The Quick Hook

The 2020 European Tour season, upended at its midpoint, will draw to a close one month later than originally scheduled, at the DP World Tour Championship in Dubai, UAE. Defending Race to Dubai and Tour Championship champion Jon Rahm will not defend his tournament and season titles at Jumeirah Golf Estates' Earth Course. Two time DP World Tour Champion Rory McIlroy is also skipping the event. The season finale of the 2020 European Tour is nigh, and much like the show that the headline of this article is stolen from, there's a good chance that when the winner is confirmed, fans are going to be equal parts confused and enraged at the result. Much is made in the US of the convoluted FedEx Cup points system, and its overwhelming generosity to those that perform well in the playoff events, but as the European Tour creeps closer and closer to crowning a fourth part-time member in six seasons as the champion of the season long Race to Dubai points list, the complaints of the FedEx pale

We've all heard about Daniel Berger, the world's 13th ranked golfer, not being invited to play at the 2020 Masters, due to having too low an Official World Golf Ranking (OWGR) position in March. So much has been made of Berger's omission, that the absence of several other top players has gone almost completely unnoticed.  It has been a long time since the field was set - so who else will not be teeing it up at Augusta National this year? Astoundingly, six of the top-50 ranked golfers in the world, including Berger, will not participate in the final major of 2020. This would have been seven players, were it not for Kevin Streelman dropping to 51st in the latest OWGR update this week. Joaqin Niemann and Sergio Garcia, ranked 40th and 42nd in the OWGR respectively, have both withdrawn after positive COVID-19 tests. Niemann had qualified by winning the 2019 Greenbrier Championship, while Garcia is a past-champion. Niemann is not currently qualified for the 2021 Masters, but can

The Italian Open has attracted a strong field this week, even despite relinquishing Rolex Series status, which it had held for the last three seasons. Meanwhile, on the PGA Tour, Sherwood Country Club will step in as the host course for the ZOZO Championship, which was originally scheduled to be played in Japan. Starting with the event in Brescia, very few underdogs have emerged victorious in the Italian Open in recent years, perhaps due to the elevated status, and subsequent jacked-up prize money. While it has lost this status, and much of the financial lucrativeness, the field is still top-heavy this week, which comes as somewhat of a pleasant surprise. Teeing it up in Italy will be Lee Westwood, who just chalked up his sixth consecutive Top-20 finish at the Scottish Championship. Alongside him will be Victor Perez and Matt Wallace, who are both arriving on the back of runner-up finishes. The defending champion Bernd Wiesberger is also in the field. On to the stats, Chervo Golf Club

Temporarily moving from Nine Bridges in South Korea, the CJ Cup is taking place at Shadow Creek at MGM Resorts in Las Vegas, Nevada. The event marks the competitive return from injury of Brooks Koepka, and the first time all five of the world's top ranked golfers will play the same event in the 2021 season. Meanwhile, on the European Tour, the inaugural Scottish Championship will be played on the Torrance Course at Fairmont St Andrews, presumably due to the presence of an onsite hotel, and not because no other course was available in the entire country. So, it's the Fairmont and MGM, in St Andrews and Las Vegas. Who said golf was out of touch with the common person? Bring on hotel week. Detailed analysis is going to be difficult this week, as neither the Fairmont nor Shadow Creek have hosted a ranking professional stroke-play championship. Shadow Creek played host to the first edition of "The Match" between Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson in 2018, but neither of those

It's the flagship week on the European Tour, as Wentworth Club takes centre stage, as it has every year since 1984. In the United States, the Tour moves to Las Vegas and TPC Summerlin for the Shriners, where the strongest non-major field of the 2021 Tour season so far will compete. Despite having the higher strength of field total than the BMW PGA Championship (The European Tour's equivalent to The Players Championship), The Shriners will play second fiddle in terms of awarding of Official World Golf Ranking points, due to the elevated status awarded to the event in England. The last two champions, Danny Willett and Francesco Molinari, have both become somewhat the forgotten men in golf. This tournament actually has an odd history of doing this to the champions. Chris Wood and Matteo Mannassero have both won here since 2013, cracking the Top-30 of the world in doing so. Both, currently, languish outside the world's Top-900.  Is this a cursed championship? Perhaps not - but

