Blades Brown is 17 and already facing a fork in the road of his pro golf career
Associated Press
Blades Brown is still three weeks away from his 18th birthday and already facing another fork in the road.
The first big turn came in December when Brown decided to skip college and turn professional without status on any tour.
He has played four PGA Tour events on sponsor exemptions and made one cut, a tie for 34th in the Mexico Open. He took two sponsor exemptions on the Korn Ferry Tour and made the cut without cracking the top 40.
And then one week changed everything.
Brown used the third of his maximum four exemptions on the Korn Ferry Tour last week at the Veritex Bank Championship in Arlington, Texas. He opened with a 61 and finished in a five-way tie for second place, three shots behind Johnny Keefer.
The next stop was supposed to be a 45-minute drive north of Dallas for the CJ Cup Byron Nelson on the PGA Tour with a $9.9 million purse. Instead, Brown chose to fly to Mexico for another Korn Ferry Tour start.
It would appear to be the right turn.
That runner-up finish was worth 167 points and moved Brown to No. 44 on the Korn Ferry Tour points list. That leaves him just 53 points away from special temporary membership, which is crucial to someone in his position.
He earned his way into the Tulum Championship at PGA Riviera Maya this week by finishing among the top 25. To play the CJ Cup Byron Nelson would have meant giving up a free start on the Korn Ferry Tour, leaving him only one more exemption the rest of the season.
And if he plays well enough in Mexico — a top 15 should do the trick — Brown could get enough points for special temporary membership. He would not be able to accept it until May 21 when he turns 18.
But that would give him unlimited exemptions and make him eligible to improve his category ranking, effectively giving him a full Korn Ferry schedule for the rest of the year. The top 20 in points at the end of the season earn PGA Tour cards. At worse, he has a place to play.
'I say this to my caddie all the time, like every single event that I play in I feel like I'm exponentially better, more relaxed,' Brown said after the second round last week. 'I think that comes with just experience. Like anything you do for a while, you're going to get more acclimated and comfortable.
'Yeah, I'm really excited for what's to come.'
His decision to skip the PGA Tour and stay on the minor league circuit is reminiscent of the decision Jordan Spieth faced as a 19-year-old in 2013. He turned pro after one full year at Texas and one failure at Q-school when he didn't get out of the second stage.
Spieth missed the cut at Torrey Pines and tied for 22nd at Pebble Beach. And then he headed south of the border for what now is the Korn Ferry Tour. He tied for seventh in Panama. He tied for fourth in Colombia.
And then came a fork in the road.
Spieth had a sponsor exemption the following week in the Puerto Rico Open. Status was based on money back then, and Spieth was about $4,000 short of earning full status on the Korn Ferry Tour. He wanted to give back the Puerto Rico Open exemption and head to Chile to lock up his status. Part of him felt compelled to honor his commitment to Puerto Rico.
'We sat there for 30 minutes trying to figure it out,' Spieth said at the time.
He chose Puerto Rico, which proved to be the right move.
Spieth tied for second, which got him into the next PGA Tour stop at Innisbrook for the Tampa Bay Championship. He chipped in for birdie (a sign of big moments to come) on the 17th hole and finished with a 7-foot par putt to tie for seventh, giving him enough money for special temporary membership on the PGA Tour.
Four months later, Spieth won the John Deere Classic. By the end of the season, he was the youngest American to play in the Presidents Cup.
Spieth was special. He was a two-time U.S. Junior Amateur champion, the No. 1 player in the American Junior Golf Association ranking. His athletic genes came from a father who played college baseball and a mother who played college basketball (his younger brother, Steven, played basketball for Brown and later in Europe).
Brown is a different player cutting a different path, though he also has golf history and athletic stock worth noting.
His mother, Rhonda Blades, played basketball at Vanderbilt and spent four years in the WNBA, where she has the distinction of making the first 3-pointer in WNBA history (her only points that game for the New York Liberty).
Brown also was No. 1 in the AJGA ranking and earned a measure of fame at the 2023 U.S. Amateur when at 16 he became the youngest player to share medalist honors, breaking a century-old record held by 18-year-old Bobby Jones.
That led to making his PGA Tour debut last year at the Myrtle Beach Classic, where Brown made the cut a week before his 17th birthday. Two weeks later, Brown and Jackson Herrington were runner-up in the U.S. Amateur Four-ball.
He is making moments and he's not even 18, traveling with his father, unable to rent a car but already curious where the road leads.
Brown is not the first teenager in a hurry. Akshay Bhatia turned pro at 17 in 2019. He went through some lean times and spent two years on the Korn Ferry Tour before finding his way. Now at 23, he has two PGA Tour titles and is No. 26 in the world.
