Golfpocalypse is a meandering collection of words that runs prior to each week’s PGA Tour event, mostly ABOUT that event. Reach out with your hottest takes on absolutely anything at shane.spr8@gmail.com. We’ll publish the best emails here.
Valspar time! (Yes, that exclamation is doing a lot of work, but this is still a tournament … for now.)
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1. Rogue Golf Thought: I can’t stop thinking about Cam Young’s drive on 18
A quick look back to start things this week—I want to point you to Jamie Kennedy’s piece on Young’s ridiculous 375-yard, best-of-the-shotlink-era-and-probably-best-of-all-time drive on 18 at Sawgrass. Jamie has all the stats, and the stats are jaw-dropping, but one I kept thinking about was how he yanked his drive on Saturday into the water with a similarly ambitious shot shape, and how it looked extremely costly at the time. Instead of being in the final group with Aberg, he dropped four shots back and gave himself a huge hill to climb. That had to be in his head, but he still took the bold route and unleashed a corker. That’s real guts! I mean, this is a guy who until last summer had the “can’t win a Tour event” tag smacked firmly on his back, and how he’s hitting legendary high-risk drives under pressure at the Tour’s biggest event? It’s wild stuff.
I also loved how it capped off a trio of elite shots going back to his tee shot at 17 that completely reversed the momentum. He needed to do something extremely special to win, because Fitzpatrick was so steady, and he had almost no time left. The way he stepped up with the great tee shot on 17, the tricky downhill birdie putt, and the bomb on 18 will probably be the clutch-est trio of shots we’ll see all year. I can’t get over it. You could convince me right now that he’s going to win two majors this year. In fact, don’t even try—I’m already there.
2. Can Viktor be a victor Again?
On to the Valspar, where all eyes will be on Viktor Hovland, who won here last year in one of the funniest victories ever. Why funny, you ask? Because nobody expected it, including Hovland himself, and he was very open about it. He had just come off shooting 80 at the Players, he almost decided not to play in Tampa at all, and it was only after hitting a few good shots in the Tuesday pro-am that he committed. It was a true low point. When he somehow managed to win, he wrote, “stupid, stupid game” on Instagram, and in his press conference said that “I’m still hitting a lot of disgusting shots” and that he never had his “best stuff.” How discouraging must it feel to get beat by someone who sounds like they just shot an 85?
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Anyway, Viktor is back at Innisbrook, he’s playing much better than last year (he was even in the mix at the Players early on Sunday), and in his three appearances here, he’s got a win, a T-3, and a T-33. He’s fourth in most odds lists, but all eyes will be on him as he tries to accomplish the very difficult feat of repeating. I feel a little cautious about his prospects, mostly because from tee to green he’s been just a little better than average this year (46th in SG in that category) and he’s been almost exactly average in putting. That feels like good enough to do well at a course he likes against a so-so field, but with Matt Fitzpatrick and Xander Schauffele lurking, it doesn’t feel like a win.
3. Don’t sleep on Innisbrook
We don’t really hear a lot of talk about Innisbrook among the best Tour courses, and to be honest, some people find it plainly average, but it was a sneaky top-five for me years ago when I was out on Tour almost every week. I am far from an architecture or design knower, so take my vibes-based assessment with a giant grain of salt, but the aesthetics of the place were up there with the best of the Florida courses (low bar, I know), and while it’s no Sawgrass, I liked it a lot better than Doral or Bay Hill or PGA National. It’s a beautiful place, with more elevation change and a little less water than you’d expect in Florida, and for a moment I got a slight psychological boost after a loooooong Florida month.
My weird preferences aside, its profile the last few years has skewed Hilton Head-ish in that it’s rewarded accuracy over distance, which is evident in a few of the recent champions, from Hovland to Peter Malnati (!!) to Adam Hadwin. (Of course, you can win here with above average power—see Sam Burns and Taylor Moore—but it’s not a prerequisite).
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All in all, to use a technical term, this tournament is feeling very Fitzpatrick-y.
4. Is the “Snake Pit” Actually Venomous?
A couple weeks ago, I called the “Bear Trap” at PGA National overrated from a difficulty standpoint, so I feel we should give the same treatment to the so-called “Snake Pit,” the final three holes at Copperhead. Are they really that tough?
Looking back at the toughest holes in 2025, I can report that 16, the long par-4, was the toughest hole on the course, and 34th overall on the PGA Tour at +.298 over par. That’s very respectable! The problem is, the next hardest holes at the course were 3, 8, 9 and 13. It’s not until 179th on the overall list that you get to no. 18 at Copperhead, which only played .135 strokes over par. By the time you get to 17, you’re at 332nd on the list, and just .048 strokes over par.
