Low-town repeat: Tony Finau, PGA hit Detroit thinking '30 under'
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[June 29, 2023]
If last week's birdie parade at the Travelers Championship
was not your cup of tea, avert your eyes from the Rocket Mortgage
Classic starting Thursday at Detroit Golf Club.
"I think I'm pretty much calling 30 under this week just because of
the conditions," defending champion Tony Finau said of the potential
winning score.
Keegan Bradley won the Travelers on Sunday at par-70 TPC River
Highlands with a 23-under 257, which could have been even lower had
he not gone 3-over for his final six holes. A whopping 44 players
finished the tournament at least 10 under par.
Detroit Golf Club, hosting this PGA Tour event for the fifth time,
is a par-72 and similarly gettable. Finau went 26 under last year to
beat Patrick Cantlay, Cameron Young and Canadian Taylor Pendrith by
five; the winning numbers the first three years were 25, 23 and 18
under.
"When Nate Lashley won (in 2019), he was able to get to 25," Finau
said. "Both years were pretty soft, but they started to get firm on
the weekend because we didn't experience any rain. It's a golf
course clearly you can score on so with the conditions, barring any
wind, I do think you're going to have to shoot 28 to 30 under."
The course did experience rain last weekend -- it was battered by a
severe storm that felled several trees around the course. The
grounds crew focused on tree removal Monday, and tournament
executive director Jason Langwell said the club was "really
fortunate" there was no further damage that would delay the
tournament. All holes except No. 10 were open for players to
practice on Tuesday.
The field includes 11 players who have won on tour this season, but
World No. 9 Max Homa is the highest-ranked golfer playing as the
schedule returns to standard, non-"designated" events for a few
weeks. Homa and Finau are joined in Detroit by Bradley, Rickie
Fowler and South Korea's Tom Kim and Sungjae Im.
Two-time major champions Collin Morikawa and Justin Thomas, two big
names trying to turn around their season before it's too late, will
aim to take advantage of the easy track in Detroit.
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Morikawa, 26, hasn't won a tournament of any kind
since hoisting the Claret Jug at the 2021 Open Championship and
dropped to 20th in the world ranking. He has three missed cuts and
an injury withdrawal (back spasms at the Memorial Tournament) over
his past seven starts.
Morikawa is safely in the FedEx Cup mix. Thomas is not.
The top 70 in FedEx Cup points at the end of the regular season
qualify for the first playoff event. Thomas is on the bubble at No.
66.
The 30-year-old shot four forgettable rounds in missing the cut at
the Memorial and the U.S. Open, but he found a higher gear at the
Travelers, going 64-62-67 over his final three rounds to tie for
ninth.
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Thomas, whose last victory came at the 2022 PGA Championship, added
the Rocket Mortgage Classic to his schedule in early June.
"I'm not in a position right now where I can't play," Thomas said
after his final round at the Travelers. "I'm very, very fortunate
this many years into my career I've never had to add events at the
end of the year for Playoff purposes, but that's where I'm at, and
I'm just trying to make the most of it.
"...I've felt very close for a while. Just have had literally
nothing to show for it. And you never know. I'm one round away
tomorrow from kind of completely changing my focus and outlook on
the year and the rest of the year."
--Field Level Media
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