Golf’s Next GEN, Episode 6: Aphrodite Deng

Episode No. 6 of Golf’s Next GEN features Aphrodite Deng, two-time Rolex Junior All-American, 2023 Junior All-Star Team member, and the current No. 1 player in the Rolex AJGA Rankings. Aphrodite talks about her path to the top of junior golf, playing alongside Nelly Korda at the Mizuho Americas Open, and competing at events like the U.S. Girls’ Junior. From balancing high expectations to staying grounded through the grind, Aphrodite shares what fuels her both on and off the course.

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Hi everyone and welcome to Golf’s NextGen, the official podcast of the American Junior Golf Association. My name is Tim Jackman. I’m the vice president of communications. That is Thomas Harrison. He’s in operations somewhere. Over there is our producer Justin and we have guest assistant producer Angela back over there. So, um, lots going on in the golf world today. Thomas just wrapped up the Open. We got just wrapped up Windham Cup on our side. Got a great guest coming up from a recent little USG event. So, a lot of stuff going on. Yeah, I mean exciting time in the world of golf. Obviously, major season now over on the men’s side. So, um, you’re just kind of waiting for the RDER Cup season, of course, waiting for the announcements of the captain’s picks. Um, right off the bat, Tim, kind of want to get your thoughts on something that’s been a hot topic, Captain Keees being a playing captain. What are your thoughts on the playing captain of the RDER Cup? I’ve kind of been anti-playing captain, but I feel like this may be the most valid version of that. If he ends up being a playing captain, I think that would I’d be okay with it. mostly because he’s really earned the spot. Like sometimes I feel like in the past it’s been a little bit like, oh, let me just kind of get get on the team or whatever, but I he’s legit earned the spot, I think. So, it’d be hard I think it’d be hard to say no to it right now. Yeah. I think right now where maybe you’ve seen I don’t want to say the struggle on like the American side of it, but there’s probably not as clear-cut of like who are those next six guys that you take where it’s like I don’t know if you can have a valid argument against having him being a player. I think if you’re like trying to roll the best lineup out there. I feel like right now like you said he’s just kind of played his way into it. So I think if he were in like that 15 to 20 range right there and then he ends up as a playing captain I think yeah it’s like eh this was probably like we probably didn’t need that but right now if you just took the next six I mean he’s in. So um I don’t necessarily disagree with you. It feels kind of weird but he’s also I feel like just really embraced the role like a President’s Cup. Feel like you saw everyone getting behind him as like Captain America already. So I think it’d be kind of a cool twist but saw him make a hole in one at the uh par three contest of the Masters. Okay. just flexing on everybody. It was I mean my name is Tim. I went to the Masters. It was a big deal. Everybody was jazzed up about it. So very jazzed that they were super jazzed up. They really were. But um speaking of the Masters again, major season, want to get your thoughts on the Open and kind of how all that played out. Obviously we talked about a couple episodes ago like how we’d rank the majors and I want to see now like looking back on the year where do you think that kind of held up? cuz I feel like we were both pretty much like the open kind of being in that two spot behind the Masters, but want to get your thoughts where that kind of stacked up after watching the year. Yeah, I think I probably I think I would probably keep my probably keep my rankings to be honest with you. I think the the how hard that golf course played at the Open given like but it wasn’t just like the Greens being like a 14 or a 15. that wasn’t why I played hard but which I think is really cool especially given the US Open and kind of that’s the defense of of there. So I think I I think I would keep it honestly I think after seeing especially after seeing the champions of each one of them I mean Rory getting the career slam at the Masters I think has to make keep that one at number one. So I I actually don’t think I would change my rankings. Yeah. I think it’s just like you said just watching being that’s such a different style of golf like you know what to expect and I feel like it would just be super cool like the tour has the Florida swing like I feel like we need kind of the link swing where they’re over in like over in Scotland, England and Ireland just like some of those courses that we don’t get to see outside of the open which again that may take some of the allure away from the open being that that’s like your one chance to see it but I feel like it would be nice Yeah. I feel like it’d be nice to have a couple. It’s nice having like the Scottish right into it, but you know, seeing it twice a year, I think we’d just almost appreciate it more even if you saw it just