The fall on the DP World Tour is typically reserved for the playoffs (and Rory McIlroy winning a Race to Dubai crown). The most consequential golf occurs in the Middle East, and historical implications tied to European legends like Seve Ballesteros and Colin Montgomerie are usually intertwined.
That will not be the case this year.
McIlroy has a fantastic opportunity to win the season-long race in Europe once again as he trails only Eugenio Chacarra and Patrick Reed entering the postseason. Combined with Jon Rahm and Tyrrell Hatton jumping back into the fold after exiting LIV Golf, the DP World Tour suddenly has two significant headlines from which it can draw attention and attendance.
What may be overlooked is another ongoing development with a man who played through some of the most consequential golf the sport has to offer this past weekend.
Avid golf fans probably don’t know Sean Crocker, but he is an American who has played on the DP World Tour his entire career. He has one professional victory, which came in 2022, and entered this week’s Genesis Championship with only an outside chance of retaining his tour card.
With top-15 finishes in his last two starts, the 30-year-old moved to No. 103 in the standings entering this week with just four rounds left in his season.
The one problem? Only the top 100 are safe.
On Sunday, Crocker was consumed by his nerves early. He turned in 3-over 39 and looked as if the moment was going to be too big for him. Only then did he become bigger than the moment.
Crocker rattled off birdies on Nos. 10-11 and then four straight to finish the round on Nos. 15-18 to come home in 5-under 29 — a 10-stroke improvement from his front nine. He signed for a final-round 68, eked inside the magic number and kept his playing privileges.
His emotional post-round interview is well worth the watch:
Stacking wins and years
The Bermuda Championship has turned into that relative you don’t hear from often, but when you do, they are up to something absurd. For the second straight year, the tournament was defined by weather, which forced the PGA Tour to cancel play on Sunday and forgo the final round entirely.
Shortening the event to 54 holes, the PGA Tour elected to hold a Monday playoff between Austin Smotherman and Seamus Power, who were tied after three rounds. It was Smotherman who reigned victorious after three playoff holes as the American has now won consecutive tournaments after going winless in his first 99 starts on the PGA Tour.
Smotherman entered FedEx Cup Fall at No. 80 in the FedEx Cup standings but has now moved up to No. 51. More importantly, he has earned exemptions at a convenient time as his wins at the Bank of Utah Championship and Bermuda Championship have him slated to play on the PGA Tour Championship Series through the 2029 season, i.e., the first two years of the tour’s new competitive model.
As an aside: The PGA Tour turning the playoff into a closest-to-the-pin competition by holding it on a par 3 was a joke. That is all.
A national open bandit nabs another … and more
Everyone knows about Rory McIlroy’s propensity toward winning national opens, but what about … John Catlin?! That’s right. The 35-year-old American has done it again, adding more than just another trophy to his mantle with his most recent win.
Catlin claimed the Hong Kong Open this past weekend, firing four rounds of 66 or better, reaching 20 under for the tournament and winning by five strokes over Kalle Samooja and Matthew Cheung. Rounding out the top 20 were fellow LIV Golf 1.0 alumni Caleb Surratt, Thomas Pieters, Kieran Vincent, Scott Vincent, Lee Westwood, Peter Uihlein, Anirban Lahiri, Branden Grace, Dean Burmester and Louis Oosthuizen.
Nice to see them growing the game.
Catlin’s win comes with invitations to both the Masters and The Open. The man who ranked No. 447 in the Official World Golf Rankings at the onset of the week earned a tee time at Augusta National at the end of it, as he will make his tournament debut and his sixth major appearance next April.
As for his growing list of national open titles, here’s Catlin’s tally:
- 2026 Hong Kong Open
- 2026 English Open
- 2024 Saudi Open
- 2021 Austrian Open
- 2020 Irish Open
- 2019 Thailand Open
Speaking of nabbing …
Grifters gonna grift.
LIV Golf’s short history has been one mired in, well, everything, but one constant throughout is the relationship between inflows and outflows. Whether that is players, capital, favorable coverage it paid for or whatever else, a league that was once a place where investment never stopped (thank you to Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund) is now one where everything is going in the opposite direction.
On Friday, the LIV Golf exodus was headlined by Tyrrell Hatton and Lucas Herbert, days after Oosthuizen made it known that he would no longer captain the Southern Guards. Is nothing sacred anymore? In total, LIV Golf 2.0 has 15 players interested in the league, according to the Financial Times.
These three (and many others) will instead play on the DP World Tour, as will American Charles Howell III, who has made all of one start on the DP World Tour in his career. I enjoyed the writing of Eddie Pepperell — who entered the final week of the DP World Tour season No. 100 in the standings only to fall outside of the number — on the matter.
Various parties continue to seek pennies-on-the-dollar payments through the bankruptcy proceedings. Players, vendors and small businesses have all been left holding the bag. Those who have not, though, are those who you would expect. According to court documents, LIV Golf executives received $15 million in retention payments this past summer, with CEO Scott O’Neil collecting just about $6.4 million.
Thank goodness for that.