Brown still has a long way to go. This trip to Mexico might not be the first detour.
___
On The Fringe analyzes the biggest topics in golf during the season. AP golf: https://apnews.com/hub/golf
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
San Francisco Chronicle
31 minutes ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
Scottie Scheffler is primed for another tough major at the US Open
OAKMONT, Pa. (AP) — Scottie Scheffler doesn't care what the oddsmakers think or what people say about his status as the overwhelming favorite in this U.S. Open, and pretty much everywhere he plays. But he can hear them — and sometimes, he hears from them. 'That's why I had to get rid of my Venmo, because I was either getting paid by people or people requesting me a bunch of money when I didn't win. It wasn't a good feeling,' Scheffler said with a laugh Tuesday at Oakmont. It wasn't entirely clear if he was kidding. He did say later the most anyone tried to pay him for a win — he has won 19 times worldwide in just over three years — was a couple of dollars. 'That didn't happen nearly as much as the requests did,' he said. Perhaps the most telling number for Scheffler, No. 1 in the world ranking for the longest streak since Tiger Woods in the late 2000s, is that he has won 25% of his tournaments since capturing his first PGA Tour title at the Phoenix Open in 2022. He has won three of his past four tournaments — including his third major at the PGA Championship last month at Quail Hollow — by a combined 17 shots. There's a lot of numbers that define his dominance in golf. None of it matters to him. 'I don't pay attention to the favorite stuff or anything like that,' he said. "Starting Thursday morning, we're at even par and it's up to me to go out there and play against the golf course and see what I can do." That doesn't figure to be easy. Oakmont is considered the toughest golf course in America, and the last few days of practice rounds have not changed anyone's opinions. Most of the attention is on the rough that covers the tops of shoes. Sunshine on Tuesday made the greens feel even faster after a few days of rain. Scheffler thinks the bunkers are underrated. The overall consensus? 'Man, it's just tough,' Collin Morikawa said. Scheffler would seem to have a game built for this given his extraordinary ability to control his golf ball from tee-to-green. He has yet to win his national open, though he had chances at Los Angeles (2023), Brookline (2022) and Torrey Pines (2021). The exception was last year at Pinehurst No. 2, where Scheffler was never in the mix. One reason might be the schedule — the Memorial was the week before the U.S. Open last year, another tough test that Scheffler won and never felt he had a chance to catch his breath. He won the Memorial again this year. 'Having the week off was really important for me to get home, get some rest, recover, and I showed up here on Sunday and was able to play maybe 11 holes and really get used to the conditions,' Scheffler said. 'It feels much more like my normal major prep, versus last year where you're coming in from basically a major championship test. Coming into another one is pretty challenging.' Rory McIlroy had a few extra days off after missing the cut in the Canadian Open last week, giving him time to find a driver that will help find the fairways at Oakmont, perhaps the most critical part of this test. McIlroy and Scheffler were listed as close to co-favorites after McIlroy won the Masters, giving him the career Grand Slam. He already had won three times on some of golf's biggest stages. Scheffler at that point had yet to win this year. So much has changed in the last two months. McIlroy spoke at the PGA Championship of still wanting to achieve more in golf, knowing that nothing will ever beat that feeling of finally becoming a Masters champion to join the most exclusive club of players with all four majors. He spoke last week of lacking motivation when getting ready for the Canadian Open. 'At some point, you have to realize that there's a little bit more golf left to play this season,' said McIlroy, singling out Oakmont, the British Open in his native Northern Ireland and the Ryder Cup in September. 'But I think weeks like Quail Hollow or even weeks like last week, it makes it easier to reset in some way, to be like, OK, I sort of need to get my stuff together here and get back to the process and sort of what I'd been doing for that seven months from October last year until April this year.' For Scheffler, he's been on such a roll that how he plays will be a big part in the chances the rest of the field has. Jordan Spieth was asked about Dustin Johnson — only Scheffler has been at No. 1 longer in the last 10 years — and Spieth immediately turned it into a conversation about his Dallas neighbor. 'Scottie's level is something I haven't seen personally out here,' Spieth said. 'I play with him at home, too. He might pull an iron shot once and then hit the pin on his chip.' The margin for error is smaller at Oakmont than on most courses, mainly because of all the trouble off the tee — bunkers and dense rough — and challenges on the fast greens. 'I think everybody knows this is probably the toughest golf course in the world right now, and you have to hit the fairways, you have to hit greens, and you have to two-putt, worst-case scenario,' defending champion Bryson DeChambeau said. 'When you've got those putts inside 10 feet, you've got to make them. It's a great test of golf. I'm looking forward to it. I'm sure everybody else is.'
