Non-Bay Hill Storylines

A busy day in golf is upon us. While most eyes will be fixed on Bay Hill and a stacked leaderboard there, I wanted to give you some great storylines from the events happening in the rest of the golf world. 

There is an opposite field event in Puerto Rico that Tiger Woods might be locked into, a Korn Ferry Tour event with a former top-ranked amateur who has found his form, and the results from both the LPGA and Epson Tour events. 

‍Puerto Rico

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1. Will Tiger Woods be watching? Former Stanford standout and new Sun Day Red ambassador Karl Vilips leads a crowded leaderboard. The Tiger Woods brand signed him very recently, and now he takes a one-stroke lead into the final round, looking for his first win. Will he wear red? 
2. Another Cardinal—Joseph Bramlett, another former Stanford star, is just one back in his second PGA Tour start. Bramlett, who has battled injuries throughout his career, finished 146th in points last season and so has very limited conditional status. Late last year, in an interview, good friend Mav McNealy spoke about the fact that Joseph would be back on Tour full-time soon. Today might be that day. 
3. Amateur Hour—South African Kieron van Wyk would become just the second amateur to go on Tour since 1991 (Nick Dunlap last year). The 157th-ranked Amateur in the world, who is a standout at the College of Charleston, would be an unbelievable story. This is his first PGA Tour event, and although he has an APGA Tour win and has played big amateur events, this is by far the biggest stage of his career. 
4. What's Cooking? Austin Cook made just three cuts in 17 events on the PGA Tour last season and finished 190th in points. This week is his first PGA Tour start of the season, although he has played solidly on the KFT. Last season, this was also his first event and he finished T10, earning a spot in the Valspar. He starts the day just two back of Vilips.
5. Anybody's Game –  NINETEEN players are within four of the lead, including Garrick Higgo, Norman Xiong, Harry Higgs, and Matteo Manassero. 

Another factor to watch as the tournament winds down tomorrow is the top-10s. There are a lot of players around that top 10 who aren't currently in the Valspar field (the top-10 rule wouldn't get them into Players, but transfers to the following week). Players are very aware of the limited number of starts available for conditional members and, therefore, will be very aware of the top-10 number if they aren't battling for the win. 

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Korn Ferry Tour

‍Cole Hammer - This is stating the obvious, but Hammer is a story to watch as he holds a two stroke lead going into the final round. Hammer was a standout amateur with a list including:

• Qualify for the US Open at 15
• World Number 1 Amateur 
• 2019 McCormack Medal Winner
• 2019 & 2021 Walker Cup (winning both)
• 2019 Palmer Cup

And the list goes further, but you get the idea. Hammer has been in the spotlight from a young age, and people marked him as a future shoo-in PGA Tour player. Perhaps it hasn’t been the path he or others expected, but full status on KFT for 2025 and the possibility of his first tour sanctioned win, could be what he needs to take the next step.

Logan McAllister - Tying for the best round of the day on Saturday with a 63 (eight under), McAllister has put himself into contention, three strokes back heading into Sunday. 2023 was McAllister’s first full year on the KFT, and he finished 44th in the standings. At the LECOM Classic in Saratora, Fla., McAllister went into a playoff with Scott Gutchewski. Gutchewski won by holing a putt from all the way across the green. A win is 500 points and a 2nd is 300. McAllister fell 100 points shy of a PGA Tour. Meanwhile, Gutchewski moved onto the PGA Tour by a slim margin of 13 points. That is often the difference between those who narrowly advance and those who don’t. 

McAllister struggled in 2024, finishing 92nd in points, and entered 2025 with conditional status. A solid round tomorrow will solidify the rest of the season for him and could push him up into a solid race for a PGA Tour card. 

Zack Fischer - Fischer remains to this day the only player to win the final stage of Q school twice. He enters Sunday’s final round at T-9, six strokes back of the lead. Fischer narrowly missed a PGA tour card in 2022, finishing 36th in the points. Unfortunately, golf happened, and in 2023, he finished 111th and lost status completely. Fischer played the Americas tour in 2024 with some solid play and advanced again to Final Stage of Q school, playing well enough to earn guaranteed starts once again. After missing the first four cuts of the year, a T-29 in Argentina (when he won on the LA tour) has him trending. 

Bryson Nimmer - Nimmer was a standout collegiate player at Clemson University, ranking in the top 25 in the world when he graduated in 2019. Nimmer has had guaranteed starts on KFT in 2022 and 2023 and failed to finish inside the top 100 in the points in either of those years. Chile is his first start of the year, and he had to make the cut to extend his season. He did just that and some, and is currently T-9 going into the final round. He will not get into the next event off his number alone, so he must finish in the top 25 tomorrow to guarantee his spot in Savannah, Ga., in early April. 

Blaine Hale Jr. - Hale played on the PGA Tour in 2024 after finishing in the top five at the final stage of Q school. Up until then, Hale played developmental mini-tours such as APT and suddenly found himself on the PGA Tour that very next year. Hale struggled and finished outside the top 200 in the FedEx Cup, which had him returning to the second stage of Q school with no guarantees of status on ANY tour. 

He buckled down after rough play throughout 2024 and advanced to the final stage but finished a bit short of guaranteed starts. This is his second event of the year and first made cut. He sits at T-48, and if he wants to get more starts in the future, he will need a solid round to collect as many points as possible before the next reshuffle. 

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LPGA Tour

Rio Takeda shot a final round 64, the best score of the day by three, and breezed to a six shot win over Min Jee Lee. It’s Takeda’s second LPGA win in just six official starts. Add this to her EIGHT (!!!) Japan Tour wins last season, and the 21-year-old will be a force for years to come. 

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Epson Tour

Laetitia Beck is the only Israeli pro golfer in both men’s and women's golf, and captured the first win of her 10-year career. Her bogey-free final round 66 at the Atlantic Beach Classic presented by Access, was good enough for a three shot win. Beck was born in Belgium before moving to Israel, where she won the Israel Open five times. She went to high school in the U.S. and attended Duke. 

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