for a couple week stretch there. Yeah. No, I agree. I mean, links links golf is so interesting and so cool. I mean, we got a few links courses on the AJ schedule or you could say or link style courses. I don’t know that they’re true links, you know, with stream song, the black course. Um, next year the Windham Cup’s going to be at Old Sandwich, which is just a phenomenal golf course. Um, kind of a link style. Uh, I think you mentioned Trinity Forest. We’ve had an event there. Trinity Forest. Malard Golf Club is a link style down at Lake Charles and East PTOAC. The Baby Grand event. They’re going through a renovation here in the next couple years to get it back to the original link style design. So, um, a lot of trees need to come down, but um, should be kind of cool to see. Set some more AJ records there. Hey, we’re going low, Tim. We’re going low. But, um, yeah, it’s just it’s a different style, and I mean it’s interesting to see how those players hold up. Obviously Scotty just being on top of the world, it seems like he can go anywhere and win it, but um it seemed like early on that may have been more of a challenge. Obviously, as the week progressed, he got a little more dialed in and kind of ran away with it. But for a little bit there, it seemed like like that day one leaderboard was anyone’s game. There were guys that you’ve never even heard of who are in the top five of that leaderboard and you’re looking like where did this guy come from? Yep. Yeah. The some of the I think one of the coolest things about it is it forces these guys to do different shots, right? They’re not just coming out there and just blowing driver doing whatever. I mean, some of the some of the knockdown shots, the stingers that they were hitting, trying to keep it out of the wind and just get it on the ground was I mean, it was just phenomenal to watch all the different styles of everybody out there and kind of what they were doing to accommodate the conditions. So, um, again, I think that’s why it’s number two. I think again just with the masters and the aura surrounding that, but I do think that’s why the open is number two. You laughing at me saying aura. Yeah, I’m just picturing you saying it. is just tough for me. Try to contain it. Picture me on the front of a little boat doing my Yeah, exactly. Could you could you rip that dance for us, Tim? No chance. Maybe next time. But crazy enough though, I think it’s no secret the biggest story of the week was probably before the open started, the Scotty interview. So, yeah. Um, diving in. If you haven’t heard it, it’s basically Scotty going through a little bit about, you know, each week you just get asked like, “What does this tournament mean to you? How are you going to come out here and compete?” And he just basically goes in a little bit of a direction that we really haven’t heard before of somebody saying like, “It’s not necessarily as fulfilling as you may imagine.” Mhm. And so it was very interesting, I feel like, to hear somebody in his position with that spotlight on him kind of dive into it in depth like that of just saying it’s not as rewarding as you may think. Like it’s it’s more of a challenge than people anticipate. Yeah. Yeah, I mean he was big on the fact that, you know, it’s just kind of a a few minutes or a very brief moment of like euphoria and then it quickly fades and you’ve got to, you know, get out there and grind on the next one or it’s never about, you know, no matter how many you win, it’s always a question about what’s the next one or doing this or um just talking about his, you know, family and how important that is to him too, which, you know, I could there were a couple of other interviews done with players after the fact that I wouldn’t say they were like negative necessarily, but there were certainly some some I think some comments where it raised a few eyebrows. You know, I saw a few headlines that were like Scotty hates winning and stuff like I was like, “No, that’s not really what he said obviously.” But it it is a different perspective. I mean, I don’t know of another athlete necessarily at the at the top of their sport that has said in an interview like, “Yeah, winning’s great, but it’s, you know, it’s not all that.” Yeah, I feel like it is. It’s just something that maybe people didn’t necessarily think about before, but for him, like he did, he mentioned he’s like, “Each week it’s no different for me.” Like, “Yeah, these are majors. They there’s a little more around it. Just obviously all the bells and whistles that go with it and all the attention, but he’s like each week is the same deal.” I think given what he well, one, the position he’s in at the top of the sport, unquestionable. Number one, I mean, just out far and away the best player in the game right now. And then two, just kind of the the reputation he’s built with being, you know, that that g guy who’s going to be, you know, a great dad and a great husband and a family man and do all these things that he can say something like that and it’s and it’s taken in the way that I think it was meant. Um, so I think that’s another thing with it too. But I mean, I’ve seen people some people say like this is one of the greatest press conferences they’ve seen from like the top athlete in a sport. And it was I would encourage you to just go back and kind of watch the highlights of it because there’s a lot of great things that he talked about in there that are so relevant and just so just almost shocking. And I think that’s kind of what it was shocking to people because it’s just not the norm. Like you just don’t hear people talk about that. Yeah. And especially too just to bring up the fact that he’s like the second I feel like it’s interfering with my family or my kids like I’m I’m done. And it’s like I think it kind of gave people that like could you imagine if right now Scotty was like I’ve been number one for how many weeks basically almost of coming up on a year of or two years of just this pure dominance to just be like all right I’m done. Like I’m I’m out. I’m not playing golf again. You guys have fun. He would do it too. And I think it’s like you know who he is when he says it like some guys say that and you’re like oh they’d never do it and they miss and you feel like for him it’s a guy where again there’s always the career numbers but like what individual title does he have left to accomplish? He’s he’s got to get his his US Open, right? And then after that it’s like he’s done everything else, right? So it’s like what what is there left for him on a personal level? And so it’s it’s just very interesting to think about of like could you imagine the golf world at the end of this year? It’s just like all right, Scotty’s done. Who’s next? And just how crazy that would be. That’d be insane. I do love seeing uh seeing Meredith and Bennett at the whenever he wins though. I feel like we’re wa literally watching that kid grow up because we see him like it’s like every other week he’s winning an event. So you get to see him progress. So that was fun at the end there. Um which was pretty cool. Yeah. I feel like he’s just also just the marketing dream of like you just have Bennett always on camera just always holding the trophy just wandering around by the green just playing around and that every clip and like every advertising piece you see about Scotty following there’s always just Bennett’s involved like Bennett’s got to be just racking up some residuals at this point and just like not that that that fund needed any padding but I think Bennett’s Bennett’s just piece there. Yeah. Where’s his piece of the pie? So, oh nice. Uh well, kind of moving out of that a little bit, we have a great guest uh today, Aphrodity Deng. She’s going to be joining us. She just won the US Girls Jr. Uh so that’s pretty cool. Um she’s also played in a lot actually of AJ tournaments. She’s been on pretty good tear. Just moved into number one in the Rolex AJ rankings as well. So, um excited to have her on. Yeah, it’s going to be going to be fun to talk with Aphrodite again. like you mentioned, she’s just she’s played everything. She’s um been kind of in that battle for a while of one of those top two spots. She’s just always been right there, but this is her first time kind of breaking through, emerging to that point. Um it’s tough to see like that’s your breakthrough when you’ve won all these times across the AJ, but um it’ll be interesting to talk to her a little bit. Like you said, coming off her win at the US Girls Junior is is obviously a big one, one of the majors of junior golf. So, uh very excited to get her on the podcast. Yeah, it’ll be uh the Roller Junior Player of the Year race is going to be a little interesting on the girls side with her and then obviously Asteris Tally as well up there. So, well, let’s go ahead and uh bring Aphrodite on here and we’ll get going. Hi, Aphrodite. How are you doing today? Thanks for joining us. I’m good. How are you? I’m doing well. We know you’ve had quite the busy schedule uh over the the last few weeks and over the summer. um talk a little bit with us about all the stuff that you’ve had going on. I know you got a couple big wins so far this year. How’s that all been? Oh yeah, it’s been really fun and it’s been a lot. So it’s been pretty tiring. What’s been your uh favorite event that you’ve had this this summer so far? Um probably Windham Cup because it was just like for fun and it was nice having everybody and seeing all my friends. I was going to say it’s I feel like we get that answer a lot is because it’s not as much pressure, but um still gets a little competitive out there. Did you find yourself like having those times where you kind of had to turn it on, get a little more competitive trying to close out a match? Yeah, it definitely does get competitive. I think I tied like a few of my match matches this this year. Yeah, that sounds that’s always a good time when you’re out there competing with your friends and I’m sure you you probably get to see a lot of those uh other players kind of a week to week uh basis as well while you’re playing in other junior events also. Yeah, I do. And it’s like really fun cuz Windom is