Hass and Garcia Have Experience to Win Players; Kirk and Kisner Are Contenders

While there are names such as Chris Kirk and Kevin Kisner on leaderboard at the 2015 Players Championship, it is much more likely that the winner will come from a group of experienced golfers a few shots back, such as Bill Haas or past champ Sergio Garcia.    

The reason is that anybody can have a great third round, but it takes a little more than that to get into the winners circle on Sunday. And as Johnny Miller said during Saturday’s telecast, the course is “just filled with pressure shots, one after the other.”

There’s no let-up from the first tee to the final putt.

“I remember thinking it’s just a difficult hole, like every hole you can make bogey, and we don’t play that many courses where it feels like even the easy ones out here, if you don’t execute, they aren’t easy,” Haas said about his first impressions of the course.

Haas and Garcia can handle pressure because they have handled it in the past. Garcia has won The Players before, and Haas won the $10 million FedEx Cup in a playoff. That’s intense golf.  

Haas said his experience winning The Tour Championship and FedEx Cup has been important.

“It’s definitely something you can rely on,” he said. “I’ve been over putts before, and I’ve told myself, you’ve done this.”

Past champ Sergio Garcia will rely mainly on his good ballstriking.

“I’m very confident with my game, with my long game. Even my chipping has been quite good,” he said. “Unfortunately my putting has been up-and-down.”

How up and down? Yesterday he broke his putter in two and tossed it into a trash can before leaving the golf course.  

David Facey, chief golf correspondent for the Sun in the UK, saw what happened. He said that immediately after Garcia threw the club away, three young boys materialized and went to retrieve the broken implement. One got the grip end of the putter, one got the putter head and one got the putter cover. It was a four-way win.

Kirk, like a lot of recent PGA Tour winners, was a member of the University of Georgia NCAA Championship golf team in 2005. However, he has three PGA Tour victories, including the Deutsche Bank last fall.

“This is a very stressful golf course,” he said. “It definitely can feel like work a little bit out there at times, just because there’s so much penalty for misses on this golf course. And you know, with it playing difficult like it is right now, it takes a lot out of you for sure to play a good round.”

Kisner lost in a playoff to Jim Furyk a few weeks ago at the RBC Heritage. He was on the same golf team as Kirk and has been off and on the Web.com and PGA Tour since turning professional in 2006. Of those on the leaderboard, he has the least experience. He understands it’s a tight race.

“At one point there were like 45 guys within four shots of the lead,” he said. “Who knows what’s going to happen tomorrow. You better get off to a hot start and start making some birdies, or you’ll get lapped.”

Yes, there are cases to be made for others on the leaderboard, including Kevin Na who nearly won three years ago. At the time he had what he called the full-swing yips. He was also one of the slowest golfers on the planet, mainly because it took him so long to hit due to his inability to complete a swing.

However, with 16 golfers within two shots of the lead and 25 within three shots on a golf course that delivers unpredictable bounces, lies and results, anything can happen. Even Adam Scott or Bubba Watson, four strokes back, could win should others falter. They understand major championship pressure.

A victory at The Players carries a lot with it. There’s the $1.80 million first-place check and a five-year exemption to all PGA Tour events.

Kathy Bissell is a Golf Writer for Bleacher Report. Unless otherwise noted, all quotes were obtained first-hand or from official interview materials from the PGA Tour, USGA or PGA of America.