[Photo: Jordan Bank]
Golfpocalypse is a 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 [email protected]. We’ll publish the best emails here.
Let’s play a word association game with the John Deere Classic – a tournament that’s easy to overlook but has been a fixture on the PGA Tour, in one form or another, for as long as I’ve been alive. In fact, it’s now more than 50 years old. Here are a few things that immediately come to mind when someone says “John Deere Classic”:
- It’s at TPC Deere Run, which is either in Iowa or somewhere near the border of about four different states.
- Zach Johnson and Steve Stricker have combined for at least 27 wins.
- It’s close to The Open.
- The winner is always about a million under par.
- Spieth.
How’d I do? Well, TPC Deere Run is actually in Illinois. It is very close to Iowa (and the tournament was played there in its early days), but it’s not near four states. I was thinking of the Quad Cities area along the Mississippi River, which sits right by the course. Zach Johnson and Steve Stricker have combined for four wins (Stricker won three straight from 2009-11), the winning score is indeed ridiculously low, The Open is only two weeks away, and Jordan Spieth has won here twice. Not bad.
I know everyone’s attention is starting to turn towards links golf next week, but let’s give this underrated event its moment. Here we go.
1. Let’s get EXCITED about the field!
Any top-10 players? Nope.
What about some of the in-form or entertaining names just outside the top 10 – Hovland, Xander, Koepka or Burns? Also no.
Any Europeans? Actually, there are 11, which feels surprisingly low, although I have no point of comparison. None of the big names are here unless you’re a massive Pontus Nyholm fan (which I might be one day, but not yet).
However, there are still some intriguing players to watch:
- Chris Gotterup – The highest-ranked player in the field (No. 14). He caught fire around this time last year, winning the Scottish Open before finishing third at The Open.
- Matt Wallace – Runner-up in Italy last week and quietly putting together a solid season, including a T-2 at the Valero Texas Open.
- Max Homa – I just have a feeling…
- Jackson Koivun – Professional debut for an amateur who’s been nothing short of sensational.
- Rickie Fowler – I could barely finish typing his name, but I’m old-school. It wasn’t that long ago he rattled off three straight top-10s, all in Signature Events.
Am I forgetting someone?
Oh yeah…
2. The Jordan Spieth Sadness Index (JSSI)
Last time we checked in, we were sitting at 4.9 before the CJ Cup.
Now?
Folks, I’m taking the rare step of pushing this thing to 11.6.
Yes, the scale is technically out of 10, but these are dark times.
Since then he’s missed the cut at the Memorial, limped to T-56 at Shinnecock and then finished 66th out of 72 players at the Travelers.
To make matters worse, I re-watched his final six holes at Royal Birkdale in 2017.
Seriously, go watch it.
From the train wreck tee shot on 13, to the half-hour adventure working out how to make bogey from the driving range, to one of the greatest major finishes you’ll ever see… it’s the full Spieth experience.
It’s also a painful reminder of what we’re missing.
So yes, we’re breaking the scale.
Anyway, Spieth’s in the field this week.
I don’t expect much, which is probably the healthiest mindset in 2026…
…which obviously means he’s going to win.
Actually, now that I expect him to win, he’ll probably miss the cut.
Unless I expect him to miss the cut…
(spends the next eight hours trapped in a Spieth thought loop)
3. Ranking the Sponsor’s Exemptions
Can you believe Brian Rolapp is getting rid of sponsor exemptions?
Does he care nothing for this very niche feature in Golf Digest tournament previews?
How am I supposed to feed my family?
Anyway, let’s enjoy them while we still can.
- Who? Ryan Voois – Very good college golfer.
- Who? Preston Stout – Also a very good college golfer.
- Why? Dylan Frittelli – Does he still wear those unusual glasses?
- Interesting: Mason Howell – Eight professional starts, eight made cuts.
What are we going to do without this?
4. What do we need to know about TPC Deere Run?
It’s very easy, particularly the three par-5s, which Tour players ate alive last year, going about 1.5 strokes under par on average cumulatively, which is a lot when you consider that it counts even players who missed the cut. The other holes aren’t much harder, and as Michael Kim said on Twitter, the key to winning is “birdies and lots of them,” and it’s the kind of course the players themselves love, which should make you suspicious because the players are spiritual weaklings who want to make eagle on every hole. However, the course is not uninteresting—it looks great (nice drone fly-over with hole analysis here), and it can punish you if you’re wild off the tee, especially after a few recent changes that included some bunker shifting and fairway tightening. If you’re a Deere Stan, you’ll enjoy this ode from Adam Woodward at The Fried Egg.
Other fun facts, courtesy of the Tour: Apparently they just lost a century-old tree, and also this used to be an Arabian horse farm.
5. Big Dig Appreciation
I’ve never been to this event, but from Woodward at The Fried Egg, I learned that every year they let the players do a Big Dig with John Deere machinery. I would give anything to dig up the earth with a backhoe for an hour in the Quad Cities, or just to watch Keegan Bradley and Zach Johnson drive one into a ditch and then dig themselves deeper.
6. Golf Tweet of the Week: THIS IS A SICK JOKE
Thank you Skratch for this, which captures the Spieth zeitgeist:
“This is a sick joke.”
Spieth is going through it. 😬 pic.twitter.com/kYduFYJklT
— Skratch (@Skratch) June 26, 2026
7. Second Golf Tweet of the Week: Scottie and the Dog Man
I did a quick post about this yesterday, but I seriously can’t stop laughing about it, and because we’re at the John Deere, I’m allowing myself a second tweet:
https://twitter.com/HardFactorPat/status/2071348605076607267
This is the start of a sports movie where the dog sees Scottie, starts to take some putts in his free time and ten years later becomes the first non-human to win the Masters.
8. One Normie Pick, One Weird Pick
My normie pick is Jacob Bridgeman, but I’m going to go with my gut and ride with Max Homa on the weird pick. The signals are strong from the universe, and one of these days it has to be right. (I’m going to allow myself a medium normie-weird pick too: Harry Higgs. Big time “he was going to quit the game, now he won a tour event!” energy.)
9. Rogue Golf Thought: I think the Tour changes are going to make these events better
I know this sounds insane right now, but let’s say for argument’s sake that the John Deere doesn’t get to be one of the championship series events when the Tour’s changes go through in 2028. If they get to be one of the seven events that takes place when there’s no championship series event, it almost makes them more meaningful and interesting despite not having the world’s best players. I’m not saying your average fan is going to care right away, but it adds some stakes where right now your Cognizants and Canadian Opens and John Deeres are just placeholders.
Now, if they’re one of the 13 or so events that have to co-exist on a weekend with a Championship Series event? Yeah, then you’re screwed.
10. Rogue Non-Golf Thought: Science must defeat mustard water
I’m a huge mustard guy, and I love it all—the classic yellow, Dijon, mustard mixed with hot sauce, honey mustard. Even spicy brown has its place, despite the fact that it kinda sucks. If you ever go on a diet, yellow mustard will save your life, because it’s the only thing in the world that is both flavourful and not terrible for you. I glorify the mustard seed.
What I hate is when you don’t use a bottle of mustard for a while, open it up, and the first squeeze is just all disgusting mustard water. I ruined a sandwich that way just this week, and it leaves me feeling disgusted and unsettled. It’s the food equivalent of watching that Bryson dancing video that No Laying Up won’t stop tweeting out. It takes me 48 hours to get over it, and science should take a break from fixing none of our important problems to defeat it forever.
