Golfers eye Players Cup as springboard

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This article was published 13/08/2019 (2545 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A win at the Players Cup can lead to big things in a professional golfer’s career.

Last year’s champion, Tyler McCumber, a Florida native who moved up to the Korn Ferry Tour this season, clinched his PGA Tour card on Monday as he finished 22nd on the final regular-season points list.

As for 2017 Players Cup winner Kramer Hickok, he’s currently golfing with the best of them on the PGA Tour. He earned his card in 2018 with a second-place finish on the Korn Ferry Tour. Hickok, who resides in Dallas and was named the 2017 PGA Tour Canada Player of the Year, has made US$494,424 this season.

But you don’t have to remind the players competing this week at Southwood Golf & Country Club about what the previous winners have gone on to do. They’re fully aware of what a win in Winnipeg can do for their careers. Just ask Taylor Pendrith, the top Canadian on the Mackenzie Tour as the Richmond Hill, Ont., product heads into this week as the No. 4-ranked player.

“It’s inspiring,” Pendrith said on Tuesday morning of the success of past winners, before teeing off at Southwood in the pro-am event in the afternoon. “The champion of the Players Cup last year is a PGA Tour member, so hopefully I can contend to get a win here this year and follow in his footsteps.”

Pendrith is coming off of the biggest win of his career as he won the 1932byBateman Open in Edmonton on Aug. 4 — his first Mackenzie Tour-PGA Tour Canada event victory. Pendrith’s win was also the first time since Adam Cornelson won the 2016 Bayview Place DCBankOpen that a Canadian finished at the top of the leaderboard at a Mackenzie Tour event. Pendrith has been knocking on the door all season — he also has a second- and a third-place finish to his name this year.

“I mean, it’s great. I think golf in Canada is in a good spot right now,” Pendrith said.

“There’s tons of Canadians on the PGA Tour playing well. A bunch of guys on the Korn Ferry Tour. Mike Gligic just got his PGA Tour card yesterday. And there’s a bunch of us out here who are trying to make our way up through the ranks. I think you’ll see, over the next couple years, more Canadian winners, but to get that first one, it feels great.”

Although Canadians haven’t been winning in bunches on the Mackenzie Tour, the same can’t be said about Paul Barjon of France. The 26-year-old has earned $114,772 on the Canadian tour this year as he’s finished in the top 10 in seven out of nine events, and already has two victories — the Osprey Valley Open in Caledon, Ont., and the Bayview Place DCBank Open in Victoria — to put him in first place on the money list. Barjon began playing on the Mackenzie Tour in 2016 after it was recommended to him by a teammate of his at Texas Christian University and fellow Frenchman, Julien Brun.

“In my last two years of pro golf, I’ve been kind of up and down. You know, like missing a lot of cuts. And this year I haven’t missed a cut yet,” said Barjon, who also had a top-10 finish at last year’s Players Cup. “Twice I finished pretty far outside the top 10, but most of the time I got a shot and go, ‘OK, if I play great on the last round, I can maybe scare the leader or maybe be right up there.’ So, it’s been good.”

Despite sitting in the top spot, Barjon said he’s as motivated as ever to have an impressive showing at the Players Cup.

“You know, it’s always the same thing, and it’s super stacked up right now. There’s three guys at more than a hundred grand on the money list,” Barjon said. “So, you know, with the last tournament counting for more points and dollars, you never know what’s going to happen. Someone could win the last one being at $60,000 and just kind of jump in front of anybody, really. And also, that’s what everybody wants when they show up here, right? To win the tournament and get one more trophy.”

With only two more Mackenzie Tour events after the Players Cup, the competition is heating up as players try to climb the rankings before the season ends. The top five will graduate to the Korn Ferry Tour — which is one step away from the PGA Tour — next year. Those who finish six through 10 will have a little more work to do, as they will play in the final stage of a qualifying tournament at the end of the year in hopes of getting bumped up to the Korn Ferry.

Pendrith, a 28-year-old in his third year on the Mackenzie Tour, said you can’t afford to get caught up with the rankings as you need to focus on your game. That’s because getting into the top 10 is no easy task.

“It’s a grind. There’s so many good players now,” Pendrith said.

“This tour has gotten so much stronger in the last three or four years, with a bunch of college kids from the States coming up here to play. It’s really challenging to win out here, to win anywhere, really. But to finish in the top 10 is a big accomplishment with the level of talent here. Some guys from here can move up to the Korn Ferry and then from the Korn Ferry to the PGA Tour. It’s a long battle and sometimes it’s quicker for others and sometimes it take four, five, six years. You just got to stay patient and trust that your game is good enough.”

The first round of the Players Cup tees off on Thursday.

taylor.allen@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @TaylorAllen31

Taylor Allen
Reporter

Taylor Allen is a sports reporter for the Winnipeg Free Press. Taylor was the Vince Leah intern in the Free Press newsroom twice while earning his joint communications degree/diploma at the University of Winnipeg and Red River College Polytechnic. He signed on full-time in 2019 and mainly covers the Blue Bombers, curling, and basketball. Read more about Taylor.

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