2021 Barbasol Championship: Smylie Kaufman Deserves Admiration
By Tim Letcher
There are many more important stories in the world of golf right now, including the season’s final major, the Open Championship. But I want to give a huge shout out to Smylie Kaufman, who is playing in the Barbasol Championship this week in Lexington, Kentucky.
On Thursday, Kaufman had a dreadful round. There’s no disguising the fact that Kaufman was really bad in the event’s first round.
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And it started from almost the very beginning. He parred his first hole but bogeyed the second, double bogeyed the third hole and, you can probably see a pattern developing here. Already at 4-over par, Kaufman closed his front nine by making a 10 on a par four. That left him with a 10-over par 46 on his first nine (and that included a birdie).
His back nine was not nearly as bad, with one major exception. Kaufman made seven pars and one bogey on his second nine. The lone exception was a snowman on a par four. The quadruple bogey, combined with his bogey, gave him a 41 on his second nine. That left Kaufman with a 15-over par 87 through 18 holes.
It was the worst round on Thursday by a whopping nine shots. It would have been very easy for Kaufman to just withdraw because he had absolutely zero chance to make the cut on Friday.
But here’s where the shout out comes in – Kaufman did not quit on the week.
He came back out on Friday and played his round. And again, it wasn’t his best round but he kept at it. Even when he had three bogeys in his first eight holes on Friday to drop to 18-over for the event, Kaufman kept playing.
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And, what do you know, the golfing gods rewarded Kaufman for his persistence. He actually birdied his next three holes to get back to even par for the day.
Among the players who did not withdraw, Kaufman finished last this week. But he should gain the admiration of golf fans everywhere simply for playing his Friday round after his disastrous Thursday.