Hamilton Spectator
34 minutes ago
- Hamilton Spectator
Scottie Scheffler is primed for another tough major at the US Open
OAKMONT, Pa. (AP) — Scottie Scheffler doesn't care what the oddsmakers think or what people say about his status as the overwhelming favorite in this U.S. Open, and pretty much everywhere he plays. But he can hear them — and sometimes, he hears from them. 'That's why I had to get rid of my Venmo, because I was either getting paid by people or people requesting me a bunch of money when I didn't win. It wasn't a good feeling,' Scheffler said with a laugh Tuesday at Oakmont . It wasn't entirely clear if he was kidding. He did say later the most anyone tried to pay him for a win — he has won 19 times worldwide in just over three years — was a couple of dollars. 'That didn't happen nearly as much as the requests did,' he said. Perhaps the most telling number for Scheffler, No. 1 in the world ranking for the longest streak since Tiger Woods in the late 2000s, is that he has won 25% of his tournaments since capturing his first PGA Tour title at the Phoenix Open in 2022. He has won three of his past four tournaments — including his third major at the PGA Championship last month at Quail Hollow — by a combined 17 shots. There's a lot of numbers that define his dominance in golf. None of it matters to him. 'I don't pay attention to the favorite stuff or anything like that,' he said. 'Starting Thursday morning, we're at even par and it's up to me to go out there and play against the golf course and see what I can do.' That doesn't figure to be easy. Oakmont is considered the toughest golf course in America , and the last few days of practice rounds have not changed anyone's opinions. Most of the attention is on the rough that covers the tops of shoes. Sunshine on Tuesday made the greens feel even faster after a few days of rain. Scheffler thinks the bunkers are underrated. The overall consensus? 'Man, it's just tough,' Collin Morikawa said. Scheffler would seem to have a game built for this given his extraordinary ability to control his golf ball from tee-to-green. He has yet to win his national open, though he had chances at Los Angeles (2023), Brookline (2022) and Torrey Pines (2021). The exception was last year at Pinehurst No. 2, where Scheffler was never in the mix. One reason might be the schedule — the Memorial was the week before the U.S. Open last year, another tough test that Scheffler won and never felt he had a chance to catch his breath. He won the Memorial again this year. 'Having the week off was really important for me to get home, get some rest, recover, and I showed up here on Sunday and was able to play maybe 11 holes and really get used to the conditions,' Scheffler said. 'It feels much more like my normal major prep, versus last year where you're coming in from basically a major championship test. Coming into another one is pretty challenging.' Rory McIlroy had a few extra days off after missing the cut in the Canadian Open last week, giving him time to find a driver that will help find the fairways at Oakmont, perhaps the most critical part of this test. McIlroy and Scheffler were listed as close to co-favorites after McIlroy won the Masters, giving him the career Grand Slam. He already had won three times on some of golf's biggest stages. Scheffler at that point had yet to win this year. So much has changed in the last two months. McIlroy spoke at the PGA Championship of still wanting to achieve more in golf, knowing that nothing will ever beat that feeling of finally becoming a Masters champion to join the most exclusive club of players with all four majors. He spoke last week of lacking motivation when getting ready for the Canadian Open. 'At some point, you have to realize that there's a little bit more golf left to play this season,' said McIlroy, singling out Oakmont, the British Open in his native Northern Ireland and the Ryder Cup in September. 'But I think weeks like Quail Hollow or even weeks like last week, it makes it easier to reset in some way, to be like, OK, I sort of need to get my stuff together here and get back to the process and sort of what I'd been doing for that seven months from October last year until April this year.' For Scheffler, he's been on such a roll that how he plays will be a big part in the chances the rest of the field has. Jordan Spieth was asked about Dustin Johnson — only Scheffler has been at No. 1 longer in the last 10 years — and Spieth immediately turned it into a conversation about his Dallas neighbor. 'Scottie's level is something I haven't seen personally out here,' Spieth said. 'I play with him at home, too. He might pull an iron shot once and then hit the pin on his chip.' The margin for error is smaller at Oakmont than on most courses, mainly because of all the trouble off the tee — bunkers and dense rough — and challenges on the fast greens. 'I think everybody knows this is probably the toughest golf course in the world right now, and you have to hit the fairways, you have to hit greens, and you have to two-putt, worst-case scenario,' defending champion Bryson DeChambeau said. 'When you've got those putts inside 10 feet, you've got to make them. It's a great test of golf. I'm looking forward to it. I'm sure everybody else is.' ___ AP golf:
Fox Sports
41 minutes ago
- Fox Sports
Scottie Scheffler is primed for another tough major at the US Open
Associated Press OAKMONT, Pa. (AP) — Scottie Scheffler doesn't care what the oddsmakers think or what people say about his status as the overwhelming favorite in this U.S. Open, and pretty much everywhere he plays. But he can hear them — and sometimes, he hears from them. 'That's why I had to get rid of my Venmo, because I was either getting paid by people or people requesting me a bunch of money when I didn't win. It wasn't a good feeling,' Scheffler said with a laugh Tuesday at Oakmont. It wasn't entirely clear if he was kidding. He did say later the most anyone tried to pay him for a win — he has won 19 times worldwide in just over three years — was a couple of dollars. 'That didn't happen nearly as much as the requests did,' he said. Perhaps the most telling number for Scheffler, No. 1 in the world ranking for the longest streak since Tiger Woods in the late 2000s, is that he has won 25% of his tournaments since capturing his first PGA Tour title at the Phoenix Open in 2022. He has won three of his past four tournaments — including his third major at the PGA Championship last month at Quail Hollow — by a combined 17 shots. There's a lot of numbers that define his dominance in golf. None of it matters to him. 'I don't pay attention to the favorite stuff or anything like that,' he said. "Starting Thursday morning, we're at even par and it's up to me to go out there and play against the golf course and see what I can do." That doesn't figure to be easy. Oakmont is considered the toughest golf course in America, and the last few days of practice rounds have not changed anyone's opinions. Most of the attention is on the rough that covers the tops of shoes. Sunshine on Tuesday made the greens feel even faster after a few days of rain. Scheffler thinks the bunkers are underrated. The overall consensus? 'Man, it's just tough,' Collin Morikawa said. Scheffler would seem to have a game built for this given his extraordinary ability to control his golf ball from tee-to-green. He has yet to win his national open, though he had chances at Los Angeles (2023), Brookline (2022) and Torrey Pines (2021). The exception was last year at Pinehurst No. 2, where Scheffler was never in the mix. One reason might be the schedule — the Memorial was the week before the U.S. Open last year, another tough test that Scheffler won and never felt he had a chance to catch his breath. He won the Memorial again this year. 'Having the week off was really important for me to get home, get some rest, recover, and I showed up here on Sunday and was able to play maybe 11 holes and really get used to the conditions,' Scheffler said. 'It feels much more like my normal major prep, versus last year where you're coming in from basically a major championship test. Coming into another one is pretty challenging.' Rory McIlroy had a few extra days off after missing the cut in the Canadian Open last week, giving him time to find a driver that will help find the fairways at Oakmont, perhaps the most critical part of this test. McIlroy and Scheffler were listed as close to co-favorites after McIlroy won the Masters, giving him the career Grand Slam. He already had won three times on some of golf's biggest stages. Scheffler at that point had yet to win this year. So much has changed in the last two months. McIlroy spoke at the PGA Championship of still wanting to achieve more in golf, knowing that nothing will ever beat that feeling of finally becoming a Masters champion to join the most exclusive club of players with all four majors. He spoke last week of lacking motivation when getting ready for the Canadian Open. 'At some point, you have to realize that there's a little bit more golf left to play this season,' said McIlroy, singling out Oakmont, the British Open in his native Northern Ireland and the Ryder Cup in September. 'But I think weeks like Quail Hollow or even weeks like last week, it makes it easier to reset in some way, to be like, OK, I sort of need to get my stuff together here and get back to the process and sort of what I'd been doing for that seven months from October last year until April this year.' For Scheffler, he's been on such a roll that how he plays will be a big part in the chances the rest of the field has. Jordan Spieth was asked about Dustin Johnson — only Scheffler has been at No. 1 longer in the last 10 years — and Spieth immediately turned it into a conversation about his Dallas neighbor. 'Scottie's level is something I haven't seen personally out here,' Spieth said. 'I play with him at home, too. He might pull an iron shot once and then hit the pin on his chip.' The margin for error is smaller at Oakmont than on most courses, mainly because of all the trouble off the tee — bunkers and dense rough — and challenges on the fast greens. 'I think everybody knows this is probably the toughest golf course in the world right now, and you have to hit the fairways, you have to hit greens, and you have to two-putt, worst-case scenario,' defending champion Bryson DeChambeau said. 'When you've got those putts inside 10 feet, you've got to make them. It's a great test of golf. I'm looking forward to it. I'm sure everybody else is.' ___ AP golf:
