2021 Pebble Beach Pro-Am: Top 10 power rankings

Don’t look now, but Francesco Molinari has three top-15s in his last four starts on the PGA Tour. The talented Italian appeared to be lost at sea after losing confidence from his second-nine blunders at the 2019 Masters where the 54-hole leader settled for T-5th.

Molinari didn’t crack the top 10 in an event afterward and did not return to golf after the pandemic began until October. He claimed he was busy moving his family from London to Los Angeles, but taking seven months off and skipping two majors was a little fishy.

Regardless of his reasons, Molinari finally reappeared this fall for a tune-up at the Shriners Open. He missed the cut. The time in Vegas at least helped shake off the rust and preceded T-15th at the Houston Open.

Molinari’s game wasn’t quite major championship ready by Augusta (MC), but the 38 year old is off to a nice start in 2021.

The 2018 Champion Golfer of the Year was under par all four days (69-66-69-70) to earn T-8th at The American Express. Backing up a good week like that is paramount to prove it’s no fluke. Molinari did just that with T-10th (72-71-72-66) against a much stronger field at the Farmers Insurance Open.

Against one of the weaker fields he’ll play against in a while, there’s no reason he can’t keep the top-10 streak going. Molinari’s making his third appearance at Pebble Beach and first for the pro-am. He MC’d at the 2010 U.S. Open but returned for T-16th (68-72-71-70).

Molinari’s historic 2017-18 season resulted in him finishing eighth (.69) on the PGA Tour in strokes gained off the tee and 10th (.593) in SG approach. Albeit in just 12 measured rounds, Molinari is 46th (.309) and 17th (.733), respectively, this season. He’s also sixth (.586) in SG around the greens.

If he can roll in putts on poa, which tends to be an equalizer, then he could be back to the Ryder Cup form that saw him go undefeated in 2018.