Richy

Werenski

Werenski entered the week with six straight finishes outside of the top 45. He also missed the cut in his only previous appearance at TPC Craig Ranch (2022). He flipped that script today, piping 13-of-14 fairways and landing 16 GIR to get the job done with his ball-striking skills. “I played good in the practice round, too, made a bunch of birdies, and I don’t know, I’m seeing the greens and stuff are matching up well with my eye, and like I said, I just feel like I’m hitting it pretty solid. I feel like it’s going to be hard to get in too much trouble.” The Georgia Tech product entered the week at just 154th in the FedExCup standings.

Werenski has missed the cut in nine of his last 10 starts with a T44 finish in the other event. There was no form to speak of but he’s flipping that script early in the week at Detroit Golf Club. The recipe has been steady iron play (15th in strokes gained approach) and a hot putter (14th in putting). Can he maintain this pace for two more days? Fans of course history would tend to think so as he’s now been inside of the top 25 after nine of his last 10 rounds played at Detroit GC.

Friday was snake-bit from the get-go, beginning with persistent fog that delayed the start by 2 hours, and at press time, there’s yet to be any golfers who have turned in a completed scorecard for Round 2. The 156-man field, already lightened by two mid-tourney WD’s earlier, has reduced by two more, jettisoning World No. 848 David Drysdale, who had yet to hit a shot in R2, and World No. 422 Richy Werenski (illness), who was 2-under thru 10 holes (4 birdies, 1 double), and sizing up a fourth straight birdie at 11 (from 9'5") when the horn blew at 12:20 pm and players were removed from the course. For Drysdale, the 47-year-old Scot who has yet to win on the European (DP World) Tour in 559 events, he was making his first PGA TOUR start (third overall) since a T27 at the 2017 Open, while Werenski, a runner-up here three tries ago in 2018, is a mid-tourney WD for the first time in 156 events. Werenski, who opened with a 4-over 76, arrived 194th in the FedExCup standings but is fully exempt thru the 2022-23 season from his lone TOUR victory at the 2020, opposite-field Barracuda, so he has that in his back pocket if he fails to finish in the Top 125 in the season-long points race.

Signing for rounds of 65-69-68-67 last year, Uihlein and Werenski were dominate in Rounds 2 and 4 which featured the Alternate-Shot format. Playing those 36-holes in 8-under, they topped the field in that category, but unfortunately could not do enough during the Best-Ball portion of the tournament and fell one-stroke outside the two-team playoff. This year, they appear to be flying under the radar as they are listed at +15000 at PointsBet Sportsbook. The Oklahoma State product has played consistently since late February, connecting on six straight cuts between the Korn Ferry Tour and the PGA Tour, including a runner-up finish at the Chitimacha Louisiana Open. Werenski on the other hand has been more up-and-down after a dreadful start to his 2022. Missing his first five cuts of the year, the 30-year-old has since made 3-of-5 with finishes of T-28 and T-21 sprinkled in.

This is the 30-year-old’s fifth appearance, missing his prior four cuts, and before today, was a cumulative 23-over at the Copperhead Course while his best rounds were 70 (x2). It’s his first time in the top 10 after R1 since the 2020 3M Open 48 starts ago, where he was the 18-hole leader (and a 36-hole and 54-hole co-leader) before finishing T3 (63-67-68-70). On eight (of 13) fairways and 13 greens in regulation, the South Florida resident lost 0.348 strokes around but gained 0.423 off-the-tee, 1.186 approaching and 3.649 with the flat stick. He penciled six birdies at 10, 14, 17, 1, 5 and 9, two from between 10 and 26 feet, and also saved par two times from between eight and 10 feet. The Georgia Tech alum checked in off seven missed cuts in his last eight, interrupted only by a T28 at the opposite-field Puerto Rico Open two starts ago, where he was T14 after R1 (69-71-69-71).

Debuting with a T-50 finish in 2016, Werenski has followed up his initial start at El Camaleon with a T-41 in 2017 and a T-3 finish in 2018. Having not played at Mayakoba in three years, the 29-year-old hopes to pick up where he left off on the Greg Norman design. Possessing a 68.50 scoring average in 12 rounds, the former Georgia Tech Yellow Jacket comes in having made the cut in his last start at the Shriners Children’s Open.

The 29-year-old Werenski has made just one cut in his last seven starts and has missed the last three straight. He told media on Wednesday that while he’s not panicked about his end-of-season status (he’s No. 114 in the FedExCup standings), he would like to “get that final little push going into the playoffs.” To that end, Werenski articulated his strategy coming into the tournament, which features a modified stableford scoring system: “You might play a little bit more aggressive. If you do happen to make a bogey, it’s not the end of the world. It’s kind of worth a little bit of the risk. I wouldn’t say I’m going to go out playing, hitting everything out of every pin and playing super aggressive, but compared to your normal week, I would say 20 percent more aggressive, if I had to say. So, you kind of pick and choose, but it’s nice to know that you kind of have a little bit of cushion to take that extra risk.” Last year, Werenski defeated Troy Merritt by one point for his first career PGA Tour win. Entering the final round seven points off Merritt’s lead, Werenski closed with an eagle and three birdies over his last seven holes to earn 11 points and finish with a total of 39. On the season, Werenski is 14-for-28 with two top 10s, finishing T-4 at the Arnold Palmer Invitational and third in the Zurich Classic with partner Peter Uihlein. He’s made the cut three times at the Barracuda, with the win in 202o and a T-2 in 2017.

The Georgia Tech alum, who remained T6 on the board, played with Georgia alum Kevin Kisner today and will be with him again on Sunday out of the fourth-to-last pairing. He owns 11 top 10s in 127 prior events, a whopping seven of those going for top 3s, but the lone win to date came at last season’s opposite-field Barracuda 28 starts ago, where he came from 7 points back (T5) with 5-under 66 (+13 pts.) to win by 1 point over 54-hole leader Merritt (+5 pts. in R4). The Massachusetts native ticked five birdies versus two bogeys today on eight (of 14) fairways and 15 greens in regulation, losing 1.965 strokes off the tee but gaining 1.982 on approach and 0.595 on the green. At the three-quarter pole, he ranks 74th (of 77) in SG: Off-the-Tee (-1.895) but 18th in SG: Approach (3.139), 16th in SG: Around (1.797), and 8th in SG: Putting (3.854).

The 29-year-old was in the top 10 after 36 holes last year as well (T3) before fading to T21 (67-66-72-70). Making his 25th start of the season, this is just his second time (individually) in the midpoint top 10, first since T6 at the ZOZO @ SHERWOOD back in October, where he eventually finished T57 (72-61-72-76). On eight (of 14) fairways and 16 greens in regulation, the South Florida resident lost strokes off the tee (-0.658) and around (-0.051), but gained 1.674 approaching and 2.402 on the green, despite a 3-putt bogey at 7 from 53'1" for his lone dropped shot of the lap.

Werenski is making his first start at the event this week but he did play the course last year at the Workday Charity Open, snagging a 35th-place finish while gaining 6.3 strokes on approach and 3.5 strokes around-the-green. More recently, he was going through a putting slump, losing strokes with the flat stick in five straight events before gaining 0.9 strokes putting at the PGA Championship and 4 strokes putting last week at the Charles Schwab Challenge. Werenski sits at 94th in the FedExCup race with five top 25s in 21 starts and he’s well-positioned to make the Playoffs for the fourth time in five seasons played on TOUR.