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  • McIlroy says Norman rift began with his ‘brainwash’ comment

    McIlroy says Norman rift began with his ‘brainwash’ comment

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    Rory McIlroy thought his differences with Greg Norman over a Saudi-funded rival golf league had been patched up. That changed when Norman accused him of being “brainwashed” by golf’s ruling brass.

    “I thought, You know what? I’m going to make it my business now to be as much of a pain in his arse as possible,’” McIlroy said in a lengthy interview in the Sunday Independent in Ireland.

    The interview with writer Paul Kimmage is the second of three parts. McIlroy also details how his relationship soured with longtime friend Sergio Garcia.

    McIlroy and Tiger Woods have said Norman, the CEO and commissioner of LIV Golf, needs to be out of the picture for golf to have any chance of coming together. Norman said that won’t be happening.

    “I pay zero attention to McIlroy and Woods, right?” Norman said in an interview with British magazine Today’s Golfer. “They have their agenda for whatever reason. They’re saying whatever they want to say. It has no bearing or effect on me. I’m going to be with LIV for a long, long period of time.”

    McIlroy has been taking shots at Norman since he won the Canadian Open in June, a day after LIV Golf finished its inaugural event outside London. He went out of his way to point out his 21st career PGA Tour win was “one more than someone else.”

    “That gave me a little extra incentive today,” McIlroy said.

    The reference was to Norman, who has 20 career PGA Tour wins and now leads LIV Golf.

    When he had a chance to return to No. 1 in the world ranking at the CJ Cup in October, McIlroy was asked if he had a goal of how many weeks he would like to be No. 1 by the end of his career. He mentioned 332, which is one more than Norman.

    Most recently in Dubai last month, McIlroy said the fractured state of golf between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf could not heal as long as Norman is involved.

    “I think Greg needs to go. I think he just needs to exit stage left,” McIlroy said, adding that no one would be willing to talk “unless there’s an adult in the room.”

    Woods echoed those comments at the Hero World Challenge this week in the Bahamas.

    “I am not going anywhere. I don’t care what anybody says. I’m not going anywhere,” Norman told Today’s Golfer. “I am so proud of the position I am in and maybe, maybe, it’s my leadership that has them scared. Maybe.”

    McIlroy said the rift began in February 2020 when talk first surfaced about a “Premier Golf League” backed by Saudi money. McIlroy was the first top player to say he wasn’t interested, adding he wanted to be on the right side of history.

    He referenced a moment when Arnold Palmer stood up for the PGA Tour against Norman’s proposed World Golf Tour in 1994. Palmer’s words put a quick end to it.

    “He (Norman) wasn’t happy, and we had a pretty testy back-and-forth and he was very condescending. ‘Maybe one day you’ll understand’ and all this (stuff),” McIlroy said in the Independent interview.

    Then, in April this year, McIlroy watched an ESPN documentary on Norman’s collapse to lose the 1996 Masters and was moved enough to send Norman a message that included, “Hopefully it reminds everyone of what a great golfer you were.”

    McIlroy said Norman had sent him a touching note after McIlroy lost a four-shot lead in the final round of the 2011 Masters.

    “He was great,” McIlroy said. “So I said to him, ‘Watching it reminded me of how you reached out to me in 2011, and I just want to say that I’ll always appreciate it. It meant a lot. I know our opinion on the game of golf right now is very different, but I just wanted you to know that and wish you all the best.’

    “So, a bit of an olive branch, and he came back to be straightaway: ‘I really think golf can be a force for good around the world. … I know our opinions are not aligned but I’m just trying to create more opportunities for every golfer around the world.’

    “Fine. Really nice,” McIlroy said. “Then, a couple of weeks later, he does an interview with The Washington Post and says I’ve been ‘brainwashed by the PGA Tour.’

    “We’ve had this really nice back-and-forth and he says that about me.”

    McIlroy added in the interview that the PGA Tour is lucky Norman is involved in LIV because “I think if they had found someone less polarizing, LIV could have made more inroads.”

