Rory’s sacred turf, Cam the Terminator, and boring/interesting Quail: 10 things for the Truist Championship

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Here’s a question: How many top 20 players have to drop out of a signature event before it’s no longer fun?

RELATED: Bryson DeChambeau says he’ll focus on YouTube if LIV Golf ends, takes shots at PGA Tour

I ask this in the context of a seemingly more important question facing the PGA Tour ahead of 2027, which is, if you’re going to make the entire calendar signature/elevated events, how do you compel guys like Rory McIlroy to actually show up?

We have to wait on that answer, but in the meantime, we can ask where the threshold is. Last week at Doral, you had three of the top 10 missing (Rory, Fitzpatrick, Spaun) along with Bobby Mac and Ludvig Åberg from the next 10. And it was fine! Yes, it would have been better with them, but there were enough stars there to make it fun, and we had Young and Scheffler in the final group.

It’s the same thing this week, in my opinion, as we’re missing Scottie, Morikawa, Henley and Si Woo from the top 20. Despite losing the world No.1, you’d probably take that trade with last week to get Rory and Fitzpatrick back, but regardless, that doesn’t feel like a death blow at all. What’s my point, you ask? Well, maybe that the signature model can sustain a decent amount of rolling absences throughout the year, as long as they don’t all happen at the same time. (But also, Scottie and Rory need to co-ordinate like they’re the only two doctors at a rural clinic to make sure they’re not off at the same time.)

Here are 10 things for the Truist Championship, our appetiser for the PGA!

1. Rory owns this town

We may as well start with the obvious – this is Rory’s turf. Last year before the PGA Championship at Quail Hollow, we made a video about how wildly dominant he has been throughout his career at the Charlotte course, and you can watch it here. But here were my favourite stats (not taking last year’s PGA into account, where he was very much not himself, got pinged for a non-conforming driver, and finished 47th):

+ Ten top-10s in 14 tries (this is more impressive for me than the four wins).
+ The course is basically tailor-made for his game, but he somehow (per DataGolf) gains about a stroke. more per round than even his own very high expectation.
+ He owns the Strokes Gained career totals on seven of the course’s 18 holes.
+ He had the greatest final round in PGA Tour history here, in 2010.

The fact that driving is so important there, and there are still so many approaches from longer than 160 metres, feeds right into his strengths – the further you are from the hole on the second shot, the better he gets. He also just feels good there; he’s friends with the president of the club, he got his first PGA Tour win there and the tournament is usually played during his birthday week. At Quail, everything is constantly coming up Rory.

2. But Cameron Young has become a terminator

When I watched Cameron Young win his first PGA Tour event last August in Greensboro, I was a little taken aback because he looked so invincible. It was giving off those elite vibes you only see every once in a while, where the firepower is so off-the-charts you start wondering how good he can be. That was tempered by the fact that he’d had trouble winning before, and it felt very premature to tag him with the “next big thing” label.

Since then, he was the only American bright spot at the Ryder Cup, he won the Players Championship with incredible clutch play at the end that included the greatest drive we’ve maybe ever seen and he just crushed everyone – including Scottie Scheffler – at a signature event. We are no longer tempering; this man feels like a superstar in waiting.

Or, maybe we’re tempering a little, because he missed a big chance to win the Masters and looked uncomfortable that Sunday at Augusta National en route to a 73. But that’s the last big question: can he do it at a major? Because at Doral, the driving and the putting alone were absurd enough to warrant some pretty intense comparisons.

Long story short, I wished aloud last week for a Young–Scheffler duel on Sunday at Doral, and kinda/sorta got it, so this time I’m invoking whatever powers I’ve been granted to get Young and Rory going down to the wire at Quail.

3. Quail Hollow is boring in a kind of interesting way

As a North Carolina guy (transplant/carpetbagger, but I’ve been here for more than 15 years now, so I’m counting it), I wish I liked Quail more than I do. There’s a certain drab, repetitive quality to it, and on an aesthetic level it’s made worse by the grotesque mansions lining the fairways, a byproduct of huge amounts of banking money and zero taste.

But what makes Quail Hollow dull – a seemingly unending stretch of long, punishing holes – makes it sort of a fascinating test of who can fight the war of attrition best and for longest. Do you have power? Can your power hold up over long stretches? Everyone can bomb, but can you bomb straight-ish for four days?

When Rory says that a ball rollback would favour him, I think Quail is his best proof – when everything is punishingly long, this guy will kill you because he never bends or breaks. Three of the 20 hardest holes on the PGA Tour last year were at Quail, (ranking ninth, 11th and 18th most difficult), and though two are par 4s and one a par 3, they’re basically the same hole.

