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Midwest first round
1. Collin Morikawa vs. 16 Louis Oosthuizen
8. Daniel Berger vs. 9. Taylor Pendrith
4. Shane Lowry vs. 13. Stephan Jaeger
5. Corey Conners vs. 12. Viktor Hovland
3. Justin Thomas vs. 14. Harry Hall
6. Aaron Rai vs. 11. Brooks Koepka
2. Russell Henley vs. 15. Kurt Kitayama
7. Sam Burns vs. 10. Min Woo Lee
On Monday, and the following Monday, I’ll update this file, and I’ll provide updates in future Weekend 9’s. There’ll be upsets; we’ve seen some already. The winner gets a golf clap.
Let’s see if we can find eight more items for the Weekend 9.
2. Whom do I have in my basketball brackets? Houston in the men’s, and USC in the women’s.
One takeaway / one feel-good story from the week
3. Keeping with the theme, the week gave us a Cinderella story, too.
Playing the PGA Tour’s Valspar Championship, via its Monday qualifier, was Andre Chi, who 9 to 5 works as the assistant pro at Deepdale Golf Club up in Manhasset, N.Y. Earlier in the week, the tireless Ryan French of the Monday Q Info website shared his story, and, after his first round on Thursday, Chi shared more.
Inside Rory McIlroy’s $995 Uber ride — and how ‘Aquaman’ saved the day
His dad, through magazine clippings, introduced him to the game before YouTube took him the rest of the way. Tiger was a model. Adam Scott, too. Chi’s road then took him to an NCAA Division III national title, before he took a club pro job. But the 24-year-old is a stick. And he’s a dreamer. He continued to compete. And this winter, he took what he called a gamble — on himself. He’d go down to Florida. And he’d just play. Cash would be extremely tight — “there’s money going out, no money coming in,” he said Thursday. Who knows what would happen, but you live only once.
Chi fell short at Q School and at two other Monday qualifiers. But then came the breakthrough. He was in the Valspar. Chi played a practice round with Scott even. “So, yeah, it was a great time, he’s super generous, super nice,” Chi said. “He was trying to give me a lot of advice on this golf course and how to tackle this golf course and it was awesome,” Chi said. “It was awesome.”
Thursday was tough. He shot an 81. Didn’t matter. One start may mean more.
“I’m not sure if it’s set in yet,” Chi said. “I’m just trying to put one foot in front of the other right now and trying to soak everything in. I think once this week’s over, I think it will kind of hit that I did play in a PGA Tour event, but right now, I’m just trying to figure out my putting.”
Another feel-good story from the week
4. Thursday, Angela Stanford was named Solheim Cup captain. The day before the announcement, she was with friend and fellow pro Kim Kaufman, who is undergoing chemo treatment for cancer.
Announcer Grant Boone described things well here.
X.com
An instruction tip for your weekend
5. This was good from Keith Mitchell, on what he would remember from last year’s Valspar Championship, where he led by two going into the final round, only to shoot a 77 and tie for 17th:
“I still think about it. It’s still definitely in the back of my mind and I want it to stay there for hopefully for the rest of my career to just motivate me to remember what it feels like when you let those kind of nerves get in your way. A round like today feels like the opposite of that. So, processing it, I guess, is something that I want to keep to always have it in the memory banks, like this is what not to do. You look at a lot of guys in their career, everybody has a few of those, and that was mine.”
Another instruction tip for your weekend
6. This was good from Xander Schauffele, who’s been struggling some on his way back from a rib injury:
“I’ve kind of had stuff all over the place. I feel like I’m cramming for a test, and when I’m out there, I feel like I’m still trying to study almost, not really just taking the test. Today, whether it was a few swing videos that were taken, sent to Chris [coach Chris Como], I just didn’t look at ’em. I need to start looking — what my dad taught me a long time ago is look at the ball and react to the ball and not to how your swing looks. I think I’ve gotten a little too nitpicky on swinging the club correctly and trying to get back in a good pattern when I was playing really good golf. Sometimes when you just focus on the task at hand versus the result, you can get yourself there.”
A golf story that may only interest me
7. Nelly Korda, via a series of photos on her Instagram story, shared that she recently swung a persimmon driver; the club was a MacGregor. The photos — and the results — are below.
Another golf story that may interest only me
8. Here’s J.J. Watt, who’s in an interesting position:
What you’re emailing me
9. I received this email after last week’s Weekend 9. The first two sentences won me over.
Hey, Nick,
Really enjoyed the Weekend 9. Look forward to reading more.
Quick question: I would love to see an article on what needs to change with TGL. You folks probably have something in the works; waiting for the season to end?
My suggestions:
1. Like the lifts under the green, they need to put some under the hitting area for the second or third shot. I would love to see some downhill or sidehill lies. Several times the players get a perfect lie after the drive clearly is not on a flat surface.
2. They need a fourth playing box, with the grass much higher. Plus, they can’t drop their ball in it — the opposing team gets to one-bounce it in there.
3. If the technology is available, how about adding some wind?
I really like these ideas, especially the wind. Some rain would be fun, too.
More of what you’re emailing me
10. Let’s do 10 items! Here’s another email I received after last week’s Weekend 9.
Always a good read, but here’s No. 11 for ya:
Secret to John Feinstein’s golf- and sportswriting success wasn’t complicated
Passing of John Feinstein, author of many books on sports, including several on golf. Of those, “A Good Walk Spoiled” is one of the best.
(And apologies if you mentioned it in an earlier article — if you did, I missed it!)
The reader was very right: I should have included that. But now I am, along with sharing an article on Feinstein, written by GOLF’s Michael Bamberger. You can read it here.
What live golf is on TV this weekend?
11. Let’s do 11 items! Here’s a rundown of live golf on TV this weekend:
— Saturday
10:30 p.m (Friday)-3 a.m. ET: Porsche Singapore Classic second round, Golf Channel
1 p.m.-3 p.m. ET: Valspar Championship third round, Golf Channel
3 p.m.-6 p.m. ET: Valspar Championship third round, NBC
5 p.m.-8 p.m. ET: Hoag Classic second round, Golf Channel
— Sunday
10 p.m (Friday)-3 a.m. ET: Porsche Singapore Classic third round, Golf Channel
1 p.m.-3 p.m. ET: Valspar Championship fourth round, Golf Channel
3 p.m.-6 p.m. ET: Valspar Championship fourth round, NBC
4 p.m.-7 p.m. ET: Hoag Classic third round, Golf Channel
A non-golf thought
12. Gonna end things by asking for a favor from you.
Five years ago yesterday, my mom died. It was sudden; my sister called at 8:30 in the morning, and there were times when I’d wondered if my sister even had my number. I picked up, though, and a few hours later, I was on a flight back home.
It was around then when I scrolled through my texts.
I wanted to see a few of the last ones between me and my mom, and I got sick. Disgusted. The exchanges were one-sided. Mom would reach out, and I’d respond every third or so time, usually with just a few words. It wasn’t intentional, but just other things had a higher priority, or at least they did in my stupid head. And my mom would understand. She always would.
But good lord, would I love to get a message now. Or a call. And the chance to respond with … whatever. My mom would listen. She always would. So I kept the texts. I’m looking at them as I type this. It’s a reminder. Of what she sounded like.
