Sermon on the Mount

Welcome to the members-only portion of today’s newsletter.

Thank you for being here on one of the best weeks of the entire year.

4. OK a word on comps. I sent what I thought was a thoughtfully-researched tweet on Sunday afternoon that got just eviscerated.

To be fair to the detractors and the haters, I didn’t do a good job of clarifying that these are age-specific comps.

So I’m not saying that the 46-year-old Lucas Glover has a slightly worse overall resume than Berger. Only that Berger’s trajectory at age 32 is a bit better than what Glover’s was at the same age.

When I get on Baseball Reference, I don’t care that 27-year-old Ronald Acuna Jr. can easily be compared to the career of Richard Hidalgo (!). I do care that at age 27, he compares favorably to Mookie Betts and Reggie Jackson.

I guess I thought this was obvious, but apparently it’s not (?).

5. Let’s look at the name that raised the most havoc among commenters: Keegan Bradley. Berger’s career DG points line is in green. Bradley’s is in blue. They are having … basically the same career?

And while Berger obviously doesn’t have the major championship that Bradley has, nor the high level wins, he’s also seven years younger and playing tremendous golf right now. They have almost the exact same number of top 10s at majors (Bradley has five, Berger has four), and it’s not difficult to see Berger cruising along for the next seven years (hopefully injury free) and picking off a couple of big wins and maybe even a major.

I don’t think this is a stretch at all, but, uh, a lot of other people did.

6. Also, yeah, I do think Rickie has had a better career than Keegan Bradley. The Players-PGA wins are close enough to a wash for me, and even though Bradley has more overall victories, Rickie’s major record and the number of Ryder Cups he’s played in (5-2 in favor of Rick) tip the scales.

I mean I pretty definitively think Rickie has had a better career than Keegan.

Rickie

Keegan

I think non-sickos value winning majors a lot. And while majors should be valued quite highly, I do think we run this risk of allowing them to block out everything else that has happened. Example that I use a lot: This time last year, Rory very easily had a better career (by a wide margin) than Brooks. But because Brooks led in majors 5-4, you could find folks who argued the other direction.

That’s not necessarily what’s going on here with Rickie and Keegan.

If you’re arguing that Keegan has had a better career, I’m not going to quibble with it. But it’s also not crazy to say that Rickie (again, two years younger) has had a better career than Keegan. Anyone who thinks it’s completely definitive in favor of Keegan might not know as much ball as they think!

7. As I watched Russ Henley rack up another T6 and another $700,000, I started thinking about the most underrated player in the world right now.

The answers are all over the planet, but my top five would probably look like this.

1. Scottie Scheffler
2. Jake Knapp
3. Russ Henley
4. Patrick Reed
5. Si Woo Kim

I gravitate toward guys like Scottie, Rahm and sometimes Rory because however good people think those guys are, they’re just that much better.

Henley is the new Charles Howell III (but better). Total ATM but can go in any grocery store in America unrecognized. The dream.

Also, Knapp’s finishes in five events this year.

Sony: T11
Torrey: T5
Phoenix: 8
Pebble: T8
Riviera: 6

8. Speaking of Scottie. Is there reason for concern? I tentatively say no.

He said on Sunday that he found something with his iron play, which had been middling (for him) over the last few tournaments.

He lost a ton of shots on approach on two holes on Sunday. The 18th, which he doubled after hitting it in the water and the 14th, which he doubled after hitting it into a palm tree and wasn’t able to identify it with a TV camera normal sport. Everything else was flawless.

So yes, the approach number was negative for the first time since the 2024 BMW and just the second time since the 2022 St. Jude, but I’m not overly concerned about it.

Here are his first five starts this year.

Compared to his first four starts last year.

This year is objectively better overall, and last year he went on to win six times (including two majors). I do think the part that’s worth worrying about heading into this week is a new driver that he seems a bit uncomfortable with on a golf course that demands a ton of accuracy off the tee.

Also, some of the decision making last week struck me as odd. I was watching on Saturday when he was still kind of in the mix and tried to take on the right side of the fairway on 18 out of the rough.

Scottie normally hits that ball 25 yards left of the right edge and tries to get up and down for four. I don’t know if it was a mental error, a mis-hit or a bad lie, but it was definitely a shocking result.

9. It’s hard to convey how much this graphic ruled on the broadcast. Exactly what I want to see in the moment as Akshay tried to find the green. Sponsored content done perfectly.

10. An update here …

Eight players have done it so far, and one of them — Collin Morikawa — has actually done it three times.

Morikawa — 3
Gotterup — 2
Scott — 2
Young — 2
Bridgeman — 2
Kitayama — 2
Min Woo — 2
Sepp — 2

Thank you for reading our ridiculous golf newsletter that is sometimes (but often barely) about golf. Every edition is handcrafted by me (Kyle) and Jason. No AI, no algorithm, no machines (other than the ones we’re typing and drawing on).

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