In this debut edition of The Birdie Buzz, Marie delivers the week’s biggest LPGA headlines in one quick listen. First up: Charley Hull breaks through in Cincinnati at the Kroger Queen City Championship, winning her first LPGA title in three years after battling a tough season of injuries. The dramatic finish came as World No. 1 Jeeno Thitikul stumbled with a shocking four-putt on the final day, making Hull’s gritty win one of the stories of the season.
Next, Marie breaks down the heated Rookie of the Year race led by Japan’s Miyu Yamashita, whose fifth straight top-10 finish gives her an edge over fellow Japanese standouts Rio Takeda and Chisato Iwai. With eight events left, the race is far from over, but Yamashita’s consistency and poise make her the front-runner.
The episode also spotlights the newest Epson Tour graduates headed to the LPGA—including 19-year-old Yana Wilson, Japan’s Erika Hana, and Duke alum Gina Kim—showcasing the fresh wave of talent set to join the tour.
Finally, Marie shares candid reflections on Commissioner Craig Kessler’s first players’ meeting. While Kessler promised to build trust and refine scheduling, his remarks about women needing to be “more compelling” raised concerns about the LPGA’s media strategy and fan engagement. Marie doesn’t hold back in her critique, stressing that the women are already interesting—it’s the platform that needs to catch up.
Stay tuned every week for The Birdie Buzz—your quick front-page snapshot of everything happening in women’s golf.
everyone, welcome back to the Birdie Briefing. I’m Marie and today we’re doing something new. Alongside our tournament previews, I’ll be bringing you a fresh weekly news segment called
the Birdie Buzz, which is your quick hit of LPGA news in one easy listen. Think of it like a front page snapshot, the biggest headlines, the storylines you want to
follow, and a few things that you might have missed from around the world of women’s golf. This is our first edition of the Birdie Buzz and we will be covering the week of September
15th, 2025. So let’s dive in. The big story of course, if you’ve been following along is Charley Hull’s win at the
Kroger Queen City Championship this past weekend in Cincinnati, Ohio. It was a nail biter. It really came down to it. I tuned in for the final day and I was not disappointed by the action. Charley Hull won After world number one, Jeeno Thitikul four-putted. I would say go watch it, but really it’s horrifying. We’ve all been there. Jeeno’s one of us, absolutely. But still, it was painful to watch. But at the same time, I’m very happy for Charley Hull. She has had a tough year physically. She’s tore a ligament in her ankle after the British Open. She’s also had some back issues. She said she injured her back when she was lifting a box. She had a cyst on her spine and then she was sick when she was at Evian and she fainted. So really she’s been deep in it, having a very tough year. Has not won yet. Has not won in three years. But this is her first win of the year. I’m sad for Jeeno that she has to deal with the fact that she four-putted, which is really
the biggest news story, almost more so than the fact that Charley Hull won. So anyway, it Glad to see Charley on the leaderboard. That again gives us 25 different winners for 24 different tournaments. So still no individual person has had two wins this year on the tour. We’ll see what happens this next weekend. A little bit more about Charley. She had some really fun quotes from the weekend that I wanted to mention. She had a really good attitude. She said, golf course is just the place I am meant to be. I love being on the golf course. I just enjoy playing golf well. It’s not a chore to me. It’s not work. I’m just out there loving life. And then they had a quote for her on Saturday when she was really in the top and winning
contention. She said, I just feel pretty chilled out to be fair. Looking forward to my fish tacos later tonight. I mean same girl. So she also said I don’t think that in depth I just hit a ball and find it and hit it
again the trouble with many golfers is overthinking and then The last but it’s just a game hit a white ball at the pin make a birdie make par make a bogey Whatever just roll to the
next hole So she really does embody that resilience and perspective She really showed a lot of grit and grace through her injuries, and I’m really happy for her Another big story uh coming out of the tour is the Rookie of the Year race. It is wild. These Japanese rookies are killing it. I want to talk about of course Miyu Yamashita. I do apologize if you’ve been listening. I’ve been calling her Miyu Yamashita. That’s what my little American brain thinks it should be pronounced like. But no, I listened to how she pronounced it, which is Yamashita. But Miyu Yamashita, she is currently the leader in the Louise Suggs Rolex Rookie of the
