about that, said “Don’t defend, go out and have fun.” Justin gets a lot of wisdom from Coach Saban as they’ve played together several times. Justin is a rabid Crimson Tide fan and particularly Alabama football and was asked by Todd Lewis of the Golf Channel if he watches Alabama games with a group of friends. He said no that he’s by himself in a hotel room because he’s such an obnoxious fan. He’s being hard on himself. Nothing wrong with a little passion. Justin said he’s not defending the Players because no-one is going to take the trophy from him. He’s just trying to win again. Sounds like an excellent attitude.

He has multiple victories at 4 places, the former CIMB Classic in Malaysia, the Sentry Tournament of Champions in Hawai’i, the CJ Cup and the WGC-FedEx St. Jude. He has won 14 times on the PGA Tour including the 2017 PGA Championship at Quail Hollow Club in Charlotte, and last year’s Players. He’s a hard worker. As a great football coach said one time, “if you work hard, good things are gonna happen.”

So an interesting possibility in JT.

Last week’s winner at the tremendously challenging Arnold Palmer Invitational at Bay Hill was the young 25 year old superstar Scottie Scheffler. He won at 5 under par in a torturous test of golf. Scheffler also won at the Waste Management Phoenix Open 3 weeks before. He’s a hot player.

Odds of winning.

JT 14/1, Collin Morikawa, 14/1, Rahm, 14/1, Rory, 18/1, Voktor Hovland, 20/1, Scheffler, 25/1, Patrick Cantlay, 25/1, Xander Schauffele, 28/1, Hideki Matsuyama, 30/1, Dustin Johnson, 30/1, Daniel Berger, 30/1, Cameron Smith, 33/1, Brooks Koepka, 35/1, Shane Lowry, 35/1, Matt Fitzpatrick, 35/1, Jordan Spieth, 40/1, Sungjae Im, 40/1, Sam Burns, 40/1, Will Zalatoris, 40/1, Billy Horschel, 40/1, Joaquin Niemann, 45/1, Tyrrell Hatton, 45/1, Louis Oosthuizen, 50/1, Corey Conners, 50/1, Adam Scott, 50/1, Talor Gooch, 50/1, Tony Finau, 55/1, Paul Casey, 60/1, Webb Simpson, 66/1, Max Homa, 66/1.

TV

Thursday-Friday, 11 AM-5 PM CT, Golf Channel. Saturday-Sunday, 12-5 PMN CT, NBC.

Interestingly, the top 5 players in the Official Golf World Rankings are all under 30. In order, Jon Rahm is 27, Collin Morikawa is 25, Viktor Hovland is 24, Patrick Cantlay is 29, and Scottie Scheffler is 25. The young guys come out on the tour ready to compete and win. There’s still room for veterans as well, it’s pretty unpredictable who’ll win week to week.

But White’s World will keep grinding it out. Last week, my pick Gary Woodland took the lead on 16 with an eagle to move to -6, one up on the field. But then he found the trap on the difficult par 3 17th and took 2 shots to get out of the sand and doubled it. He bogeyed 18 to finish tied for 5th at -. Walter had a good pick with Tyrrell Hatton, who finished tied for 2nd at -4.

Winner this week at Players

The weather will make this a survival of the fittest tournament and nothing’s wrong with that. Jon Rahm said he likes it like Bay Hill was instead of what he called a putting contest at the American Express in California where the winner, Hudson Swafford, shot -23. Cameron Smith shot -34 to win at the Sentry Tournament of Champions, so hard is good. The rough is 3 1/2 inches deep, which is challenging, but, more importantly and difficult for the players, it’s extremely dense, so staying in the fairway is at a premium. The Bermuda greens will be stimping at 13, but the PGA may slow them down if wind conditions persist as expected. It’s going to be quite a weekend in Ponte Vedra Beach. 16, the par 5, the famous Island Hole, the par 3 17th, and one of the toughest and most underrated holes in golf, the par 4 18th, with water running down the entire left side and rough, mounds and trees on the right, will determine the winner on Sunday. Sunday’s conditions will be a lot better, so should make for major drama.

I’ll take the 25 year old graduate of Cal Berkeley and native of Los Angeles. Already a 2 time major winner at the 2020 PGA at Harding Park in San Francisco and the 2021 Open Championship at Royal St. George’s in Sandwich England, I like this young stud to break through and win a Players. There has never been a repeat winner in the 48 year history of the tournament. That’s a fascinating stat. The only multiple winners of the Players at TPC Sawgrass are Hal Sutton, 1983 and 2000, Steve Elkington, 1991 and 1997, Davis Love, 1992 and 2003, Fred Couples 1984 and ‘96, and Eldrick, 2001 and 2013. The gap in years that each of the 5 players who have won the tournament is, on average, 11.6 years apart.

I’ll take this young Gun.

Collin Morikawa

Sleeper

Adam Scott