Sam Burns Defends His Valspar Championship Title

We’ll get to the golf in a second, but we first have to congratulate the St. Peter’s Peacocks for both having the best mascot at the NCAA Tournament and making the Sweet 16. Good stuff from the 15-seed!

Bermuda Burns

Much to the chagrin of reptiles everywhere, Sam Burns returned to the Copperhead Course at Innisbrook Golf Resort and defended his Valspar Championship title. He overcame a three-shot deficit on Sunday and in the second hole of a playoff against Davis Riley rolled in a 32-footer to win. The 25-year-old has now won three times in the past year and broken into the top 10 of the Official World Golf Ranking for the first time in his career.

Burns is sometimes called “Bermuda Burns” for his strong play on Bermuda grass, which is found on many Florida golf courses. Six of Burns’s seven career top-three finishes on the PGA Tour have come on Bermuda-grass greens. True to form, he lit up this year’s Florida swing: T-9 at Bay Hill, T-26 at TPC Sawgrass (T-2 through 54 holes), and now a second consecutive Valspar win. He’s a threat on any golf course, but keep an especially close eye on Bermuda Burns whenever he visits the South.

What hurts the most…

Burns’s main victim this weekend was Davis Riley, a PGA Tour rookie who won twice on the Korn Ferry Tour last year. A third-round 62 at Innisbrook vaulted Riley, who had two top 20s on the season prior to this week, to the 54-hole lead. A triple bogey on Sunday cost him dearly, but it wasn’t the sole reason he fell short.

Riley is statistically one of the weaker iron players on the PGA Tour, and this week—while he was top five in Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee, SG: Around-the-Green, and SG: Putting—he lost about 2.5 shots to the field on approach. Strong iron play is crucial to consistency on the PGA Tour, so we’ll see if Riley can tighten things up in that category. He has a beautiful swing, after all.

The Latest from The Fried Egg

ICYMI – Fried Egg Guides: Pacific Dunes Roundtable – The first edition of Fried Egg Guides, a new video format from The Fried Egg, debuted last week. In this episode, Garrett Morrison, Andy Johnson, and Will Knights sit down at Bandon Dunes Golf Resort to discuss Tom Doak’s Pacific Dunes.

The Shotgun Start – Bermuda Burns survived the snake pit and the boys are thrilled. Listen on iTunes and Spotify.

Results

Justin Thomas (T-3), Matt Fitzpatrick (T-5), and Sahith Theegala were among the other notables in the top 10 at the Valspar Championship.

Shaun Norris overcame a rocky start to his final round at the Steyn City Championship to earn his first DP World Tour trophy.

Carl Yuan edged Peter Uihlein with a birdie on the first playoff hole at the Chitimacha Louisiana Open on the Korn Ferry Tour.

PGA Tour players aren’t the only ones holding their noses and taking Saudi Arabia’s money: Georgia Hall won the third annual Aramco Saudi Ladies International on Sunday.

Quick Hooks

Local law enforcement may be close to identifying the cause of the fire that destroyed the Oakland Hills clubhouse. More from Emma Stein of the Detroit Free Press

Bryson DeChambeau hasn’t played a PGA Tour event in nearly two months, but as of now he’s in the field for this week’s WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play.