Ever since Collin Morikawa turned pro in June 2019, I have thought he would be a dominant force in Golf. Four events took him to finish in the top ten for the first time, with a T-2nd at the 2019 3M Open. In his next start, he finished T-4th at the John Deere Classic and then won the Barracuda Championship in his sixth start. He won again mid-way through the 2020 season at the Workday Charity Open, an event played at Muirfield Village as part of the resumption of the PGA Tour season due to COVID. But a month later, when Morikawa won the PGA Championship at the tender age of just 23 years and six months, many figured he was the next coming of Tiger Woods.

The following year, he won the WGC-Workday Championship and then the British Open over the summer, but he wasn't the dominant player we thought he was. He won the 2021 season-ending DP World Tour Championship in Dubai. Morikawa was superb from tee to green, but he struggled with the putter. In his first full year on tour in 2020, Morikawa was 128th in Strokes Gained Putting, but he dropped to 178th the following year. Last year, he was 131st, and so far this year, 111th. The stats don't lie; in putting inside ten feet, Collin ranked 156th in 2021, 168th in 2022, and has improved to 67th this year. As we said in our Tourinsider during the Ryder Cup, Morikawa realized his problems and started working with putting guru Stephen Sweeney at the beginning of the year. He came close to winning at the Sentry Tournament of Champions in January, then finished 3rd at the Farmers and T-6th at the Genesis. While his putting was improving, he struggled around the greens when he missed hitting a green. Still, he has worked hard to put all facets of the game together and showed signs of improvement in finishing 2nd at the Rocket Mortgage. Since then, he showed some promise in the FedExCup playoffs, finishing T-6th at the Tour Championship. He hinted that the answer to his putting woes was addressed during the summer when he was able to get a putting shaft with the same stiffness but lighter, which helped him. These weren't the only changes he made; he switched golf balls to the TaylorMade TP5x ball at the BMW Championship, which gave him lower spin and higher launch, especially in crosswinds. He also put in new, lighter shafts in his long irons. But during the playoffs and Ryder Cup, Morikawa had more confidence in the putter.

Playing in the Zozo Championship is important to Collin. His father is Japanese and Chinese, and his mother was born in China. So Collin never misses a chance to play in Japan. He loves sushi, and on arrival to Japan, Collin, along with his wife Katherine and agent, stopped at the world-famous sushi spot Sukiyabashi Jiro, which is a 10-seat restaurant located in a subway station in Tokyo. Collin told all how great it was getting his week off to the right start. Another important element for Collin: on Wednesday afternoon, Collin and his caddie, J.J. Jakovac, spent three hours on the putting green. Something was off in the stroke, and the two found something that carried over to the first round. He shot 64 in a bogey-free round in which he made a lot of putts. Friday was a struggle due to high winds as he shot 73 and then got off to a terrible start on Saturday with a double bogey on the first hole and a bogey on the fourth hole. But Morikawa played his last 31 holes in 14 under par, starting with a birdie on the sixth hole. He went into the final round two shots back of third-round leader Justin Suh, shot 63 to win by six shots. It was his sixth PGA Tour victory, and he has only led once going into the final round at the WGC-Workday. Morikawa has a great record going into the final round within five of the lead, as you can see from this chart.

The big question is whether Collin Morikawa may have found something to take him in a new direction in 2024. We know he is excellent from tee to green and isn't bothered by pressure, but putting has always been his major problem, and if he has solved that mystery in his game, we will see him contend more. We won't see Morikawa until the Hero Challenge in December, but I can see him winning again before the tour moves to Florida.

As I said in my preview,

watch out for the Japanese in this event. Three players, Ryo Ishikawa, Kensei Hirata, and Ryo Hisatsune, finished in the top ten and will get exemptions into the World Wide Technology Championship. As for Ishikawa, I think he is the best player in Japan and could have been better than Hideki Matsuyama. Ishikawa played on the PGA Tour between 2010 and 2015. He broke into the top 100 of the Official World Gold Rankings in 2008 at the tender age of just 18, and the following year broke into the top 50.

At the end of 2009, he got as high as 29, but after that, while trying to make it on the PGA Tour, he suffered a severe back injury that plagued him for almost a decade. He returned to playing full-time in Japan in 2017 and has won 18 times on the Japan Golf Tour. Despite not achieving success in America, he didn't burn out like fellow youngster Ty Tryon and, at 32, is still young enough to play in America if the opportunity comes.

Eric Cole

continues his run in his rookie season on the PGA Tour by finishing T-2nd at the Zozo Championship. It was his second runner-up for the year (he lost a playoff at the Honda Classic) as he is the Rookie of the Year honors leader. He still has to earn the honor; close behind him is Vincent Norrman, who won at the Barbasol, and Ludvig Aberg, who is the hottest player right now and will play in Mexico and the RSM Classic.

