LIV Miami Recap

Legion XIII move into second, Smash disarray and the Goats go Grazing

It was a great Sunday watch, one that seemed to blow the PGA out of the water most of the day until Denny McCarthy made a charge for the ages. But the broad truth remains: LIV’s structure and set-up allows for more shots to matter and for a lot more shots to be seen by fans. There will be more contenders with 54 holes vs 72 plus the team title and at least a nod at the podium to try and make 2nd/3rd matter.

Kieran Vincent’s collapse actually meant something to the team leaderboard, Rahm rolled in a big birdie late that meant nothing to the individual title but he celebrated knowing it helped his team. Not to even mention the season-long races (we will update those later), which are much easier to keep up with on LIV. Not to slag off the PGA, the McCarthy charge was amazing (and heartbreaking for a guy with a 80/1 Denny ticket) but LIV is just better setup overall in many ways for a TV product. Onto the recap

Team Contributions

Legion XIII takes down their second title with an absolute team effort. All 4 players shot under par which was basically par for the tournament (50th percentile), the only team to do so. The drama of Vincent’s free fall late in his round was exquisite, as the guy who is really dragging down their overall title hopes did so in this event. He was able to stabilize just enough for Legion XIII to steer it home.

I noted in the preview that Doral was the perfect course to Graze for the Goats, and Graze they did. It looked as if they could take home a title but captain Watson’s poor play and Uihlein’s fade from contention had them in second. Wolff’s great play (-10, podium finish) was fantastic to see.

Burmester and Louis carried Stinger to a podium without much help.

Torque gritted their way into contention on Sunday somehow but without anybody truly playing well it was always going to be tough. This a team that will always be there come the end of the season.

I tipped the Fireballs to have a big week, Sergio getting into the playoffs with Ancer playing well as well gave them a basis but the young guns totally collapsed. Puig and Chacarra threw away a good chance at a podium for Fireballs fans all over the world.

A disappointing week for the league leading Crushers as they finish in the points, but just barely.

Koepka prepared for the Masters by going totally backwards on Saturday and Sunday here, into the Phil/Kozuma/Kim part of the pylon and dragging Smash out of the points. As a LIV captain he has been quite poor.

DJ’s captaincy might be over the hill as well, Pat Perez was awful for the Aces but they also lack pop up top. 0 points again for the once well-known Big, Bad, Bullies who are now just another mediocre team likely playing without a bye.

Bland and Meronk are actually playing some solid golf right now, but captain Kaymer and Kalle Samooja are still dragging down the Cleeks into also-ran status.

Leishman was fine but Ripper lacked their captain and emotional core in Cam Smith, out with bad seafood digestion. Ben Campbell joined in, the old backup New Zealander. This is how I imagined him on the range with his Aussie teammates.

As for the HyFlyers, Majesticks and IronHeads what can you say? They deserve their spots in the cellar. Just essentially unmitigated garbage throughout their rosters and certainly one of these teams deserves a total relegation from LIV.

Team Standings

Big changes see Legion XIII climb from 4th to 2nd and cut the Crushers lead down to 26 points.

Torque and Smash slide down a spot.

Stinger didn’t pick up any places despite their 16 points and podium finish but this got them back into the discussion for the bye places, they are just 3.5 points behind a suddenly stagnant Smash who have just 3 total points over the past two events.

The RangeGoats are into that conversation as well with their second place finish moving them up from 8th to 6th.

The 4Aces, Fireballs and Ripper are at the bottom of the real teams list, right now Ripper would have to play Fireballs in the opening day of the team championship. It would be like when Michigan State and UConn get matched up early, someone’s gotta go home.

The Majesticks and Cleeks remain a bit ahead of the putrid IronHeads vs HyFlyers battle at the bottom to see who can even make it to the team championship. 13th place doesn’t make it, whoever gets points next might be the team that climbs in.

Individual Standings

Niemann remains on top by over 30 points, Dean Burmester crashes into the top 3 with his win. He’s been playing well all season, and jumped from 12th to 3rd with this week.

Sergio moved from 11th to 4th with his runner-up.

Top 15 players falling a bit include Talor Gooch, Charles Howell III, Paul Casey, and Cam Smith.

Matthew Wolff climbed into 11th from 23rd.

Leishman got a good bit clear from relegation troubles, going from 42nd to 24th.

Others with big steps up from relegation

-Patrick Reed (40 → 30)

-Thomas Pieters (45→32)

The still scoreless club

-Kalle Samooja, Andy Ogletree, Jinichiro Kozuma, Danny Lee, Lee Westwood, Mito Pereira, Hudson Swafford and Anthony Kim.

Pieters and Kieran Vincent (0.33 points) escaped the scoreless crew this week.

News and notes and scuttlebutt from around the league

Trump was disgusted with Anthony Kim’s untucked shirt and generally sloppy appearance…..Sergio was basically a second away from swinging on Louis Oosthuizen, who inadvertently sprayed him with champagne on the 18th after Burmester’s win….Louis making a triple and a double bogey on a par 5 to throw away the tournament while having the lead, only to emerge 30 minutes later to lead the celebration for Burmester shows he’s either a great captain or truly cares more about farming than winning golf tournaments, or both….Hatton’s absolute full bore profanity-laden rant was run in full “Fucking cunt” he called his driver at the end of it, rumors that’s what Kieran Vincent was called as he almost made a triple to throw away the team title….I do wish we would see a team playoff soon, we almost had one….the new Monte Carlo sims and difficulty of holes remaining on screen show just how hard the team is working and innovating but don’t think they quite add enough to be worth the time they spend. Difference in remaining holes is almost always less than a shot and projected final score is roughly what they are at now, don’t think the projections are totally dialed in yet. We still don’t have a total feel for what is possible with all 4 scores counting…..hearing it’s just incredibly bleak and depressing in the Majesticks locker room, the Hard Knocks cameras got kicked out in a no-holds barred meeting for the 3 captains…Trump and Bryson seen deep in conversation…P Reed wanted the Mar-A-Lago invite….Cleeks Nation seems to have latched onto Meronk as the face of the franchise with Blandy as the sort of fan favorite. Samooja not catching on we hear (low merch sales even in Scandanavia) and the dead weight that is the Kaymer long-term contract have many Cleeks fans poring over the Asian Tour for replacements.

Up next some tournament in Augusta before the real business gets going in LIV Adelaide.