Year race. She finished fourth at the Kroger Queen City Championship. So she now leads other Japanese rookie Rio Takeda by 32 points and then Chisato Iwai is in
third place and she is behind first place by 295 points. This is the fifth consecutive top 10 finish for Miyu Yamashita this year. And even at Queen City, she just shows how excellent she is. She played in the 60s all week. She had a 69, 67, 66, and 69. She’s really showing herself to be consistent and have a lot of composure for a first-year
player. And I believe she’s 23. She’s not someone who was on the Japanese tour for a very long time, like some of the
others. So really unbelievable, Miyu. Congratulations for taking first place. It’s not over yet. There’s still, I believe, eight tournaments left. before the end of the year, with that she’s been showing, I think she has it in the bag,
but I could be wrong. Last year, just for a little context, last year Japanese player Mao Saigo won. Mao of course won the Chevron championship major this year. Miyu won a major this year also. But before Mao and now Miyu and all the other Japanese rookies, there was not a Japanese
winner of the rookie of the year. before that it was in 1990, was Hiromi Kobayashi. So really, although the Japanese rookies are taking everything by storm right now, that
has not always been the case. And this award has been presented since 1962, so that’s what, 63 years? And this, if Miyu wins, one of the other Japanese rookies wins, it’ll be only the third
time. So although it seems like the Japanese rookies have always been good, it’s really more of
a recent phenomenon. I speaks highly to the Japanese program and the Japanese tour. Just a little bit more about how the rookie ranking points system works. Obviously only rookies earn points. They are awarded for top 10 finishes in official LPGA events. If you’re at a major and you score well, those points count double, which explains how
Miyu probably shot up there after winning a major. Let’s see, a rookie winner, they’ll get 150 points for first, 80 for second, 75 for third, 70 for fourth, and then down to 55
points for 10th place. So really Rio Takeda is definitely not out of it. Even the Iwai sisters who I believe are third and fourth are not out of it. There are a lot of tournaments left, but still Yamashita is definitely delivering this
year. She’s really emerging as a standout rookie. combining that consistency scoring with a lot of potential. And I just love watching her play. She’s amazing. So we’ll see. We’ll see what happens next week on the tour. Let’s talk a little bit more, speaking of rookies, about our pre-rookies, I guess, the
Epson Tour graduates that are coming to the LPGA. Of course, this is not a full list. The Epson Tour is not over. It will not be over until October 5th at the Epson Tour Championship in Indian Wells,
California. But we do have, let’s see, five different players that have won their LPGA Tour card. The most recent one, the youngest, is 19-year-old American, Yana Wilson. She made her professional debut this past weekend at the Kroger Queen City Championship. She originally was gonna play golf at the University of Oregon, but chose to do the Epsom
Tour, so that she had always dreamed of turning professional. So I look forward to watching her play. We also have Erika Hana who is a Japanese player. is 26, so she has been on the Japanese tour for a little bit. She actually won the Japanese Open in 2020 and 2023. She turned professional seven years ago in 2018 and then has spent several seasons in
Japan before joining the Epson tour. So she, I’m sure, is thrilled to have her card and finally be on the LPGA tour. Can’t wait to see her play. We also have 23-year-old American Melanie Green from Medina, New York. She has got her tour card. She played for the University of South Florida and will be joining the tour. We also have 25 year old American Gina Kim. She played at Duke. She joined the Epson tour in 2022. She’s had four wins there. She used to be on the LPGA. So she went Epson, LPGA, Epson LPGA. She’s a really outgoing player. She called herself, I didn’t say it, she called herself a yapper. So I bet she’ll be a great personality to add to the LPGA tour. And finally, the last Epson Tour player that will be definitely joining us on the LPGA
Tour, is Brianna Chacon. Chacon? Sorry for that. she’s American, she’s from California. She did play golf at the University of Oregon and she joined the Epson Tour last year in