In fact, they’re the last three holes on the course – the so-called “Green Mile” – and it’s the toughest three-hole stretch by far on tour every year (as recently as 2024, the 18th was the literal hardest hole on the entire calendar, and the only one where players averaged half a shot over par).

It’s not the most fascinating design you’ll ever see, but it will absolutely wear you down.

4. Ranking the sponsor’s exemptions

Why? – Tony Finau: I mean, I guess I understand why – he’s a big name – but it has been struggle central for Big Tone, and the last signature event they let him into, the RBC Heritage, he finished DFL by a mile.

Double Why? – Mackenzie Hughes: I do understand that these exemptions involve partnerships and connections and all that, but I refuse to stop gawping when it doesn’t immediately make sense.

Solid – Webb Simpson: Local boy, in the Ryder Cup captaincy pipeline, so… sure. Yeah.

Nice – Max Homa: Previous winner here, twice, fun guy, shown flashes of competence lately. This is how you use a sponsor’s exemption.

5. The Jordan Spieth Sadness Index (JSSI)

I’m raising it from a 7.6 to a 9.8. Do you realise what this guy just did to us? Do you realise what he’s putting us through? He hit all the beats of a comeback story early this year, albeit a bit stop-and-go, and then he shot a beautiful 65 on Thursday at Doral to sit just one shot off Young’s lead. This was going to be it. And then? AND THEN?? Dead even the rest of the way. Finished right where he left off, seven-under, tied for 18th, with us, his loyal fans, left to limp off licking our wounds again. The Saturday 75 was especially brutal. And what makes this so hard is that he left us still kinda hopeful, but also more broken than ever. Now we have to sit here wondering if that 65 meant anything, or if we’re just doomed. This is hell.

6. Could Xander be warpathin’?

I’m just saying… two runner-ups at Quail in ’23 and 24, loves the course and has been lurking all year with top-10s in the Players, the Masters and seemingly everywhere else. We’re not talking about Xander very much in 2026 – his 2025 season was an effective Men In Black-style memory eraser – but it really can’t be long until he’s the X-Man again. He’s just a little behind his 2024 pace in both SG: Tee to Green and SG: Putting, but not as far as you might think.

7. Golf Tweet of the Week: The Alex Fitz haters are crying

From Golf Digest‘s own Alex Myers:

Yes! Fitzpatrick was phenomenal at Doral, finishing T-9, and as someone who thinks it’s completely fine that we have one tournament a year where you can win with a partner and get a long tour exemption, it was cool to see him stuff it in the haters’ faces. It was amazing how fast everyone’s enjoyment of the great finish at the Zurich, and the brothers winning together, boomeranged into petty whining about Alex’s exemption. It literally happens once per year! It’s fine! I hope he wins the next three majors.

8. One Normie Pick, One Weird Pick

I’m taking Young for a back-to-back over Rory on the normie side (my words last week: “I’m rocking with Cam Young for my normie pick, even though it feels like the absolute worst Scheffler will finish is third”… please pat me on the back), and for the weird pick, let’s go with Keith Mitchell. His form is just so-so, but he led here after round one at the PGA last year, and he’s got two top-10s in the past. Isn’t it about time for a weird, out-of-nowhere signature winner?

9. Rogue Golf Thought – Rahm’s deal proves LIV and its players have no leverage

This is late-breaking as I’m writing, but apparently Jon Rahm has made peace with the DP World Tour, agreeing to a deal where he pays his old fines and plays five events on tour (he wanted four, they wanted six, and if you want a breakdown of the entire fight, I’ve got you covered). That’s a big win for the DPWT and a win for the European Ryder Cup team who won’t have to worry about Rahm being a hold-out next year. Five events represents a nominal concession (and one the DPWT probably didn’t have to give), it was probably worth it just to ink the deal.

What it actually represents is another sign that these guys on LIV who didn’t bail out are already desperate for a soft landing, and I’d wager a hefty bet that we’re getting a return to the PGA Tour announcement soon. This reads a lot like a guy securing his near future as his league supposedly collapses, and PGA Tour chief executive Brian Rolapp isn’t one to miss a chance to deal a killing blow to his rival. Unlesssss… he can’t get out of his contract, and then he’s praying like hell that LIV folds this year and doesn’t linger on in some diminished form, keeping him in golf purgatory for another few years.

10. Rogue Non-Golf Thought: I need to start eating more hummus

Every time I have hummus, I love it. It’s such a reliable, tasty dip, and yet I never have it in my house. Plus, it’s made from chickpeas, which will not kill you, unlike every other food in my house. My wife brought home some red pepper hummus the other day, I housed half of it with pretzels in 10 minutes, and this has opened my eyes. It’s time for a major life change – I’m a hummus guy now, and nobody can stop me. (But I will still never eat a disgusting olive.)