Trevor Immelman and Rich Gehman join CBS Sports HQ to recap all the action from the 3rd round of the Truist Championship on the PGA Tour.
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We’ve got two tied at the top through 54 holes at the Philly Qriket Club except Straa with a birdie at 17 from length. Straa sitting at 14 under and matched by Shane Lowry with a birdie at the same. Those two comprising her final pairing on Sunday. For more, we say hello to CBS lead golf analyst Trevor Imman who joins us following the third round of play. Trev, the plaque, I believe, reads AW Tillingast, builder of golf courses that endure. What if the Philly Cricket Club tested the power of today’s game on Saturday? Well, the strong winds certainly help, but from a golf course standpoint in true Tillingast fashion, the green complexes, Moose, are just tremendous. I mean, really, really impressive stuff. And you’ve got to be able to position your ball in the right spot. If you get above the hole at all, you’re going to have some issues, particularly with the speeds as fast as what they were today. It was a lot of fun for us to watch. Great to see a golf course that we didn’t know too much about coming into this. So, thoroughly enjoyed that day. Yeah, the bunkering, the complexes. They’re presenting beautifully on screen as well. The play was beautiful of our two at the top in the form of Lowry uh and Straa. And those two will be in our final pairing come Sunday. They didn’t just take that lead, they separated a bit here on Saturday. What stood out from those two rounds to you? Well, Shane really hit the ball well. The two blemishes he made were kind of unforced errors. That’s exactly what he just communicated to Amanda in the interview. Kind of soft bogeies that he made today with just short irons from the fairway. And as far as Sep goes, just the three putt that caused the bogey on 12th from quite short distance when he was actually thinking about trying to make a three there. So, all in all though, they were by far the two most solid players out on the golf course today. Sea has been putting the ball beautifully under other than that three putt. So we uh we’re looking for a fun day tomorrow. The weather is going to be much more scorable, much less wind and so maybe the Chasers can go out there and post a little something, put some heat on those two guys, but uh you know, I don’t see both of them faltering. Uh they’re both proven winners. Se has won this season already. uh RDER Cupers, Ryder Cup teammates, you know, these guys know what it’s like to to play under tough conditions and under extreme pressure. So, I don’t expect both of them to falter. We’ll see if those giving chase can give them something to look at earlier in the day. We will be hyperfocused on the task at hand certainly on Sunday, but we are also 18 holes away from our second major of the season. Trevor, who’s a player you’re keen to see perform and maybe carry some of that momentum to Quail Hollow? Well, I think it’ll be nice for Rory to hit a few more fairways tomorrow. He’s obviously coming in as the the overwhelming favorite to Quail Hollow. He’s just completed the Grand Slam. He’s got everything going his way, but he drove the ball terribly today. Just three fairways. And so, he’s going to want to clean some of that up before he goes to a venue that he’s dominated on throughout his professional career. But Thomas is shaping up. Obviously, Sheffller got the win last week. Bryson got a win last week uh in South Korea. So, uh, all the stars are bringing their A games to the PGA Championship. Uh, this is, uh, this is going to be a fun one down at Co Hollow. Trevor Rumman, appreciation as always. We’ll talk Sunday, pal. Thanks, Moose. A fun Sunday on the way from the Philly Qriket Club. Fresh look at a new venue at the truest because next week we go to the place that we often go at this point in the schedule. Well, that’s Quail Hollow for the PGA Championship on CBS and streaming on Paramount Plus. Just like final round action of the truest on [Music] Sunday. More reaction rolling in here on HQ as Lowry and Straa take to the top of the leaderboard. We go to the top of ours. Rick Gaiman up next. Back on post round here on CBS Sports HQ, taking a look at your leaderboard where Sept Straka and Shane Lowry have lifted and separated three shots clear of what will be your penultimate pairing in Thomas and Mitchell. Keith Mitchell your 18 and 36 hole leader. Didn’t necessarily falter all that much, but didn’t find his stride the way he did the two days prior. As for movers, none bigger than Hideki Matsuyama carding a seven under 63 to eject his name into the conversation. CBS Sports Golf analyst Rick Gaiman joins us now. Rick, this was an interesting day of golf and certainly an interesting cast of characters to pick through here. I want to first talk about the golf course because so much was said about this place and its ability to stand up to the best in the world this week. It’s done that the last two days thanks in part to the elements, but how was Philly cricket as challenging