like when you guys don’t really have that much of competition going on. So, I feel like we hear a lot of times that it’s just like almost the little fraternity or sority of like those players kind of up in the top of the rankings because you’re playing in so many of those events. So, does that do you find it makes it a little bit easier when you’re out there competing that you’re a little bit more comfortable with those players or do you find like sometimes maybe it kind of distracts you a little bit? Um, yeah. I think it’s better if you know who you’re competing against like more. So, yeah. Are there certain players that you’re like, “Well, I don’t want to be paired with them because they distract me more easily.” Oh, no, not really. There isn’t. Well, I think it probably then from hearing that, obviously playing in Missouo and getting a big win there, playing alongside the LPGA professionals. How was that experience because those are people obviously you’re not nearly as familiar with. Yeah, it was really cool. And like at first I was really like nervous cuz I played with Nelly Corda for like two rounds and that was really special getting to see how her game was and there was a lot of people watching. So it was like a really different experience. Did you see like when you’re playing with Nelly, was it different for you being like that up close and personal to it versus if you find yourself just like watching her try to close one out on TV? Yeah, it’s definitely really different. It feels like unreal, especially in person right next to her and like, wow, I’m like playing with her. It’s really cool. Is there a specific like memory that kind of sticks out to you? Obviously playing with Nelly is a a huge highlight, but are there other specific memories that stick out to you about that Missouo event? Um, obviously that’s a huge win for you. Thanks. Yeah, the food was really good that week. I really liked it. Yes, we’re bringing back the food talk on the podcast. I like it. I’ll say for a while we were a very food heavy podcast, but I feel like we’ve gotten away from it, so it may be time to get back to our roots. Yeah. Okay. If since you brought it up, what what was the food that was really good? Let’s let’s hear some of your favorites. Like the breakfast was really good and they had like they had like the meat sticks. I don’t know how to call it, but they were really good. Sausage. I don’t know. I don’t know. Good meat sticks. Got it. But surely it wasn’t just the breakfast. Yeah, it was like it was like every meal was really good. Yeah, I really look forward to that event because of the food, too. I think we would be great friends. Aphrodite whenever I’m at tournaments, you can ask any tournament director I work with. My question always is, “Okay, well, what’s what’s for lunch? What’s where are we going for dinner?” Say it’s making sense now that Aby’s such a big fan of running this event. So, I’m starting to put two and two together here. But AFI coming off of a big win recently, the US girls junior, one of those like cream of the crop events in the junior golf world. What is that feeling like? It’s obviously it’s a long week. So tell us a little bit about that process from stroke play all the way to that championship match. Yeah, winning it was like I did not think I was going to win it cuz after stroke play I was pretty far off. So I like changed my strategy to the course and I just like knew that I had to because match play was like totally different and anything can happen in match play. So what is what about your game kind of changes when you go to that match play format cuz um obviously as a junior you don’t necessarily play a ton of match play and then when you get to college that switches a little bit. So why don’t you tell us a little bit about how that strategy differs for you? Um yeah well in stroke play I hit into like five fairway bunkers. So, I I laid up a lot more in mass play and just like trying to make every putt and playing more like more at the pit. Do you feel like playing in um like a Windom Cup or or uh some of these other match play events that the AJ does, do you feel like that is a benefit for you um get you some good experience for an event like the US girls junior? Yeah, it definitely did cuz I like went straight from Windom to US girls and I had like a really good like swing feel coming off of Windom and the match play competitiveness really helped. And so you talked about maybe having some doubts cuz you were kind of far down there, but at what point did that maybe set in that hey, I really do have a shot to win this? Was it the start of that championship match or was there like a specific putt that you you hit that you’re like, “All right, I’ve I’ve actually got a shot at this.” Well, I wasn’t really thinking about like winning it. I was just trying to beat the person that I was matching. Yeah. Is that the key to match play or um from your perspective? Just kind of focused on one match at a time or one hole at a time. Yeah, I think it’s just one shot at a time and not getting ahead of yourself. I will say that does obviously again disclaimer not high level competitive golfers here. That may come as a shock to some. Uh but even when we do our staff Rusty Cup in the match play, I always find myself kind of like you said Aphrodite, it’s not really just about winning the match. I’m much more concerned about beating whoever it is I’m playing. And so that’s I feel like that’s where like you brought up maybe having that familiarity with who you’re playing because obviously you’re friends but we all want to be able to hold that over our friends head. Like if I’m sitting here playing Tim, I don’t want Tim to win. I want Tim to lose more than I want to win. I probably would not win. Um, okay. We’re going to bring it back to food again real quick cuz I heard that your lunch order for that championship match was was pretty great. Talk about that. Oh yeah. I got steak cuz like I need protein cuz it’s like so tiring. But I didn’t eat too many too much cuz like I had to go out and play another 18. So, yeah. I feel like if I ate a big old steak and played golf, I’d just be in a coma for the rest of the day. So, what kind of steak was it? Um, I don’t know. It was just a small steak. It was pretty good, though. Nice. Did you have like mac and cheese with it or mashed potatoes or um Yeah, mashed potatoes. Nice. That does It feels like kind of a bold order, but I mean, hey, it’s only weird if it doesn’t work. So, clearly you got the job done. Do you think now you have to kind of incorporate that into your uh your game planning for other events? Yeah, I probably do, but usually I eat steak like after a round. Yeah, nothing like a good filt after you play 18. That’s awesome. You talked about your caddy kind of helping keep your mind off golf a little bit during um during those the championship match. Can you talk about how important that is in those long days? Um, yeah, cuz it’s like really tiring, especially mentally, and having like your friend there on the bag, just being able to like relax and not be too nervous and focused on golf is like really nice. How did you pick your caddy for the event? Um well the first three days I think I had like a caddy from the course and then so but he was like he was really good but he was pretty old so he got like really tired so I didn’t think he was going to be able to do um 36. This poor guy’s out here just he’s hoping to be on the winning bag and he gets cut right before the final round. That is tough. Yeah. And then um so I like called my friend and I like flew him in and so he helped me carry the rest and yeah, we worked pretty well. Well, clearly look like it worked out. A couple of big wins have actually gotten you to number one in the Rolex rankings. What does that mean to you? Is that I would assume that’s at this high level, one of those goals of yours, but what was that feeling when you saw your name on the top of that leaderboard for the rankings? Um, yeah. I was really happy and it’s really cool to be first, but I still need to like continue working hard. Yeah. Do you think about Rolex Junior player of the year at all? Kind of when you see number one in the rankings, um, obviously finishing at number one is would get you player of the year. Is that something that you’ve thought about um or is that something that’s a goal of yours? Yeah, I’ve been thinking about it and it is definitely a goal of mine. When you think about it, what do you do you think that’s in your mind? Is that something you ever thought would even be possible given, you know, all of your your whole golf journey? Um, no, probably not. But this year, I thought I had a pretty big chance after winning the first two turnouts. Yeah. Oh, and you talk about it’s obviously a long journey to get here to golf. And something that a lot of people may not know about your background prior to golf is that you were actually an ice skater. And so why don’t you tell us a little bit about your ice skating career and then kind of how that transition to golf came along? Um, yeah. So I like started ice skating when I was six and I was pretty good at it. Like I could like spin the air like two and a half circles. Um, and then after like COVID hit, I just like shifted focus to golf cuz it’s more outdoors and safer. Was there anything from that? Are we just going to gloss over the fact that she said that golf is safer than ice skating and that’s why she’s flipped? I mean, she’s not wrong. She’s not wrong. We might have to get you might have to send Justin some videos so that we can put it on the on the pod here if you uh view figure skating. Yeah, we’re going to need to see the spins. We’ll slow-mo. We’ll count those up ourselves. We’ll we’ll be the judges here. But um just in general from skating seems like two kind of drastically different sports. Was there anything you were able to take from that experience as a skater to help you succeed in the golf world? Um I think like skating like rotating kind of helped with my like golf when I need to like rotate after impact. Yeah. So just being an athlete is what you’re saying. Yeah, there’s um Do you still do