Shriners Children's, he shot a final round 65 to finish T-20th, and the next week in Japan had his best finish on the PGA Tour, T-5th, just three shots back of winner Keegan Bradley. Then, at the Sony Open in Hawaii, Buckley went down to the finish line and finished 2nd, just a shot back of Si Woo Kim, who made birdies on his final two holes. He added top-tens with a T-10th at the Valero Texas Open and a T-5th at the RBC Heritage. At that point in the year, everything looked great. He was 33rd in the FedExCup race and looking for an excellent finish to the year. But after finishing T-5th at the RBC Heritage. After that, his game went into a slide, and after missing four straight cuts going into the Rocket Mortgage, he withdrew because of a torn muscle in his chest and rib area.

He took a month off and returned to the FedEx St. Jude Championship, finishing T-52nd. The good news is that he retained his top-125 status and will return to the PGA Tour in 2024. But he entered the Sanderson Farms Championship 60th in the rankings and is working out to maintain that position and get to play at the Sentry and Genesis. He opened up with a 67 at the Shriners but fell back to finish t-64th. At the Zozo Championship, he finished 72nd and still is 60th in the FedEx fall points list.

Oliver Betschart

a prodigy from Bermuda, qualified to play in the Bermuda Championship, which will be played in three weeks. Usually, a local qualifier doesn't make any news, but Betschart is just 15-year-old making him the second 15-year-old to play in the Bermuda Championship in the last four years. In 2019, Kenny Leseur was also a qualifier but six months older. He shot 77-75 to miss the cut. Today, he is a Sophomore at Butler University. Betschart shot 3 over par in very tough conditions to make the field. Betschart was born and raised in Bermuda. In 2022, he won the Port Royal Golf Club championship at 14 and has played in numerous European events. Betschart also spends a fair amount of time in Texas with his coach, former PGA Tour player David Ogrin.

Betschart will be the youngest player to compete on the PGA Tour since 2014 and the fifth-youngest since 2000. Only Michelle Wie (twice), Tianlang Guan (six times), Andy Zhang (2012 U.S. Open), and Lorens Chan (2009 Sony Open in Hawaii) were younger.

He’s back

Will Zalatoris has not played on the PGA Tour since the WGC Dell Match Play back in March. At the BMW Championship, Zalatoris tweaked his back during the third round and with the pain not subsiding, was forced to withdraw. Zalatoris's season was over. He couldn't make another start and finished 30th in the FedExCup standings because of the injury. He suffered two herniated discs in his back and was told he had to rest the injury. He couldn't play in the Presidents Cup, and what he thought would be 12 weeks turned into a four-month wait. Zalatoris explained the issue as more of a motor pattern problem, not structural. So Zalatoris consulted with Dr. Greg Rose at the Titleist Performance Institute to evaluate how he swung and make necessary changes to ensure it wouldn't happen again. He had to make changes so that he wouldn't push off his right side and make more of a turn than a lateral shift. He also changed his driver to shorten it by an inch and a quarter, which helped him turn more. Zalatoris had suffered back pain problems for the past two years, and the hope was that the new regimen would end the back problems. Zalatoris started hitting balls and playing on December 1st, making the changes. Zalatoris felt he could take the injury and turn it into a positive. His minor swing changes and the shortened driver have turned into more clubhead speed. With the time off, Zalatoris could relax, and in December, he married his college sweetheart Caitlin, and Kapalua would be their honeymoon.

The Sentry Tournament of Champions was his first event in 138 days, and he finished T-11th with an 8-under 65 in the final round. Took a week off and returned to the American Express finishing T-36th. He shot a final round 64 to finish 4th at the Genesis Invitational, four shots back of winner Jon Rahm. At the WGC-Dell Technologies Match Play, he lost to Andrew Putnam 3 & 2, then lost to Harris English 5 & 3 and conceded his match to Ryan Fox, saying he was ill. Doctors had told him he wouldn't be 100 percent until the Masters. He got together with his doctors, and they reevaluated his situation. He withdrew from the Masters, and during that week, Zalatoris had a microdiscectomy, a surgical procedure to relieve the pain caused when a herniated disc in the spine presses on an adjacent nerve. It was the same surgery Tiger Wood underwent. Zalatoris said that the surgery was made after "Careful consideration" and seeking multiple opinions. "As much as I hate not being able to play the rest of this season, I am happy that I am already seeing the benefits of the procedure," he wrote in social media post. "Playing and living in pain is not fun." So with all this time on his hands since he was shut down for the rest of the season, he decided to return to Wake Forest. He left the school a semester early to start his golf career and promised his parents that he'd graduated. In August he finished up the requiremenetss to get his psychology major. At the same time he went through a thorough rehabilitation process and in August started to chip and putt. He will work his way up to hitting golf balls starting in mid September, when he is completely out of the rehab protocol to start playing again with the hope of playing a couple of fall events before returning full-time to PGA Tour in Janauary. The good news, the field has come out for the Hero Challenge the first week in December and Zalotoris is listed to be in the field. So we will see if he can regain the same game he had when he left the PGA Tour in March.

Hard to believe but we have a week off,

the next event is the World Wide Technology Championship in it's new home in Los Cabos, Mexico at the El Cardonal at Diamante.

Please pass this on to others and have them sign up at Golfstats Insider