2024, so she didn’t spend too much time there before making her way to the LPGA Tour. So really there’s a new wave of talent that’s on its way to LPGA. A lot of Americans, which as an American it’s always great to see. I’m curious to see how Yana Wilson does. She is just 19 years old. That’s such a baby. She’s so young. And choosing to do professional golf over college. And that experience you get from college, I’ll be really curious to see sort of this generational shift in how young players are approaching their careers. So we’ll see how that goes. And the big news that I wanted to talk about is Craig Kessler’s first players meeting. Craig Kessler is of course the new LPGA commissioner. He started on July 15th, so it’s been a few months now, but he held his first player
meeting during the FM Championship a few weeks ago. I am trying to be open-minded about his election or, you know, his his appointment as the new commissioner. I’ll point out a few things I’m a little concerned about as we go through the story. He did acknowledge that he’s never been a part of an organization that to work on. Not calling it failing, but kind of, I don’t know, not a very positive approach. But then he stated his top priority is building trust and showing the team a lot of love,
meaning… like the broadcast partners, the players, the people who work for LPGA. I don’t know. Not the approach that I would necessarily want my new boss to take if I were an
organization like the LPGA. um A player raised concerns during the players meeting about the LPGA’s fan-facing app,
which I can agree is garbage. mean, not garbage, but it’s not great. And it could be very much improved. Kessler said that that is not in his top 15 priorities right now, according to an article
in Golfweek or USA Today. So think it’s great to acknowledge that the player has an issue with the app and that he
has priorities, but to say that the LPGA is fan-facing app, which honestly, everyone’s chronically online, they’re all on their phones, to have the app be bad and if you’re not
to even think that’s like a top 15 top five sure that’s not a top five priority but 15 Yes, the LPGA also is reportedly
working with sports media advisors to map out a media strategy to You know get more attention for the LPGA. I did look up the sports media advisors They don’t appear to have any sports that are you
know women sports clients. I think that’s a bit of a miss Personally, it’s just a small outfit out of Connecticut While they do have big clients like some NFL, some horse racing, I think women’s sports is
a different animal and I think it deserves a lot of specialized attention and I will remain open-minded that maybe sports media advisors will bring a good strategy for the
LPGA. Also, pointing out that the current TV deal is with the Golf Channel and it runs through
2030. There’s obviously issues with the Golf Channel, which is an NBC-based station. there was recent tournament where there was, I think it was FM Championship, where there
was some weather. And so the scheduled time for the LPGA to be on TV was moved back and it conflicted with
the men’s tour and the men’s tour won out. So my issue with that is that’s fine. That’s what the Golf Channel is going to offer the LPGA. But then when you look at how Greg Kessler approached it, he says that the LPGA has to be
more compelling so that when scheduling conflicts arise, that the LPGA will win. They’ll play the LPGA tournament and not the PGA. Well, that’s wonderful. I don’t think that that is a good strategy. If the Golf Channel can’t give your fans access to the tournament, what else are they doing? I personally, when I started watching golf, I had to purchase a whole new set of Hulu live
TV, which I didn’t have, to watch the golf channel. And so when the golf channel can’t even deliver, and I think I’m a pretty standard fan, I
think I’m the market for a lot of the LPGA, especially if you want to raise… the number of women fans, which I think you absolutely should be focused on, to then, and
youngish, younger fans, I think it’s crazy to say that it’s the women’s fault, it’s the women’s game’s fault for not being compelling enough to overpower the historic inequities
that have made the PGA tour so much bigger than the LPGA tour. I think that is crazy. I don’t agree with that. I don’t think that’s a good strategy. I don’t think saying that, having that out in the world. I found that in a news article that wasn’t hidden away. uh I think that is a really negative, blaming the victim kind of mentality instead of
thinking outside of the box and finding a new way to make sure that women’s sports are watchable and on TV. I’ll get off my soapbox soon, I promise. He did talk about the need to bring attention to the players, saying that they have to be