you still figure skate or do any ice skating or is it pretty much all just golf now? Yeah, I haven’t done it in so long. I only play golf now. There’s like no time. Say I was kind of wondering if there was like a little part of you if you were still skating that was maybe going for that like summer Olympic golden golf and then the winter Olympic golden ice skating. I feel like that’d be a combo we probably haven’t seen before. I like it. I like it a lot. Um, so you’ve obviously been under a lot of pressure. I was muted again. I I feel like I do this all the time. Um, you obviously been under a lot of pressure with uh some of these big events you’ve played in and down the stretch and stuff like that. Talk a little bit about handling that pressure of those big moments. Um, you kind of just have to like just pretend the shot is just like any other shot and try to hit it good and not think about what’s on the line. Now, as you’re kind of going forward here throughout the rest of the year, you talked about obviously looking at number one, kind of that pressure you want to keep improving. What um what are those goals you kind of set for yourself just week in week out to kind of help you achieve that? I’m just trying to go out there and get a little better each day. Yeah. Do you have any pre-round habits or kind of rituals, maybe superstitions that you have to do? Um, well, I go to like the gym to warm up before my rounds. And I always play like number one or number three golf ball. Okay. What’s the significance behind the one and the three? Was it do you have some luck in the past with those or is it just kind of a something that randomly started? I think I just play better with those now. Brace. Well, whatever works. Um, do you you obviously have had some kind of bigger crowds following you and um had some media opportunities given your wins and all those things. Uh how have you uh how have you kind of grown in especially in those areas handling kind of the attention of being um one of the elite junior golfers? Um yeah, it’s been really different. Like the interviews are like kind of scary and yeah, I have to like be better at speaking cuz my interviews are kind of Well, that’s we’re working on it. That’s why we’re getting better. You’re obviously the more you win, the more experience you get. So like think it’ll keep getting better for you. Yeah. hopefully. But we’ll uh we want to hopefully make this one a little bit more light-hearted than some of the other interviews. Keep it fun. We’re going to hit you with some rapid fire questions here. So, just don’t even think about it. Just first thing that comes to your head. So, first one, favorite club in the bag. Letter. All right. Dream course to play. Um, Augusta National. That feels fair. player you look up to the most? Uh, Nelly Corda. Oh, see, there we go. Shout out Muho. Uh, advice you would give to somebody starting out in golf. Um, just work hard. And then the last one, heading into the women’s AM, what are you most excited for? Um, just to like play Band and Dunes and enjoy that experience. See, great job. Just not even thinking about it and you’re just ready to go. What uh what we ask this question of every all the juniors who come on here. Um what give us you can think about this for a second if you want. Give us a year that you get your first LPGA win. Oh wow. I have no idea. Maybe like um like 2030. What’s that? Four five years from now. Okay, that makes sense. I like it. That’s a That seems Sometimes we get people who are like, “Yeah, next year.” And I’m like, “Oh, maybe maybe not next year, but but you never know.” Good. Well, no, Aphrodite, we really appreciate you taking the time. We know you have a a busy golf schedule. Glad we could find some time to get this in and uh really appreciate you coming on, talking with all your success, and we wish you the best of luck here as you finish out the season. Thank you. Thanks, Aphrodite. Good luck uh the rest of the way. Thank you. Another great uh guest, Thomas. You know, she she has had a phenomenal year. Um you know, she kind of mentioned it to you there being a little nervous with some of the the media opportunities and the interviews and stuff like that, but you know, kind of that’s part of what what the AJ does. It’s I mean our literally our developing golf’s next generation is what what we say we do. And part of that is getting them more comfortable with the big um the spotlight, the media attention, that sort of thing. So great opportunities for her winning all these events. Yeah. I mean, I think it’s like you said, it’s just one of those cool things we do where, you know, some of those tournaments you win, you’re probably not doing much media after, but if you win one of these any AJ event, you’re doing some interviews, but you win one of these invitationals and you’ve got a lot of media kind of coming your way um around that. So, very cool opportunity for her. It was it was fun having her on, getting to see a little bit of the personality because you don’t necessarily always see that on the golf course. We mentioned that