2021 Memorial Tournament: Top 10 power rankings at Muirfield Village
Xander Schauffele just about made a cool $300K for his two-week stay in Dublin last year. He’s been hanging around the same spot on the leaderboard in recent appearances at Muirfield Village.
Schauffele posted T-14th (69-70-72-70) at the 2019 Memorial Tournament, T-14th (69-73-66-70) at the 2020 Workday Charity Open and T-13th (78-69-72-70) at the 2020 Memorial. He was only one shot off the cut line and shot 71 in round two of his Memorial/Muirfield Village debut in 2018.
Schauffele doesn’t toss out a lot of clunkers like he did in round one of the 2020 Memorial. Credit to him to grind to make the cut on the number then join the top 15. He ranked second in the field in strokes gained off the tee (1.378) and just didn’t get a usually trusty putter to work.
The X Man comes in off of a week of rest after a rare missed cut at the PGA Championship. It was just his second since January 2020. Schauffele rattled off three top-20s including T-3rd at the Masters in his three starts before Kiawah Island.
He’s one of the more well-rounded players out there.
The Californian ranks 42nd or better on the PGA Tour in each of the main strokes gained categories, including ninth in putting (.737) and 18th tee to green (1.064).
Schauffele is also tops in sand saves (69.35%) and par-5 scoring (4.44).
The San Diego State product got some love from Phil Mickelson for beating Phil in money games during quarantine. It showed the level Phil needed to play in order to still compete on the PGA Tour.
If Schauffele can bring those low 60s rounds to the big stage, he’ll finally end that two-year win drought.