Monday’s TGL triple-header was a great national introduction to golf’s noble new experiment. A somersaulting Justin Thomas and his Atlanta Drive staged a thrilling comeback over Los Angeles, Matt Ryan and Serena Williams were showing out and talking smack, The Bay stunned Rory McIlroy’s Boston squad with a clutch hammer drop. TGL’s slate continues Tuesday, with Tiger Woods playing his first golf since the death of his mother, Kultida Woods.
How to watch today’s TGL match
New York is the only TGL club without a point thus far. Jupiter has two points and is just above the playoff cut line. (The leading team, The Bay Golf Club, has six.) Teams get two points for a win in regulation or overtime and one point for an overtime loss. Woods, Jupiter’s captain and the league’s co-founder, will square off with New York’s Cameron Young to begin the proceedings. Jupiter sends Kevin Kisner against Rickie Fowler in the second matchup, and Tom Kim faces Matt Fitzpatrick in the third.
It’s early in the 15-match season, but another points-less outing will put New York deep in the hole for March 24-25’s final series. Fowler and friends probably should’ve beaten Atlanta in their last outing after hitting 70 percent of fairways to the opponent’s 50. Young leads the league in average driver distance at 338.8 yards. Jupiter’s Kim and New York’s Xander Schauffele are two of TGL’s six competitors with 100 percent fairway hits thus far.
Tuesday night will be a meaningful round for Woods, who has been mourning the loss of a matriarch and mentor.
The President’s Day triple-header marked a cool modification of the “hammer” rule.” The hammer makes a given hole worth two points instead of one, and declining the opponent’s challenge means conceding the hole. In the first few weeks of match play, each side only had one hammer to play. Now, teams have three at their disposal. It’s still only one hammer per hole per team, but that does allow for both competitors to throw it simultaneously and make a given hole worth up to three points.
The Athletic’s Gabby Herzig spoke with Rose Zhang on her investment in TGL’s Bay team and potential collaboration with the LPGA: “I think it’s a really good platform to expose different parts of the game, show people’s personalities and have a little bit of fun. Some of my non-golf friends are like, ‘Oh, this thing is like a whole stadium and you’re playing golf indoors? What does that even mean?’ You’ve got all these crazy lights — it basically turns into a show. It’s a good source of entertainment for those who aren’t exposed to it. You don’t get to see golfers’ personalities because we don’t talk. The entertaining side of all of this is that players are mic’d up and get to interact with fans and each other. People like to see competition and camaraderie but some kind of flare to each personality.”
(Photo of Tiger Woods: Carmen Mandato / TGL via Getty Images)