several times with several of our guests, but she’s another one. You can see here she’s smiling, laughing, but on the golf course sometimes you just get like stone face from some of these kids because they’re just so locked in with what they’re doing. Yeah. I mean, some of these kids just have a completely different, you know, face when they get out there on the golf course and they start playing. It’s just very intimidating. I would not want to play against them. I’ll just say that. I don’t want to play against most people. But that’s why that’s why, Tim, because the game face, right? Uh, you know, we kind of briefly mentioned it when talking to her, too, but she did move into number one in the Rolex AJ rankings. Um, and we have just a handful of kind of big events coming up here that are really important for our player of the year race. Uh, so I wanted to talk a little bit about that as well. You know, she moved into number one. She passed Asteris Tally, who was number one previously. They’re pretty close kind of in the points race right now. So, there’s a few events that are coming up that are going to be kind of big when it when it comes to defining the player of the year. Yeah. And I mean this run that she’s been on has been impressive too because I mean earlier um in the year on the podcast we kind of talked about we’re like this is somebody would have to make an unreal run to really catch where Asterisk is and then Aphrodite that’s exactly what she did. She won basically everything since um so I don’t know if we kind of put the jinx on there or like what it was but sorry asterisk but um she Astra is still obviously playing very well having a great year but Aphrodite has just come out and she has won every step of the way in these major events and so um going to be an interesting race getting down to the end. We may have to bring our friend Jacob Kennedy back on the numbers guy get him back with the whiteboard and see what we’ve got here coming down the stretch. Yeah, Aphrodite uh her last five events she went T5 first first fifth first first. So that’ll that’ll flip the script a little bit there. I think if you do that uh with some big events coming up there and then obviously we’ve got um there’s a few there’s we have another girls invitational coming up here um at the end of August and then we have the ping invitational too. So a couple of big events there some chance to to flip the script there again I think from the girl side of things. The boy side of things is a little bit more defined, I think you could say. Yeah. I mean, it’s one of those where, and there’s a lot of kids who have had great years, but Miles start to the year was unreal. And if you want to say start to the year, kind of going back to the points year where the Rolex Tournament of Champions is really that first event where the points kind of reset for that player of the year race. Um, and so getting the win there. I mean, you look at his last finishes. Team Tailor made seven win win win T4. So it’s like not a bad stretch of golf considering those wins are the Rolex Tournament Champions, AJJ Simplify Boys Championship, and then Sage Valley, which are not too shabby if you were to pick three out of a hat. No, those are pretty good. Pretty good events. I mean, he’s he’s really I think going to be I think I think he’s probably going to be player of the year. There’s certainly an opportunity for a guy like a Luke Colton to really go on a run here and finish um do some some good stuff. Um when you look at maybe like a Tyler Watts could also make a move. I think junior players coming up at the end of August is really going to that’s going to define it, right? If Miles does well, gets a top 10 or whatever, I think he’s really going to kind of lock that in. Um, but if not, this the door I think is certainly going to be open a little just a little bit. Yeah. Which is interesting because that’s exactly where it happened in 2023. And I think that’s kind of a cool little part of where junior players falls on the schedule is on the boys side of the player of the year. That one more times than not is kind of the deciding factor. Um because you still obviously have some events afterwards, but that one is where it can be kind of the tipping point of two years ago 2023 when he came out and won that was like that locked it up. After that, that was where no other situation could play out where he lost it. Um and so it’ll be interesting. It’s a place where he’s won before. Um you’ve got a lot of guys though, we talked about Luke Cole and Tyler Watts have all had good finishes there at junior players. Um and it’s a stacked field. It’s you’re playing the tour setup. you’re playing the players championship setup for three days out there and so anything can happen. Uh but it’s definitely a spot where you have to think if he comes out and has has a good tournament that might be the spot where he can clinch it again. Yeah, I I definitely think so. You know, it’s what’s so interesting about this is we if Mile remember back to the Miles episode um where he was on with us, he talked