Winners and Losers from the 2015 Valspar Championship
At the Valspar Championship, golf fans were treated to the fifth playoff in the last seven events on the PGA Tour and the fourth sudden-death showdown in a row.
This week, it was Jordan Spieth triumphing in thrilling fashion. The 21-year-old defeated Sean O’Hair and Patrick Reed, rolling in a birdie-two and fist-pumping emphatically on the third playoff hole.
Young Mr. Spieth, of course, is a winner this week. Who else joins him (and an alligator, as you'll see)? Click through to find out.
Winner: Jordan Spieth
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Interviewed following his round, Spieth told NBC Sports that he'd just played a "crazy back nine." That's an understatement. The tournament winner was three strokes out of the lead with six holes to play. He birdied the 13th and 14th holes and saved par with a series of brilliant shots around the green down the stretch. He booked passage to a three-man playoff with one of those par saves at the 18th hole.
The 21-year-old Texan poured in a 30-foot shot on the third playoff hole to take home the trophy, vanquishing Reed and O'Hair in the process.
In seven starts this season, he's now won once and collected an additional three top-10 finishes. He also won the unofficial Hero World Challenge earlier this season, beating a field of the world's best.
With the second win of his young career, Spieth places himself near the head of the class of talented, young American golfers.
Loser: Sean O'Hair
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On the second playoff hole, O'Hair was a lip-out away from winning. Instead, the 2008 tournament winner finished tied for second.
"I gave it my all," he told NBC Sports immediately after Spieth came away with the win on the third playoff hole.
The four-time PGA Tour winner had to earn his full tour card on the Web.com Tour the last two seasons and hasn't won since 2012. O'Hair was gritty down the stretch, rolling in a clutch par save at the 18th to make it into the 10-under playoff.
Still, he's a loser this week as a win would have saved him from having to rely on sponsor's exemptions, and he has to feel like a loser after the lip-out.
Winner: Someone, Thanks to Jonathan Byrd
3 of 7Jonathan Byrd's expertly struck four-iron found the hole off the tee at the 211-yard par-three 15th hole. More plainly, the Clemson alum made a hole-in-one.
Byrd offered this succinct description of the shot: "I had good vision of what I wanted to do. (It) landed about 2 feet short of the hole and went right in" (via Sky Sports).
Unfortunately, the five-time winner missed the cut as an opening-round 74 thwarted his efforts. So we'll say that the real winner of the ace is the person whose name is drawn in the tour's Quicken Loans Sweepstakes, in which an entrant has the mortgage paid for a year every time a player makes a hole-in-one on tour.
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Loser: Adam Scott
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The longest cuts-made streak on the PGA Tour came to an end at the Valspar Championship when Adam Scott missed the cut.
He was undone by poor putting in a second round in which he missed four putts inside of five feet. The four-over 75 had him packing his bags for the weekend.
Regarding the poor putting, Scott said, per The Associated Press (via ESPN): "It can happen. You can miss some short ones. Obviously, it's not what you want, and there's no excuse. But there's a couple of things I'd like to make an adjustment with on different greens, different green speeds."
With 45 in a row, the Australian didn't come close to matching Tiger Woods' cuts streak from 1998 to 2005.
Winner: This Alligator
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Here's your official notice that the PGA Tour is in the midst of the Florida swing: a gator sighting.
During the second round of the Valspar Championship, Charley Hoffman was approaching his golf ball on the third hole when a 12-foot alligator ambled his way.
"Rarely do they walk in the middle of the fairway and halt play. We weren't going anywhere fast. And neither was he," Hoffman said, per an ESPN.com report.
Halting play and reminding the intruding golfers who owns Innisbrook, this gator was a clear winner.
Loser: Henrik Stenson
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This guy gets no respect. Henrik Stenson would have moved in to the second position in the Official World Golf Ranking with a win at the Valspar Championship.
Stenson is presently the third-ranked golfer in the world. The other four golfers in the top five: Rory McIlroy, Bubba Watson, Adam Scott and Jason Day. Golf fans hear a lot more about all of those guys than they do about Henrik Stenson.
What's the deal? This guy won the 2013 FedEx Cup and won twice on the European Tour last year in addition to finishing inside the top 10 in three of his 15 PGA Tour starts. He tied for fourth at last week's WGC-Cadillac Championship.
This week, the Swede posted a Sunday 67 to finish tied for fourth, a stroke off the pace.
Winner: The Copperhead Course
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The Copperhead course at Innisbrook Resort reaffirmed its reputation as one of the toughest courses on the PGA Tour this week.
The 7,200-yard, par-71, primarily Bermuda grass track saw scores averaging 72.1 through three rounds. During the fourth round, the course played a bit easier (70.6), but the four-day average was still over par: 71.8. In 2014, it was the sixth-hardest course on tour with a scoring average of 1.433.
And the Packard-designed course is getting a face-lift, so it should be even better when the tour arrives next year. According to a report on PGATour.com: A "six-month restorative work will take place from May through October this year and includes replacing all fairways and rough, rebuilding each green and reshaping bunkers to stay true to Packard’s masterful design."
All stats via PGATour.com and the PGA Tour Media Guide.
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