    McIlroy said his two golf idols were Woods and Garcia, describing the Spaniard as an exciting young player. They were at each other’s weddings; McIlroy was even a groomsman for Garcia.

    McIlroy said he didn’t know Garcia was joining LIV Golf until the Spaniard said to him on the range at the Wells Fargo Championship that he had a new plane and offered McIlroy a ride to the first LIV event near London.

    The relationship soured at the U.S. Open, the week after McIlroy won in Canada. McIlroy had said in his interview that week that players joining LIV Golf were taking the easy way out.

    He said he awoke Friday of the U.S. Open to a text from Garcia “basically telling me to shut up about LIV, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.”

    “I was pretty offended and sent him back a couple of daggers and that was it,” McIlroy said.

    ———

    AP golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf and https://twitter.com/AP—Sports

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  • Column: Major champions and the significant shots they hit

    Column: Major champions and the significant shots they hit

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    NASSAU, Bahamas — All it takes is one shot to settle the nerves, to create momentum or restore confidence, or in the case of Justin Thomas, to stop the bleeding.

    Thomas has won the PGA Championship twice, and both times he looked back to a moment before the final round that was crucial to winning.

    It’s like that for other major champions, too.

    In a series of interviews, they shared the signature shot of the major they won, along with a shot that was pleasing because of the subtle quality or the circumstances.

    MASTERS

    Scottie Scheffler was so nervous about his three-shot lead going into Sunday at Augusta National that he was in tears that morning. Two holes into the final round, the lead was down to one and Scheffler was in trouble again on the third hole.

    The memorable shot of what became a runaway victory was chipping in from short of the third green for birdie. Smith made bogey for a two-shot swing, the lead was back to three and no one got closer the rest of the way.

    “The timing of it was great,” Scheffler said with a laugh. “I was trying to get it up there to have a putt. At worse, I’d have a good look at par. And it happened to go in.”

    But it was another wedge a few holes earlier that really stood out. The one place to avoid with the traditional Sunday pin on No. 1 is long. Scheffler was in the trees and hit a good punch shot that rolled just over the back.

    “It’s one of the hardest pitches on the course,” he said. “You have this shelf. You’re down below the green. Everything runs away from you. The odds of keeping it on that top shelf? I don’t know if you can tell on TV but it goes up, down, left to right. It’s such a hard shot. I hit it so well it looked like it wasn’t hard.

    “That was the chip that got me settled in that all right, I can do this.”

    PGA CHAMPIONSHIP

    Thomas was in a three-hole playoff at Southern Hills with Will Zalatoris, both opening with birdie on the par-5 13th. Next was the reachable par-4 17th, with a creek to the right that meanders in front of the green.

    “I hit it in the left bunker in regulation, so I knew that had to be my miss,” he said. “I aimed at the left bunker, cut it to the second one, and if the wind wants to take that up the gap, great. As soon as it came off, it was a perfect shot.”

    It found the green for a two-putt birdie and one-shot lead, and he won with a par on 18.

    The meaningful shot cleaned up a mess from the day before.

    Thomas was sliding from contention with each of the five bogeys he made through 15 holes, one of them on the par-5 13th. The 16th hole looked like another when he drove into the rough, had to chip out and hit a pedestrian wedge to 25 feet.

    “I was leaking oil, playing bad. It was really rough,” Thomas said. “I hit a poor wedge to 25 or 30 feet and made that for par, and I birdied 17. I bogey that hole and don’t birdie 17, it’s over.”

    U.S. OPEN

    “The one thing I’ve been really struggling with this year is fairway bunker play,” Matt Fitzpatrick said after winning at Brookline.

    That’s what led to his first major. He had a one-shot lead when he drove into the bunker left of the 18th fairway. With the steep lip, it looked like his safest option was short of the green. He hit a “squeezy fade” from 156 yards with a 9-iron to 18 feet for par.

    “It was just kind of natural ability took over and just played the shot that was at hand, if I was a junior trying to hit it close,” Fitzpatrick shot.

