Major championships hit different (as the kids say) when Tiger Woods is in the field. We experienced that ten fold this week as Tiger prepped for his 23rd PGA Championship appearance at a place that he won in 2000, Valhalla Golf Club. Tiger's PGA Championship win in 2000 was amongst the most dominant stretch the game has seen and nobody has been able to come close to such winning since.
Perhaps closest we have seen to that type of dominance comes from two players also in the field this week in Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy. Scottie has won four of his last five starts including The Masters and Rory is coming off of wins in his last two starts. Then, there's Collin Morikawa who won this event just four years ago and is rounding back into his major championship form at the right time.
After spending three days on the grounds with Tiger, Rory, Scottie, Collin and Team TaylorMade...this is what we saw!
MIND BLOWING SCOTTIE SCHEFFLER STATS
Scottie Scheffler is defying statistics this season, and quite frankly has the last three seasons. Scottie is first in the following categories on the PGA TOUR this season entering the PGA Championship:
- Scoring Average: 1st
- Birdie Average: 1st
- Bogey Avoidance: 1st
- SG Off the Tee: 1st
- SG Approach: 1st
- SG Tee to Green: 1st
- SG Total: 1st
- Bounce Back Percentage: 1st
- Greens in Regulation: 1st
- Proximity to hole: 1st
- Putts per G.I.R.: 1st
- Par 3 Scoring: 1st
- Par 4 Scoring: 1st
- Par 5 Scoring: 1st
At majors the last three seasons, Scottie is first in: scoring average, SG Total, SG Approach, SG Ball Striking, SG Tee to Green, score to par, rounds led/co-led, rounds in the 60s and Greens in Regulation.
Scottie's WITB at the PGA Championship is the same it has been in all four wins this season:
- Qi10 8.0° driver (Ventus Black 7 X)
- Qi10 15.0° 3-wood (Ventus Black 8 X)
- P·7TW 5-PW (Dynamic Gold Tour Issue X100)
- Spider Tour X (L-Neck)
COLLIN MORIKAWA IS READY FOR A RUN
Collin Morikawa has been trending over the last month, especially at the beginning of April with his back-to-back Top 10 finishes at The Masters and the RBC Heritage. At the start stretch at Augusta, Collin made two big equipment changes by returning to Qi10 LS 9.0° driver and a new MySymbol TP5x golf ball. The following week at the RBC Heritage, Collin added a P·Series prototype 4-iron to the bag.
The winner of the 2020 PGA Championship's only other change to the bag since has come in the form of switching his long irons back to Dynamic Gold X100 shafts from X100 mid, as well as a fresh MG4 TW 60° wedge. His full WITB is:
- Qi10 LS 9.0° driver
- SIM 14.0° 3-wood
- Qi10 18.0° 5-wood
- P·Series Proto 4-iron
- P·7MC 5-6
- P·730 7-PW
- Milled Grind 4 50° SB
- Milled Grind 4 56° LB
- Milled Grind 4 60° TW
- TP Soto
- MySymbol TP5x
RORY'S RACE AROUND VALHALLA
The last time Rory won the PGA Championship at Valhalla he was coming off of two consecutive wins and putting lights out. This year, it is the same story as Rory has won at the Zurich Classic and in dominant fashion last week at the Wells Fargo.
Rory's putting has massively improved since THE PLAYERS where he was 129th in Strokes Gained: Putting and since then is 25th.
His WITB remains the same as it was when he won in New Orleans and Charlotte:
- Qi10 9.0° driver (Ventus Black 6X)
- Qi10 15.0° 3-wood (Ventus Black 8X)
- Qi10 18.0° 5-wood (Ventus Black 9X)
- P·Series Proto 4-iron (Project X 7.0)
- Rors Proto Irons 5-9 (Project X 7.0)
- Milled Grind 4 46° SB, 50° SB, 54° SB (Project X 6.5)
- Spider Tour X Putter
- 2024 TP5x MySymbol
TIGER IS STILL TIGER
No matter how much time has passed, how much adversity he has faced or even how much the game of golf has changed...Tiger Woods is still Tiger Woods.
Tiger drew an insane crowd for Monday's practice round on the back nine at Valhalla. He went through just about every scenario during his round: different driver shot shapes, chippy 5-wood's out of the rough and just about every short game shot possible.
Tuesday was a rain shortened practice round as Tiger completed five holes before the weather delay and on Friday he completed the final four holes before an grind session on the range and short game area.
As for Tiger's WITB, it remains the same as it was the last time we saw him at the Genesis Invitational:
- Qi10 LS 10.5° driver (Graphite Design Tour AD VF 6 X)
- Qi10 Tour 15.0° 3-wood (Graphite Design Tour AD VF 7 X)
- M3 19.0° 5-wood (Diamana D+ Limited 80 TX)
- P·770 3-iron (Dynamic Gold Tour Issue X100)
- P·7TW 4-PW (Dynamic Gold Tour Issue X100)
- Milled Grind 3 56° TW (Dynamic Gold Tour Issue S400)
- Milled Grind 4 60° TW (Dynamic Gold Tour Issue S400)