Byrd sees a half-full cup toiling on Web.com Tour
5-time PGA Tour winner is upbeat
With five victories, Jonathan Byrd had such a productive PGA Tour career that spending any time on the developmental Web.com Tour never crossed his mind. His only stop in the minor leagues was in 2001, so long ago that it then was known as the Buy.com Tour.
A year after his playoff victory in the 2011 Tournament of Champions at Kapalua, however, Byrd had wrist surgery. He missed three months to start 2013, and his game and confidence slowly eroded to the point that he was trying to make cuts, make money and keep his job.
“You stop trying to bring your best and you’re trying just to stay out here, and that’s no way to play,” Byrd said last month at the RSM Classic. “The tighter you hang on, the farther you get away from what you’re doing.”
With nothing but past champion status that would offer him limited starts, his best option to regain a full PGA Tour card was to spend a year on the Web. com Tour.
That can be a tough pill for someone who had never come close to losing his PGA Tour card before the injury.
Byrd, who turns 39 in January, brought with him an attitude that is worth emulating for anyone who winds up in that spot.
“It was humbling,” Byrd said. “To go back to the Web was difficult. There’s so many reminders every week that you’re not where you want to be. But I tried to embrace it. … I didn’t want to be the grumpy old tour player talking about how great it is on tour and how bad it is out here and how good I used to be. I made friends out there. I enjoyed it. I focused on enjoying the competition.”
Byrd even turned down a half-dozen exemptions to PGA Tour events last year. He finished 48th on the money list (the top 25 get PGA cards) and he didn’t earn one of the 25 additional spots from the fourtournament series at the end of the year.
Even so, he was upbeat about his progress. Besides, being around a bunch of kids in their early 20s has helped.
“You’ve got to play good to beat these guys,” he said. “But what I’ve learned from being out here so long is that I’ve got what it takes. Guys who have won five times on the PGA Tour, it’s a short list. I’ve got something in there that’s good enough. And I still think it’s good enough.”
DIVOTS: The Walker Cup will be played in Florida for the first time. The amateur matches are coming to Seminole Golf Club in 2021. The USGA also said the 2025 Walker Cup will be held at Cypress Point Club on the Monterey Peninsula, where it last was played in 1981. Next year’s matches will be on the North Course at Los Angeles Country Club.
Seventeen players were outside the top 100 in the world when they won on the PGA Tour this year.
Patrick Reed (No. 8) and Bubba Watson (No. 10) are the only players from the top 10 in the world who did not have multiple victories this year. Hideki Matsuyama (No. 6) had the most with five victories worldwide.