    Three holes earlier, he hit a 5-iron out of the rough on the 15th that led to birdie. But it was another birdie, even more unlikely, that stands out to him.

    “The putt on 13,” he said. “It was 50 feet. For whatever reason, I genuinely felt good over the putt. I felt like I had a chance, and you don’t often get that. I’ve had it multiple times over 10-footers and 20-footers. That one … I felt good over it.”

    As for the timing? He had missed a 6-foot par putt on No. 10. He three-putted from 15 feet on the par-3 11th, falling two shots behind. And then he dropped the big one.

    “It just changed the momentum for me,” he said.

    BRITISH OPEN

    Imagine leading the 150th Open at St. Andrews by one shot on the 17th hole, 40 yards away with the notorious Road Hole bunker between you and the pin.

    “It was pretty daunting,” Cameron Smith said. “I hit a great putt. I figured somewhere on the putting surface I’d have a good look at par.”

    The danger was losing pace if it started too close to the edge and funneling into the pot bunker. The pace was perfect and settled 10 feet away. Smith made everything on Sunday, and that par putt was no exception.

    “I was trying to hit it to a certain spot on the green and trying not to think of the big bunker that was staring me right in the face,” he said. “That’s probably the one shot on the back nine where if it goes pear-shaped, we’re not talking.”

    He made five straight birdies in that closing 64. But when asked for a meaningful shot, he thought back to the second round, a 3-wood into the par-5 14th for an eagle.

    “My favorite shot of the week,” he said. “I had to take a little off a 3-wood and hold it off the breeze, and it turned out perfect.”

    It told him the long game was in top form. The short game never seems to leave him.

    ———

    AP golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf and https://twitter.com/AP—Sports

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  • Tiger Woods to return at his tournament in the Bahamas

    Tiger Woods to return at his tournament in the Bahamas

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    Tiger Woods made it official Wednesday by announcing he would return to competition as part of the 20-man field at the Hero World Challenge in the Bahamas.

    Woods is the tournament host of the unofficial event on Dec. 1-4 at Albany Golf Club, where the tournament has been played since 2015.

    It will be the first time Woods has played the Hero World Challenge, which benefits his foundation, since 2019.

    Woods, who announced his decision on Twitter, has not played competitively since he missed the cut in the British Open at St. Andrews in July.

    That was only the third tournament he played in 2022, all of them majors. He made the cut at the Masters and PGA Championship, finishing 47th at Augusta National and withdrawing after three rounds at Southern Hills.

    The Hero World Challenge is the start of a busy month for Woods, who also has agreed to play in a made-for-TV exhibition on Dec. 10 with Rory McIlroy as his partner in a 12-hole match against Jordan Spieth and Justin Thomas.

    Woods also is expected to play in the PNC Championship a week later with his son, Charlie. They were runners-up a year ago in Orlando, Florida.

    The 20-man field in the Bahamas receives world ranking points, with the caveat that sponsor exemptions must be among the top 50 in the world. There is an exception for the tournament host — Woods is at No. 1,245.

    Woods said Tommy Fleetwood and Kevin Kisner would be the other exemptions, joining an already stacked field that has 17 of the top 20 players in the world. The only players from the top 20 not playing are McIlroy, Cameron Smith and Patrick Cantlay. Smith, the British Open champion, is ineligible because of his PGA Tour suspension for joining LIV Golf.

    Also, tournament officials announced that Will Zalatoris has not fully recovered from a back injury that kept him out of the Tour Championship and the Presidents Cup. Zalatoris was replaced by former British Open champion Shane Lowry.

    ———

    AP golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf and https://twitter.com/AP—Sports

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  • Jon Rahm roars into share of lead at CJ Cup with 62

    Jon Rahm roars into share of lead at CJ Cup with 62

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    RIDGELAND, S.C. — Jon Rahm thought his 7-iron from 195 yards had come up well short of the pin because of a long shadow across the green. Moments later, he heard the crowd react to a shot that came an inch from going in on the hardest hole at Congaree.

    The way his day went, Rahm should have expected that.