Can a career be considered successful without an Aberdeen Standard Investments Scottish Open trophy in the cabinet? Yes, it can, but what about a Rolex Series title? Also, yes. The Renaissance Club in East Lothian is playing host for the second successive year at the Scottish Open.  The highly touted Tom Doak design, his first in Scotland, has drawn a field with a greater Official World Golf Ranking strength than the concurrent PGA tournament, which is extremely rare for a European Tour event. Speaking of the PGA Tour, in the latest leg of the wraparound season, they're heading to  the Sanderson Farms Championship, at the Country Club of Jackson in Mississippi. Whoopee. Back to Scotland, for the time being, and it was Bernd Wiesberger who emerged victorious last season, after a playoff with Benjamin Hebert. The Austrian picked up his second of three wins in the 2019 season, and arguably the most prestigious win of his career. Only four competitive professional rounds have ever been

It is 'Club Championship' week on the PGA Tour, as the players head to the Dominican Republic for the third event of the 2021 season, at Corales Puntacana Resort & Club Championship. Meanwhile, the European Tour heads north once more for the Irish Open, teeing off at Galgorm Spa & Golf Resort in Northern Ireland.  That's right. It's going to be a tough week. It will be the second time in three weeks that a European professional tournament will be hosted at Galgorm after the Challenge Tour's recent visit, where American Tyler Koivisto won.  The key to winning that week, as it has been in previous years at this golf course, was the champion playing the two par-five holes on the course well under par. At seven under par for the two fives, Koivisto recorded a tournament total of -13, meaning more than half of his strokes below par were found on those two holes alone. He led the field in par-five scoring for the week. Likewise, in 2018, champion Calum Hill played

The feeling that history was about to be made was seldom absent from the 2020 US Open.  Matthew Wolff entered the final round with a two stroke lead, with the knowledge that a win would make him the first person to win the US Open on their championship debut since Francis Ouimet in 1913. Phil Mickelson arrived at the resting place of his greatest chance to win the US Open, still chasing golf's Grand Slam. History dominated the discussion of the location, too. Much was made of the difficulty of the West Course at Winged Foot, and whether or not the USGA were planning on repeat performances of the slogs that took place at the A.W. Tillinghast brute, in 1974 and 2006. Everyone that tuned in to the television coverage now knows the story of Billy Casper laying up on the par-three third hole every day in 1959, just as they now know the title 'The Massacre at Winged Foot,' and similarly can visualise every shot Phil Mickelson hit en route to the double bogey on his 72nd hole in 2

The second major championship in the last 14 months is about to begin at the famous West Course at Winged Foot Golf Club, and if the present and history do indeed rhyme, it is going to be a wild ride. Before jumping into said history - just to set the stage - it's worth having a look at what some of the world's best players have to say about the venue this year. Somebody start the Kill Bill music. World number three Justin Thomas' comments have garnered the most attention. "The viewers at home are going to see some pretty bizarre stuff and probably a lot of putts and chips that make us look pretty bad. If you're into that stuff, then you're going to like this week," Thomas said. Woah! Tiger Woods said, "this one [Winged Foot] or Oakmont is either one or two," after being asked if the venue this week is the toughest course he has ever played. Just four players finished under par when the US Open was held at Oakmont in 2016, so if the aspiration is

2020 is over, at least on the PGA Tour. The FedEx Cup has concluded, Dustin Johnson is $15 million richer, and we will never have to hear about projected standings, or the Wyndham Rewards again, until... Thursday afternoon. After the shortest off-season in sport, it is time to move on to the 2021 season with the Safeway Open. The Europeans are not so lucky as this dismal year presses on, made somewhat more bearable by their visiting of Vilamoura, Portugal. The bubble of golfers will play Dom Pedro Victoria Golf Course for the 14th iteration of the Portugal Masters.  After a week at Valderrama on the European Tour, this will feel like a round on the PlayStation. It is the only course in European Tour history to yield a 59, a feat accomplished by Oliver Fisher in 2018.  The worst winning score here since 2014 has been 17 under par, including the 2014 hosting, where Alexander Levy shot 18 under par (63-61), even though the tournament was shortened to two rounds due to inclement weather. 

The 2020 PGA Tour season wraps up this week at the Tour Championship in Atlanta, while the European Tour moves from an extended spell in the United Kingdom to Spain and Real Club Valderrama for the Andalucia Masters. The Andalucia Masters was not held between the years 2012 and 2016, but the Open de Espana was hosted at Valderrama in 2016, meaning the course was absent from the European Tour rota for just four full seasons. In the four events held there since it resumed hosting duties, Andrew Johnston, Sergio Garcia (twice) and Christiaan Bezuidenhout have emerged victorious. A common misconception about Valderrama is that hitting an abundance of fairways is the be all, and end all for a successful week. While accuracy from the tee is always helpful, not leading the statistic for the week has not stopped anybody.  Garcia (x2) and Bezuidenhout bettered the field average in their title winning weeks, but neither finished inside the Top 20 of the Driving Accuracy statistic the week/s they