both good at playing and also interesting. Again, a little bit of blaming the women. I think the women are both amazing at playing and interesting. You just have to get to know them. They need the space to show how interesting they are. He’s again blaming the women for not being interesting or good enough. He did reference Drive to Survive, which of course made F1 very popular, and then Full
Swing, which made the PGA. mean, PGA was already popular, but it did help to bring a little bit more attention to the
PGA tour. He did say that there are third party creators that have offered to help tell LPGA
stories. So I think he’s going to be leaning on some social media, some creative creators online,
though he declined to share the names. So we’ll see what that means and who their target audience will be. There are plenty of great content creators online that could bring attention like he’s, I think,
envisioning. I still am a bit cautious that he’s going to be going after the male gaze and going after
male fans without really focusing on what makes women’s sports amazing and what’s made the WNBA so popular, what’s made women’s rugby so popular, women’s soccer, women’s softball. I mean, really, I could go on. Like, all of these women’s sports… are becoming so popular because they’re doing things differently to get the attention of
the right people, of the right viewers. I am not someone who ever thought I would be watching women’s sports, period. I watched, you know, NFL, the Packers, watched the universities I went to, I watched lot
of NCAA men’s basketball. I watched sports, but never women’s sports, until I started watching the LPGA and gave it
a chance because a friend introduced me. So I really don’t think this traditional method of getting fans through focusing on male
fans is really what’s going to grow the LPGA fan base. Anyway, just a few more things. He did acknowledge Craig Kessler that he’s working on the schedule, which I do think is a
good thing to acknowledge. He doesn’t want to have so much travel whiplash, know, avoiding hopping all over the
country or the world. There’s only so much he can do because a lot of the tournaments are on cycles and multiple
year plans and contracts so he can’t just You know change it with the snap of his fingers He said the first half of the year is really nailed down well though. He did acknowledge There’s a scheduling issue with the majors. There are three majors in a six-week period Let’s see is the KPMG Women’s Championship in
late June a week off and then the women have the Evian Championship, which is a major, then they
have a week off, then it’s the Scottish Open, which is not a major, but then the next week is the AIG Women’s Open. That is a crazy travel schedule at three majors in six weeks. It’s going to be a lot for the women, a lot for everyone. So I know that that’s not really his fault. That’s something that’s going to take a couple of years to really figure out, but I do have faith that that’s a problem that he’s working through. So again, kind of a mixed bag. think there’s a lot of not acknowledging that women’s sports is different than men’s
sports. And instead of saying the women should be more like men, I think we need to celebrate the
fact that they’re women and how that makes the sport more compelling. Because for people like me, it inherently makes the sport more compelling because of the
fact that women, how they play the game, how they interact with each other, how they interact with social media and their fans. These women are already good at golf. They are already very interesting. We just need to give them the platform to tell their stories. So that’s all I have about Craig Kessler I think that was plenty Again, I will remain
open-minded. It’s only been a few months, right? I just think he needs to be more careful about the narrative that he’s putting out into
the world for those that are paying attention. And here at the Birdie Briefing on the Birdie Buzz, I will be bringing you all of that
news. on a weekly basis so that you can stay up to date about what’s happening in women’s golf. I also want to give a plug to our website, birdiebriefing.com. We have all sorts of news stories on there. We have all of the tournament coverage you would really need. You could just go to the birdie briefing. Just like this updated scores in real time, the tee times, how you can watch it, all of
that information. There’s so much on there. You could just go check it out. It’s translated into 12 different languages if that’s of interest to you. So please go check out the Birdie Briefing. The website is just birdiebriefing.com. For more golf news. Okay, that’s enough. I’m Marie with the Birdie Briefing. This was the Birdie Buzz for the week of September 15th. Until next time.
