Two PGA tournaments being played at the same course
Muirfield Village will look the same to those watching at home, minus the grandstands and thousands of spectators spread across the course Jack Nicklaus built.
The challenge for the PGA Tour is to make it feel different to the players who will be in Dublin, Ohio, the next two weeks.
For the first time in 63 years, two PGA Tour events are being held on the same golf course in consecutive weeks.
First up is the Workday Charity Open, a tournament that didn’t even exist six weeks ago until the John Deere Classic chose to cancel this year without fans and the tour plugged the gap in the schedule with a big assist from San Francisco-based Workday. Then it’s on to the Memorial. It’s one thing to keep one of the elite courses on the PGA Tour from getting chewed up from 157 players this week and the 120-man field next week. It’s another to present a different test for two tournaments meant to be entirely different.
The plan is for one to be a little more gentle, the other to be a little tougher.
“I think, this week, we’re going to have to be a little bit cautious with the golf course, certainly out of respect to Mr. Nicklaus and the Memorial Tournament being next week,” said Gary Young, the PGA Tour rules official overseeing the Workday Charity Open.
The rough that frames the generous fairways is to be topped off at 31⁄2 inches, and then thicker and higher for the Memorial. The greens are to be running around 11 on the Stimpmeter this week before increasing to 13 and beyond for the Memorial, just the way Nicklaus likes it.
Tees will be moved around, especially on the par 3s, to keep the turf from being divot-filled. Slower greens should allow officials to use pin positions closer to some of the ridges, which would be impossible with faster green speeds. One possibility is a front right pin position on the par-3 fourth, with a bunker to the right and a green that moves left.
Young also anticipates the tee being moved forward on the 14th hole — just as it was for one session in the 2013 Presidents Cup — allowing players to try to drive the green with water to the right, which also comes into play with anything left because the green slopes toward the water. “It’s going to give us a chance to really highlight the golf course being played in two different ways,” Young said.
Memorial has one of the strongest fields each year, largely out of respect for Nicklaus, an affinity for Muirfield Village and its place on the calendar. In nonpandemic years, the Memorial is two weeks before the U.S. Open.
The Workday Charity Open, a one-time event with the John Deere returning in 2021, didn’t do too badly. The field features five of the top 10 in the world, with Jon Rahm at No. 2 and getting another chance to replace Rory McIlroy (not playing) at the top of the world rankings. Also playing is Brooks Koepka and Justin Thomas, Patrick Cantlay and Patrick Reed. Cantlay is the defending champion at Muirfield Village, just not this tournament.
“The more weeks we can play at Muirfield Village, I’m in,” Cantlay said. “I like the golf course, so we can play there every week as far as I’m concerned.”