as it was here on Saturday? Yeah, you’re right, Joe. Mother Nature gave a little bit of an assist here in the third round, but I I love these green complexes. I I think that you really have to understand what your ball is going to do when it lands on the putting surface and how are you going to access some of these pin locations. You can’t just take it and fly at the full number. This is not a Trackman contest. You do have to hit strong shots into these elevated greens and know what your ball’s going to do on the ground. Now, that’s a challenge at times for these uh top players in the world because that has to be the the length on the scorecard is is not a challenge. The rough in certain spots has given these guys a bit of trouble, but it so far so good. You know, I I I like the way that it looks on television. I like the way that it’s standing up. We’re not getting any outrageous scoring weeks. This has been a very a very good success for Philly Cricket Club. Yeah. This isn’t template golf. And I don’t mean that in the sense of template holes. isn’t just your copy and paste everyday test on tour. It’s something interesting to look at here for the consumer as well. Let’s talk about our leaders beginning with Lowry. It’s been a solid season, but he hasn’t really scared anything at the top of a leaderboard since Pebble. What stood out from this round and how do you project him into Sunday? Yeah, well, just to continue that conversation that we were having, I think Shane Lowry is is one of the better creative golfers that we have on the tour where he does know how to play the ball on the ground. that comes obviously from his uh decades of of Link’s experience and playing overseas that it’s a completely different ballgame over there. And and you’re seeing some of those skills break through here in in the Northeast. And I I love the way that he’s been hitting it. You know, he has really evolved his game into one of a of a positive ball striker over the last handful of years. And what we’ve seen each of the last couple of days, Joe, not not only with the wind, but with the conditions, like you have to be a solid ball striker. You have to hit a heavy golf ball that gets through the wind and and go carries the distance or goes the distance that you want it to go. And Shane Lowry has been very good in the distance control department this week. Yeah, he even probably would tell you he left a couple out there. We’ll see what scoring looks like on Sunday. Should be more receptive for those trying to give chase to those two at the top. Sea has had a nice season and that’s an understatement, a gross one at that. He’s played great golf, has a win to show for it at the Amex, but this is something different in a different type of field. What would it mean for Straka to not only get a second one but become the only multi-winner alongside Rory Mroy this season? Yeah, we are vastly disrespecting Seph Straa I believe, right? I mean, 2023 Ryder Cuppper uh had a decent 2024 and his 2025 has been outstanding. You mentioned it, Joe. The win a bunch of top 25 finishes going headto-head with some of the games best. And I thought this was a very gritty round from Sepra. He usually does a good job of keeping the ball in front of him. He didn’t really do that in the third round and he relied more on the short game and the putter and I look at that skill set and how it could translate over the course of a Sunday where I do think we are going to get some tucked pins. You know, the the wind has dried Philly Cricket uh club out pretty significantly just in the last 24 hours. That that grittiness, that ability to make par, give yourself a couple of opportunities and and hope to roll them in. I think that’s a good uh blueprint for Seraka the rest of the way. But just zooming out, this this has been a phenomenal year for him. He’s almost certainly punched his ticket um to to Beth Paige in a couple of months. Rick, I I did my best to make you proud on the Golf on CBS podcast earlier this week when asked who can win this tournament. I included Keith Mitchell on that list of players simply because it felt like a match, the oldworld feel of Mitchell and this golf course. And I did follow that by saying it’s going to it’s going to look great through 18. Well, it looked great through 36 and maybe a little bit of that doubt creeping in here through 54. Where’s the disconnect between weekday Keith and weekend Keith because we’ve seen such great play and here sort of struggles to get going and even the demeanor seemed tighter than the llays affair of days one and two. I I admittedly don’t know, Joe. And I think it is that’s okay cuz I’m not sure he does either. Yeah. And I think that’s where I’m going here. I mean I I I think this is and I hate to try to psycho analyze these guys. I I think it has to be mental at this point. I mean, he is so good on Thursday. He’s pretty good on Friday. He gets himself in the mix seemingly week in and week out. And like you said, it’s like a different guy shows up at the golf course. He is no longer excited to be there. He looks tight. He