The PGA Championship looked like a battle between Kevin Kisner, Hideki Matsuyama and Chris Stroud. Kisner held a one-shot lead over the other two going into round four. Justin Thomas sat two back.
By the end of the tournament, Thomas won by two, shooting a three-under 68.
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Kisner, meanwhile, shot a three-over par 74, and finished four back of Thomas.
Matsuyama shot a one-over par 72 and was three behind.
Go back to the U.S. Open and it was Thomas who completely took himself out of the tournament in the fourth round with a three-over par after a record nine-under par the day before. He couldn’t seem to do anything wrong in the third round, but struggled in the fourth round, his confidence obviously rocked.
Brian Harman had a one-shot lead in the U.S. going into the final round and shot an under-par 72 to finish four strokes back of winner Brooks Koepka, who was tied for second going into the final round and shot a five-under par 67.
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It was interesting that Matsuyama trailed by five strokes going into the final round and then pulled off a six-under on the final 18 holes to finish four back. It certainly rewarded him with a huge payday, but the pressure was clearly not on him.
In the British Open, Jordan Spieth had a three-shot lead over Matt Kuchar heading into the final round, but managed to recover from a crazy bogey on the 13th hole, in which he gave up the lead to Matt Kuchar, to go on to win by three strokes. Kuchar finished with a similar final round 69, but was just a little unlucky that Spieth pulled off the craziest round in recent history to win a Major.
In this case, Kuchar was just unlucky.
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Points earned in all of these tournaments matter when it comes to the FedEx Cup playoffs, so it’s not as if a top-five or top-10 finish doesn’t matter. It means, however, that the purse money is less than it could have been and the squandered opportunity of winning a Major.
