Hey driver

Maverick McNealy did not show up on Sunday. With his recent ball-striking numbers and history on the Monterey Peninsula, he will be popular this week. Si Woo Kim might not be a guy who likes the deep end of the pool. Certain elements of his Sunday reminded me too much of The American Express. Is Si Woo a winner? Yes (100%), but maybe not when the aquarium is full of sharks. Then there's Hideki Matsuyama. Matsuyama played the front nine on Sunday in 33 strokes without hitting a single fairway. Hideki was 0-7. Just goes to show how good Japan's best all-time player is when it comes to short game. Alas, we went to the well once too often and Gotterup... got us. It was a terrible outcome when all we needed was a par. “Deki,” just blow that thing a mile right, into the crowd, knock it green side, and get up and down. Starting Sunday with the leader and two players tied for second had me optimistic. In the end, that's three second-place finishes in as many weeks. It's time to move on.

Now that Kapalua has been cancelled, the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am officially becomes the first signature event of the 2026 season. A field of 80 PGA TOUR players will head to Pebble Beach for a 72-hole, no cut $20 million purse tournament. A cool $3.6 million for first place, the money grab portion of the PGA TOUR season has officially begun! I mention 80 "PGA TOUR" players because, as the title suggests, we have 80 matching amateurs in the field as well. This is our third year of signature status with AT&T. The first year, Wyndham Clark won on Saturday after 54 holes. I'll never forget that Sunday as a hurricane-style storm hit the peninsula. Residents (me) were ordered to shelter in place for their safety. That was a wild day. One year ago, Rory McIlroy kicked off his career year with a win. The golf course is no longer suited to players of this skill level, but the scenery is magnificent. Combined with the dulcet tones of Jim Nantz's call, enjoy the views of Stillwater Cove and the scoring. Since the event went signature, the average winning score is 19 under par, and one of those years was only THREE rounds!

AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am starts in...

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Monterey two-step

Eighty two-man teams will split up and play one round on Pebble Beach Golf Links and a second round on Spyglass Hill Golf Course. Following 36 holes across two courses, the amateur portion of the event will conclude, and the 80 TOUR players will compete on Pebble Beach for the weekend. It's tough to compete with Pebble Beach, but Spyglass Hill does a pretty good job. Starting with one of the best opening holes in golf, Spyglass takes you down to the sandy landscape bordering the Pacific Ocean. Hole six brings you back up the hillside into the woods, and the terrain really takes over. The green complexes are a little bigger than PBGL, and the fairways are a little tighter. Spyglass is a tougher ball striking test if the wind is tame. In the first two rounds last year, the scoring averages were: Pebble Beach GL (-2.9) and Spyglass Hill GC (-2.0). Survive the two very slow Pro-Am rounds and put yourself in position for the weekend.

Approximately 60 of the 80 men in this field can win this event if Scottie Scheffler lets them. The two golf courses are quite short by PGA TOUR standards. Pebble Beach is just one of two venues left on TOUR that measures under 7,000 yards. Did I mention the 2027 US Open is coming to Pebble? Vegas set the final score over/under at 19.5 under par. If the forecast holds up for Sunday, I would definitely take the over on the 268.5 number! All 10 of the top 10 in the OWGR are playing. They are joined by 42 of the top 50 in the world. We have a serious set of competitors ready to go. Farmers, AMEX, and WM Phoenix were all just appetizers. Eleven players sit on the odds board at +3000 or lower. That's why plenty of players can win as long as Scheffler or McIlroy do not go nuclear. Having walked both courses for the last few years, I have a great feel for what to look for in the field. These are two very specific tests. When you combine the terrain with the sudden change in temperature, local knowledge becomes key. That and confidence in your wedge game.

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How to win?

Patience is a great place to start when it comes to this event. Those first two rounds can be brutally long. Even if the amateurs know their place and skip putting out when they are not needed, these are foursomes playing on the PGA TOUR. I have walked alongside these rounds, and they take a long time. It can be deceiving when only 40 professionals are playing each course, and the coverage jumps back and forth, but I can assure you these guys are out there forever! Thankfully, the Pro-Am parade ends after two rounds. Then we can get down to business, but if you let the pace get to you through the first 36 holes, your deficit to the leader(s) may be too much to overcome. Who are the impatient players? Great question, and similar to your Saturday foursome, golfers cannot hide their personality for four plus hours. If you see it on television, then those are easily frustrated fellows on TOUR.

• Course conditions will allow scoring in rounds one, two, and three. I have talked with several people on site, and the rain has just softened the putting surfaces enough to hold the ball for the first three days. Fourteen of the 20 par 4s across both courses are under 430 yards. We are looking for wedge wizards this week. Mickelson, Berger, Rose, Spieth, all past winners, all great on approach from awkward distances inside 150 yards. The best wedge players can control trajectory, and even more importantly, they can control SPIN. Pebble Beach has the smallest greens on TOUR at 3,500 sq/ft. Throw your approach up in the wind, or rip it back, and you will miss these targets. Find yourself sideways to the hole, and saving par gets even trickier. The best players with a scoring iron in hand, and in recent weeks, are the first focus of our outright picks.
• We are back on Pacific Poa Annua grass. Eleven of the top 20 at Torrey finished inside the top 25 for strokes gained putting at the Farmers. Last year at Pebble Beach? Thirteen of the top 20 finished inside the top 22 on the strokes gained putting leaderboard. When guys start missing five-footers on bouncy greens because foursomes bring another set of footprints into play over the first 36 holes, scoring is affected. Four of the first five last year finished inside the top seven in SG:Putt and Rory was the seventh ranked player! Players with a positive history on Poa and at Pebble Beach are a must if you want to win this week.
• Small surfaces will be missed. GIRs can get skewed because each approach is from such close range, but players are going to miss greens. When they do, they are most likely to find one of 178 bunkers between the two venues. There are two parts to the Pebble Beach puzzle that most pundits overlook. Once the event got elevated, short game has become a factor. You cannot make bogeys this week. Players are going to need 20+ sub-par scores to win. Have you been watching these guys? No wind to start, be prepared to exhibit a very good birdie-to-bogey ratio. Due to the size of these greens, saving par takes some great skill, and you must be ready to play from the sand to succeed.
• The second trait commonly overlooked is the driver. For years, this was a point-and-shoot style event. Guys would lay up off the tee, etc. With the signature move, that is no longer the case. I walked with Wyndham Clark during that course record 60. Clark attacked the course with superior length. He was nearly matched over three days by Ludvig Åberg. Fast forward to 2025, and Rory wins. These courses allow most of the field to remain close due to their overall length, but if you drive it deep and keep it in play, there's a distinct advantage to be had.

Both venues possess a par 72 scorecard that measures right around 7,000 yards. The average par 3 length across the two courses is 170 yards. That's an eight iron for the elite players in this field, even with the high 50-degree temperatures. AT&T is our last multi-course stop until the end of the season. Between the amateur event and the two tracks, a bunch is going on this week. The par ranges that have helped players gain the most strokes on the field are also a clue to the winner. The par 3 range is 175-200 yards, par 4s 400-450, and the par 5s 500-550. If we know that's where the guys differentiate, it validates all of the other player points. These two courses are not complicated, and we have been close for about a month. Let's find a way to win "some" Scottie money and then cash in with an outright!

Outright Winners - AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am

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