looks frustrated. Once one thing starts going sideways, he cannot turn that ship around. And he also plays a very aggressive game. And when aggression goes sideways, like your score, like you just can’t you just can’t hold on. He just can’t put a good score together on a bad day and keep himself in the mix. So I I hate to say that this is a mental thing for any golfer out there. This game is already hard enough, but Keith Mitchell is too talented, much too talented, and getting himself in too many good positions to be having finishes like this. Yeah, that career win way back at the Honda in a different garb, a different uh let’s say fabric than he’s used to these days. The Cashmere, we’ll see if it could make a push on Sunday. There was a big mover here on Saturday and my eyes go to Hideki Matsyama. Can you tell me just statistically numerically how good 63 was out there today relative to everybody else? Oh, it was splendid. I mean, and he also the the winds kind of lied down in the afternoon just a touch. actually think he played on the more difficult side of things. That includes a bogey on the par five 15th. Joe, he was scorching with the putter immediately out of the gate. He had gained uh more feet of putts in his force first four holes in the third round than he did in the entirety of 18 in the second round. And it did not stop there. I’ll have to run the final numbers, but this is probably going to be a top five putting day in Hideki Matsuyama’s career, which is a lot longer than we think it is. He’s been around for a long time. So, he is, and we’ve seen this time time and time again where uh he can go out and shoot the best round of the day by multiple shots. I I cannot tell you how impressed I was with this 63 even with a couple of squares on the scorecard. Major champions giving chase certainly Hideki Matsuyama and Rory Mroy also in shouting distance. I I do want to pick your brain here about the setup on Sunday and maybe coming at it from this angle of how long does it take for a professional to really learn a place? How many loops around? Is there any surprise that can be presented to them on Sunday or having been out there for a week, it’s sort of we know what it’s going to look like. We are going to get one little nugget. I don’t know if I’m breaking news on this. I I think it’s public at this point, but um that 14th hole is going to play 95 yards, which is going to be the second shortest uh par three in the in the shot link era. So that goes back 20 some odd years. So that’ll be a little bit different. Um to put that into perspective, Joe, it’s not much longer than if you were hitting from the drop zone at at the 17th at TPC Srass, the island green. But no, I I think that there that’ll be a unique feature, but there won’t be any surprises. There is so much data in the game. There is so much research in the game. and with a couple of practice rounds earlier in this week, they should have been prepared for every single facet of this golf course and anything um that a hundred-year-old Tilly could could throw at them. So, I don’t think there’s going to be any surprises. I’m interested to see what the pin positions are. And of course, 14 is going to be the most cute, fun little par three we’ve seen in quite some time. You’ve got my mind on a tangent now. LACC was that the only shorter? That was the that was the one shorter. I think it was 81 yards officially in rounds number three. Remember, they have that it was only a couple yards wide. that narrow green from that angle. But this will be uh second uh short the shortest in the PGA Tour regular events and I believe the second shortest when you throw a major championship. Numbers are numbers. You got to hit the shots. We’ll see what that one looks like. Could be a fun one. Sub 100 yards. Let’s put a pick to it. Rick Gaming. Who gets it done on Sunday? I still like Justin Thomas’ chances here. No offense to the the two tied at the top, but um JT’s feeling it right now. And I I love the way that he is back to being an elite second shot player. I I think that he is still missing too many putts on the right side, but he is calling in whoever his caddy is, whether that’s Matt Minister, whether it’s Joe Grryer, he is calling them in more frequently to help read putts, and that seems to be very valuable for him. He made two bogeies on the par fives in the third round. Um I I think that this could be a really good stretch for him where he wins at Harbortown. He is in contention. It potentially wins uh the truest and then of course we’re going to go back to Quail Hollow next week. So this could be a pretty a pretty stout run for JT and I think he knows it. He’s the busiest man in the game of golf. Rick Gaiman, thank you for your time. Thanks Moose. Boj’s busy. There’s his podcast, The Early Wedge. Rick Gaiman giving you golf analysis by the numbers. Winners each and every week. It’s a hard promise, but he meets it time and time again. Scan the QR code and enjoy the early wedge.
1 Comment
CBS used to have the best golf analysts on TV. No longer. The MTV banter doesn't cut it.