    He found the middle of the clubface on just about every shot and put on an exhibition Friday at the CJ Cup in South Carolina, making 10 birdies in his round of 9-under 62 that gave him a share of the lead with Kurt Kitayama.

    Coming off a victory two weeks ago in the Spanish Open, Rahm hardly looked like a player who is easing his way toward the end of the year.

    He ran off four straight birdies on the front nine, all of them inside 10 feet. He holed a bunker shot from 60 feet on the par-4 eighth, made a 35-footer on the par-3 10th and then capped off three straight birdies with his shot into the 17th that grazed the edge of the cup. Only four other players made birdie on that hole in the second round.

    So good was this round he mentioned two swings in particular that felt perfect, and those were two he didn’t convert for birdie.

    “It was a lot of good out there today,” he said.

    Needing one last birdie for his career-low round, Rahm’s wedge into the 18th rolled off a steep slope and came to rest against a bunker rake. His pitch was strong, rolling 30 feet by and he made his lone bogey.

    Kitayama, the 29-year-old Californian who spent his first six years on the Asian and European tours, holed a tough bunker shot for eagle on the par-5 12th for a 65 and joined Rahm at 11-under 131.

    Aaron Wise spent time on a putting drill after his opening round and it paid off for him in his round of 66. He was two back, along with Cam Davis (66). Rory McIlroy (67) was two strokes behind the leaders at 9 under.

    Tom Kim, going for his third PGA Tour victory in his last six stars, was hanging with McIlroy until a late bogey dropped him into a tie for sixth, four shots behind. McIlroy birdied the 18th to cap off a 30 on the back nine.

    McIlroy, the defending champion who can get to No. 1 if he wins, was more worried about what Rahm was doing in the group ahead of him.

    “I was trying to hang on to Rahm’s coattails,” McIlroy said.

    He was an example of how it doesn’t take much to get out of position at Congaree, a fast course with severe slopes around the edges of the green. McIlroy short-sided himself twice, and while he wasn’t off line by much, it was enough to cost him two shots on the front nine.

    And then he holed a 30-foot putt at the par-3 10th and was on his way.

    Kitayama played earlier was never too far from the lead until his round took a turn for the best on the par-5 12th hole. He was in the right bunker, a popular place to miss, and thought his ball was running a little hot until it hit the pin and dropped for eagle.

    “Went in dead center, so that was good,” Kitayama said.

    He added a pair of 10-foot birdie putts late in the round and has a share of the lead going into the weekend for the first time in his short PGA Tour career.

    The UNLV grad took a while to get back home — he once played a developmental tour even in Asia where he was paid in cash on the spot after winning — but it couldn’t be a better time. He finished 40th in the FedEx Cup his first year. That means he will be in at least eight of the elevated events next year that offer at least $20 million in prize money.

    As late as it is in the year, Rahm is still going strong. The Spanish Open is important to him, and he won it for the third time to tie his national hero, Seve Ballesteros. He still has designs on being Europe’s No. 1 with the DP World Championship next month in Dubai.

    And then?

    “It’s Thanksgiving, so probably put on a few pounds,” Rahm said. “Not that I need them, but I’m for sure going to be joining that club like everybody else most likely.”

    ———

    More AP golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf and https://twitter.com/AP—Sports

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  • LIV Golf players should get ranking points, Matsuyama says

    LIV Golf players should get ranking points, Matsuyama says

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    INZAI CITY, Japan — The players who left to compete in the Saudi-funded LIV Golf series should be entitled to earn ranking points, former Masters champion Hideki Matsuyama said Tuesday.

    Speaking at the Zozo Championship, which opens Thursday, Matsuyama called the ranking-points question ”difficult” and didn’t offer any details, solutions or clarifications.

    “I think they should be able to,” he said, speaking in Japanese. “However, there’s a procedure they’ll have to follow.”

    LIV Golf is funded by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund. Matsuyama suggested he was staying with the PGA Tour.

    “I’m a member of the PGA Tour,” Matsuyama said. “The players who left did so because they thought it was the right thing to do. So I can’t say anything about them.”