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Things don’t really change significantly when you sort by the final round, so what’s the conclusion here? All in all, it’s definitely harder than the Bear Trap, and 16 is a true beast, so I’m giving it a “just very slightly overrated” rating. You can get snakebit, but it’s more like being fanged by a garter snake instead of a copperhead.
5. The Jordan Spieth Sadness Watch: Sadder, But Manageable
Ultimately, the Players increased our sadness, despite Spieth finding himself in contention after 36 holes. The 76 on Saturday was just so modern-day Spieth that it forced us into a dark place. Last week I had downgraded our sadness to a 5.9, but this is very much a “it’s the hope that kills you” scenario, so just to be safe I’m pushing us back to a 7.1. We can handle this, but we’re trending down. Luckily, Spieth is in the field this week, and he has a win and three top-tens at the Valspar. We can dream through the darkness.
6. Golf Tweet of the Week: Invisible Jordan
This is just so spot-on and funny:
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Kudos to Dylan for identifying a very real psychological/behavioral phenomenon.
7. Ranking the Sponsor’s Exemptions
Best – Jackson Suber. I’ll warn you, it’s slim pickings in the sponsor pool at the Valspar, but I like this one. Suber needs some reps after a pretty tough 2025, and it’s worth giving him a chance to grab that phenom status back.
I guess? – Adam Hadwin. Okay, he’s a former champ, but playing okay golf this year (T-2 in Panama and T-10 in Puerto Rico), and while it might be more fun to have someone younger and more exciting, I kinda get it. I guess.
Huh? – Brandt Snedeker. Guy’s 45, hasn’t made a cut this year, hasn’t won this tournament … is it because he’s Presidents Cup captain? I’ll admit there’s a lot I don’t know about sponsor exemptions, but things are weird in Tampa.
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Huhhhhh? – Henrik Norlander. A 38-year-old Swedish dude who has missed six of his last eight cuts and notched his last top-ten at the Black Desert Championship in 2024, a fall tournament won by Matt McCarty? Must know somebody.
8. Conspiratorial email of the Week – Distraction Issues??
You can always send email with thoughts/conspiracies/rants to shane.spr8@gmail.com, and we’ll publish the best ones here when they come. I found this one from John especially intriguing:
Have you noticed/heard the loud snapping/clicking noises occurring in players backswings? Especially noticeable with McIlroy’s back swing today that, perhaps without him being aware, could have caused his wild drives left, right (aside from the layoff). I noticed this last year as well. Disgruntled individual or perhaps a bettor/gambler on scores … If actually occurring, can anything be done to find the source and address it?
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It piqued my curiosity, despite the conspiratorial undertone, so I went back and looked at one of the examples, Rory on 11. You can indeed hear a clicking noise right as he starts his backswing, though to me it just sounds like another tee shot on the course. People who know more than me responded saying that it could easily be an audio error on the production side, and Rory wouldn’t have heard that sound at all on the course.
There’s no way to prove this is anything malicious, but it did get me thinking—how easy would it be, if you had a gambling interest or worked for someone who did, to subtly screw up a player’s round? If you’re in a pack of people, and there’s a total hush, and you played a loud sound on your phone right during someone’s backswing, is it even possible to single out the perpetrator? This will sound like paranoia, I’m sure, but golf feels especially vulnerable to this kind of thing because of how simple it is to interrupt a player’s concentration, and when money’s involved, we’ve all seen how easy it is to cast etiquette and ethics aside.
9. One Normie Pick, One Weird Pick
The obvious normie picks are either Schauffele or Fitzpatrick, and to me Fitzpatrick’s game looked a little more complete at Sawgrass, and he also seemed a little steadier under pressure. Without Young turning into a legend for three shots, he wins that tournament going away, and as long as he can come down from the residual emotions of that day, he seems like the obvious bet.
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As for the weird pick, give me Davis Riley. He’s been fairly bad this year, with just one made cut, but he obviously jives with this course, having notched two top-tens in four tries. He’s my dark horse.
10. Rogue Non-Golf Thought: The Grocery Store Blues
Like many modern people, we get our groceries delivered to our front door now, and in theory this is nice time-saving convenience. But lately I’ve started feeling this sense of nostalgia for the old days when I’d be walking the aisles, loading up on food, and just generally having a more direct hand in feeding myself. It’s not exactly hunting down my own sustenance, but some connection has been severed there, and I think it’s bad. Even when I do go to the grocery store for a single item, I feel similarly alienated by the self checkout, despite the fact that yes, it’s way easier. We’re depriving ourselves of micro-human interactions, folks! It’s taking a secret spiritual toll! Walk the aisles again! Get your food bagged by a sullen teen! Drop several bags on the way to the door because you tried to be a hero and carry too many! This is the human experience!
I will probably do none of this because inertia has conquered my soul, but I am sad about it.
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