🧑‍🚀 I Need My Space

📢 Fore, Please…

Can you believe it’s almost July? That means it’s almost autumn. Which means it’s basically 2026 already.

With that in mind, let’s get ahead of something big — One & Done for next year. I’m working with Splash Sports to ensure next year’s RickRunGood O&D is the best it can possibly be — but “best” means different things to different people.

To me, “best” means a large guaranteed prize purse with ~10% going to 1st, then flat payout structure the rest of the way. A lot of the conversations around these contests start with the guarantee which is driven by the buy-in. So let’s crowdsource some feedback here.

Assuming a $1,000,000 guaranteed purse, with five max entries, what is your ideal buy-in?

I’ll have more in the future, but let’s start there.

Thanks as always
Rick

🏅 Last Week’s Optimal Lineup

Keegan Bradley: $8,500 | 120.0 PTS
Tommy Fleetwood: $8,900 | 113.5 PTS
Russell Henley: $8,800 | 111.0 PTS
Jason Day: $7,000 | 109.0 PTS
Harris English: $7,700 | 104.5 PTS
Austin Eckroat: $6,100 | 86.0 PTS
TOTAL: $47,000 | 644.0 PTS 

🏃‍♂️ America Runs On Keegan

This man — oh my. The door just started to open on Sunday and Keegan kicked it down, winning his second Travelers Championship in the last three years and cementing (?) his spot on his own Ryder Cup team.

The victory at TPC River Highlands raises Bradley into some pretty elite Course Horse status. In his 52 rounds at TPC River Highlands, he’s gained +1.14 strokes/rd.

There are only 15 instances of a player/course combination that reveals a golfer gaining a stroke per round with at least 50 rounds since 2010. That’s a ton of great golf being played at the same venue.

Keegan also has a knack for drama, not only making 5’8” putt on the 72nd hole for all glory, but making bombs of 36’ 10” and 64’ 3” en route to his victory.

That putt on no. 9 — 64’ 3” — was longer than the total feet of putts made by Tommy Fleetwood on Sunday (55’ 3”).

See you at Bethpage.

😭 Tommy Lad Makes Me Sad

Since the start of 2017, the 50 best players on TOUR have accumulated 25,807 strokes gained and 226 victories. That’s 516.14 SG and 4.52 wins per golfer.

Tommy Fleetwood has beaten the average in Strokes Gained, collecting 590.65 during that stretch but has zero wins to show for it. Is golf fair and righteous? Absolutely not.

There are only four golfers inside the Top 50 who are winless. Of course, Fleetwood leads the way (+595) and is joined by Denny McCarthy (+420), Alex Noren (+360), and Louis Oosthuizen (+300).

It’s just hard to be that good and not run into a win — or four.

🧟 The Rest of the Round-Up

The rest of what you missed last week:

• After a slow start, JJ Spaun finished T14 and was the second best player in the field over the final three rounds — gaining +8.12 strokes to the field.

• Before his WD, Viktor Hovland had gained +8.28 strokes on approach through three rounds. That was not only the best in the field, but the best by four full strokes to his next closest peer.

😎 Get A Good Look

Because this is the last time you’ll see Detroit Golf Club in its current form. After the conclusion of this event, the course will undergo a restoration taking it back to some of Donald Ross’ original visions.

That’ll mean widening fairways (LOL), enlarging some greens, and updating an outdated irrigation system. It’ll take a few years before the data settles back in and we see how the changes impacted the outcome of events.

In the meantime, for the last time, let’s look at the best Course Horses at Detroit Golf Club (min 8 rounds).

These are the only 14 who are teeing it up this week and averaging 1+ SG/round. There is certainly some level of “hit it hard off-the-tee, then go find it” about this list. The penalty for missing the fairway is small (non-existent) which certainly boosts the confidence for guys who spray it the most. And trust me, those are some aspiration sprayers.

None of them rank inside the Top 50 in “Distance From Edge of Fairway” and most are well below average in the statistics.

 🦄The Long & Short of It

There’s a very strong case to be made that this week will be decided by the longest and shortest clubs in every player’s bag. Of course, I’m referring to their driver and their putter.

The ability to hit it, without regard for accuracy, off-the-tee has been well documented. In addition, the winning score of this event has routinely gotten deep under par which is going to require a lot of birdie putts to be made from all over the place.

Now, these two skill-sets are generally not correlated with one another. The guys who can hit it far often lack the touch on the putting surfaces.

I whipped up a quick quadrant chart to show how everyone in this field fares in SG:PUTT and SG:OTT with the guys in the upper right quadrant gaining in both categories. I highlighted Max Greyserman because he was the inspiration for this exercise.