    Viktor Hovland also said LIV players shouldn’t get an automatic exemption for ranking points.

    “If you want to get world ranking points, you obviously have to follow the process,” the Norwegian said. “And I think they’re obviously making an effort to get those points, but I don’t think it’s right to give them an exemption to just get points overnight. They obviously have to follow the process, whatever the process might be.”

    Matsuyama won last year’s Zozo Championship — the only PGA Tour event in Japan — with a final-round 65 for a five-shot victory over Brendan Steele at the Accordia Golf Narashino Country Club, the same venue for this year.

    He’ll be the local favorite at the course located about an hour outside Tokyo. The purse is $11 million.

    “The energy that the fans provide really helps out, it helps my game,” Matsuyama said. “But on the other hand, there’s pressure that goes along with it.”

    Xander Schauffele may be under more pressure than Matsuyama, and also will have his own Japan-related following.

    The American’s mother has roots in Taiwan but grew up in Japan. He said his wife, Maya, was born in Japan’s southern island of Okinawa, and her mother is from a small island off the Okinawa coast — Miyakojima.

    He said he has a pre-tournament meal in the Tokyo area planned with some of his extended family in Japan.

    “I think there’s going to be probably roughly 30 of us is what I’ve heard. It will be nice to see all my grandparents, my uncles, aunts and my cousins,” he said.

    Schauffele was asked precisely how many he expected for dinner.

    “As many as I can get out,” he said.

    After the tournament, he’s heading to the Okinawa area for another family event with his “wife’s grandparents.”

    “I’ve never met them,” he said, “so I’m very excited to go and spend a couple nights.”

    ———

    More AP golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf and https://twitter.com/AP—Sports

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  • 3 tied for lead after 1st round of LIV Golf in Thailand

    3 tied for lead after 1st round of LIV Golf in Thailand

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    BANGKOK, Thailand — Richard Bland, Branden Grace and Eugenio Lopez-Chacarra upstaged their more-illustrious opponents on Friday to shoot 7-under 65s and share the lead after the first round of the LIV Golf Invitational-Bangkok.

    Marc Leishman and Ian Poulter were a stroke behind while Kim Sihwan, Brooks Koepka and Morgan Jediah were among those two behind in the 54-hole event.

    The tournament is being played on the new Stonehill Golf Club north of downtown Bangkok. The course was created by American designer Kyle Phillips and opened this year.

    Dustin Johnson, who leads the money list with just over $12.5 million in five events, shot 70. British Open champion Cameron Smith, who won the last LIV event in Chicago in mid-September, shot 72.

    It’s the first time LIV Golf is being played outside the United States since its inaugural event in early June near London.

    Before the start of play, players learned that they still won’t accrue ranking points on the LIV series. The Official World Golf Ranking said in a statement Thursday that it had denied the MENA Tour’s request to immediately add the Saudi-funded series to its schedule.

    The OWGR said the MENA Tour did not give it sufficient notice and there would not be time to finish the review ahead of the Bangkok tournament and next week’s event in Saudi Arabia.

    LIV Golf created an alliance with the little-known MENA Tour, which hasn’t run a tournament of its own since March 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The MENA Tour stands for Middle East and North Africa and is a developmental tour that has been getting the bare minimum of world ranking points since 2016. It has 54-hole events with a 36-hole cut, offering a $75,000 purse.

    “I don’t think it really was much of a response. I just hate when you sit on the fence. Just pick a side,” Koepka said Friday. “If it’s yes or no, just pick one. So I’m not a big fan of that.”

    Bryson DeChambeau, who shot 69 Friday, said the decision by the rankings group was only “delaying the inevitable.”

    “We’ve hit every mark in their criteria, so for us not to get points is kind of crazy with having the top — at least I believe we have the top players in the world,” DeChambeau said. “We certainly believe that there’s enough that are in the top 50, and we deserve to be getting world ranking points. When they keep holding it back, they’re going to just keep playing a waiting game.”

    ———

    More AP golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf and https://twitter.com/AP—Sports

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