Seth

Reeves

Reeves opened on the backside this morning and had a colorful scorecard working out of the gate as he did battle with windy conditions. The big-hitting lefty traded three birdies with four bogeys before calming down at the turn. From there, he eased home with a trio of birdies and six pars. The 30-year-old arrived with missed cuts in three of his last five starts but also finished of T11 or better in four of his last eight starts. His 2-under 69 tally currently sits 4.55 shots better than the field average today.

This was the 30-year-old’s second appearance and second top 10, joining a career-best T7 during his rookie campaign three years ago. It’s also his second career top 10 in 28 events, and earns him an exemption into this coming week’s Shriners. The Georgia Tech alum, who became a new dad a couple of months ago, posted laps of 71-66, career-low 63 and 69, totaled one eagle and 21 birdies versus four bogeys, and ranked 4th in SG: Off-the-Tee (4.742), 47th in SG: Approach (0.257), 37th in SG: Around (0.281), 11th in SG: Putting (4.562), and 15th SG: Tee-to-Green (5.278).

The 30-year-old, who opened with 71-66 and has a 2-month-old baby in tow this week, is making his second appearance after a career-best T7 on debut in 2019 as a rookie, where he was T8 after 54 holes (67-70-70-68). That’s his lone top 10 in 27 career TOUR events thus far, and is back on the main stage for a second time after finishing 39th in the Korn Ferry Tour Priority Ranking last season. The Georgia Tech alum’s 63 today is a new career low in 74 rounds, previously 64/R1 of the 2019 Shriners (finished 73rd), and featured one eagle-3 (from 6'0") and eight birdies against a lone bogey. On 10 (of 14) fairways and 13 greens in regulation, he posted 1.157 SG: Off-the-Tee, 1.208 SG: Approach, 0.250 SG: Around, and 3.485 SG: Putting, converting four conventional birdie chances from between 10 and 43 feet. See link below to post-round comments.

The big hitter out of Georgia Tech got into this week’s field through Monday Qualifying. He’s played one full season on the PGA TOUR and went 11-for-25 before dropping back to the Korn Ferry circuit. His results weren’t inspiring there either, until August when he won the 2020 Pinnacle Bank Championship. He commented after the win, “When you struggle as much as I have, you have all those doubts. This tells me I can do it. If I can do it once, I can do it again.” Reeves added another big finish since then, posting a T3 at the Korn Ferry Tour Championship but arrives on the heels of MC-T59-MC since then.

The big hitter piped 13-of-14 fairways en route to gaining 1.5 strokes off-the-tee. His game stalled out from there as he landed just 13 greens in regulation and lost 0.639 strokes putting. His longest (of three) birdie conversions came from just 5'2" (par-3 8th). Despite the ho-hum round, Reeves currently finds himself in a share of 8th place. He will likely land outside the top 10 once the afternoon wave finishes their day but this is the best position he’s found himself in since the calendar flipped to 2019. In 11 starts this year he’s been outside the top 50 thru 36 holes in 10 of them with the best previous position being a T37 thru R2 at the Corales (finished T18). It’s not his first taste of mid-week success though as he was T5 thru 36 at the Sanderson Farms last fall and T15 thru 36 at the Shriners. He’d go on to finish T7 and 73rd in those two events, respectively.

Reeves has rolled up a 308.6 yard average to rank 13th in Driving Distance, but where it lands is another story. He is a dismal 181st on Tour in Driving Accuracy Percentage (56.19 percent). Reeves is also terrible in Par 4 Scoring Average (4.08), ranking 184th, struggling in another key area needed for success at TPC San Antonio. Add in the fact he is a poor 193rd in Strokes Gained: Around-the-Green, and it is likely going to be an uphill battle for Reeves this week in his first attempt on this course.

The big-hitting Georgia Tech product gained more than 2 strokes off the tee today. His short game was sharp, as well, knocking home a pair from just outside 11 feet in addition to a hole out from the fringe (37'7"). The PGA TOUR rookie arrived fresh off a top 10 at the Sanderson Farms Championship. He gained 10.3 strokes tee-to-green in that result, so he’s certainly swinging some hot sticks at the moment. The field was reduced to 132 golfers this year to prevent this kind of suspension from happening but they still failed to get everyone through in time. The second round will start as normal on Friday morning (7:00 a.m. local time).

The big-hitting lefty was lights out on day one (bogey-free 64). He couldn’t maintain that level of play on Friday as he left himself too many knee-knockers. By day’s end he missed six putts from the 6-to-12 foot range, losing 0.760 strokes putting on the day. He did save par from 29'11" at the seventh, so it wasn’t all bad. As for his ball-striking, he stiffed a 194-yard approach to inside four feet at the par-3 fifth. His four other birdies were also set up with wedges. After gaining 6.347 strokes over the field in round one, he lost 2.707 strokes to the field today, a nine-shot swing. Despite today’s stumble, Reeves is still well positioned at T8 on the live leaderboard.

This was the Georgia Tech alum’s second career event, arriving off a T69 at the Safeway three weeks ago. After opening with 67-70-70, he began T8, eight back, and hit seven (of 14) fairways and 13 greens in regulation, The 21-year-old lost 0.366 strokes on approach but gained 1.074 off-the-tee and 1.379 around-the-green. He squared a lone bogey-5 at hole 8 (3-putt from 34'7"), camouflaged by five circles at 2, 5, 6, 11 and 14, two from between 10 and 15 feet. The Georgia native and resident recorded 1.769 putts per GIR and 0.164 SG: Putting. For the week, he tallied one eagle and 19 birdies against eight bogeys and ranked 5th in SG: Tee-to-Green (10.280) though 56th (of 72) in SG: Putting (-1.067).

The 21-year-old arrives off a T69 at the Safeway Open three weeks ago, where he received some accolades for dialing up a closing eagle-3 to make the 36-hole cut on the number. This is his second career TOUR start and began the season 24th on the Web.com Tour priority list. On seven (of 14) fairways and 13 greens in regulation, the Georgia Tech alum offset two squares at holes 7 and 8 (3-putt from 19'5"), with four circles at 3, 10 (from 19'7"), 13 and 14, registering a pedestrian 1.846 putts per GIR and -1.317 SG: Putting with 30 total putts. He posted 1.129 SG: Off-the-Tee and 1.731 SG: Approach, and presently is No. 1 in SG: Tee-to-Green with a cumulative 7.400.