about his hands growing and that really kind of messed with his game a little bit. If it his hands out grown, we might be talking about backto back to back players of the year to be perfectly honest because he’s he’s been on quite the run and you can really if you look kind of like at the arc of of last year, you can see where he kind of figured it out again and really junior players were um uh I think it was the US boys junior. He kind of that’s really when he started to figure it out again and kind of put down some good numbers. So um he’s just I mean phenomenal. I mean, he’s probably going to go down as one of the best junior golfers in the last I don’t know, probably 10 years, I would think. At least when he’s done playing, which he’s a 2027 grad, so he’s still got him for two more years. Yeah, exactly. He’s still got a lot of time, but I think what was really special about him that first year was what he was able to do so young. Um, youngest champion of the junior players and just everything that he had done to that point was just something that we’d seen golfers do before, but not at that age. Yeah. Youngest player of the year. Yeah. So, it’s just seeing what he’s been able to accomplish and sometimes you get a player like that where you wonder like it’s a valid concern at this age of players growing. We have we see it on the girl side if you like a lot um just how much the growth spurts they can hit. Um but for him it was it’s a concern. It’s like what happens if he grows? What happens if he gets 6 in here in a year cuz that that happens you know I remember going from like 56 to 6’4 in the span of like a year. It was just a giant growth spurt that I hit and it was like again brought it up before not a high level competitive golfer. Disclaimer, but had I been I’d like to think that probably has an effect on you. So yeah, the golf swing is such like a grooved and it’s such like a a memory and and something that swing is so mechanical with your body that it’s hard to imagine that would be have a big effect on it. Yeah. So and you come from a baseball background, so you probably deal with some of that a little bit, but not as much. Yeah. Not not nearly as much these guys. Like if you had asked me on a day like, “Do you think your hands have grown?” I have no idea. The fact that he was in tune enough with his swing in a short game to be like, “This is my issue.” He’s like, “I’m not,” he talked about the contacts. He’s like, “I’m not misitting putts.” He’s like, “I just can’t see.” I can’t see. He’s like, he’s like, “I’m hitting it where I want to. I just can’t see where I need to be hitting it.” Um, and so it’s crazy. I wish I was good enough to be defined by that. Yeah. Just like how in tune with yourself you have to be to be able to see those things. But, um, it’ll be interesting to see where this comes down to. Like I said, Miles has a little more clear-cut path, but the Aphrodite Asteris kind of dog fight, I think, to the end here is going to be pretty interesting to watch. Yeah, definitely something worth watching and staying in tune with. Um, before we finish up here, I also wanted to make just kind of a little teaser that um next month’s episode, we are going to be having the uh captain of the 2026 Ping Junior Soulheim Cup on uh the podcast. That’s going to be announced here over the next few weeks. So that’ll be fun to um to have her on and you know we’re assuming Astress is going to make or Aphrodite is going to make the team but that would be assume Astress too. Yeah, I would assume Asteris too. So their captain um we’re going to have on the podcast. It’ll be really cool to have her on um and to be able to kind of talk Ping Junior Soulheim Cup. Yeah. Oh, it’s again such a cool event and the ties that it has to the actual Soulheim Cup. um just an experience that you probably couldn’t dream of as a young junior golfer of actually getting like getting to be in that position to be on that team. So um when that kind of comes to fruition for you, it’s just an unforgettable moment and super cool for us to watch from the outside of just see like man I like I couldn’t imagine as a kid having an experience like that. So um very exciting and um always fun to see how excited the captains get. So I think I think it’s going to be fun for us and I think uh the US team’s going to have a good time out there. Yeah, hopefully I think probably here in the next couple months too, we’ll have the uh captains for the uh Junior President’s Cup teams as well. So, there’s some stuff to look forward to, but uh we appreciate you uh tuning in uh to this episode. I think that’s all we got. Make sure that you are following along the AJ on our social media channels. Uh we got Tik Tok, Instagram X, Facebook, LinkedIn, um and of course YouTube as well. Make sure that you are leaving us a review. positive, please. And uh five stars on wherever you’re listening to this or watching this podcast. We can make sure we get the word out and get this spread around. But I think that’s all I got. Thomas, I appreciate the time today. Absolutely. Always a pleasure, Tim.