Justin Thomas didn’t expect to be in Minnesota this week and making his debut in the PGA Tour’s 3M Open, but he arrived in the Land of 10,000 Lakes on Saturday after missing the cut at the British Open, his fourth missed cut in his last six starts.
Thomas shot an opening-round 82, tying the highest score he’s posted in his career and packed his bags early for the third time in this year’s four major championships. (He finished back of the pack in his title defense at the PGA Championship.) Of his dismal performance last weekend, he said, “I’ll hit shots like a No. 1 player in the world, and then I’ll make a 9 on my last hole of the tournament. I don’t know if it’s a focus thing or I’m just putting too much pressure on myself or what it is, but when I figure it out, I’ll be better for it.”
Thomas’s first course of business is to qualify for the FedEx Cup playoffs. He enters the week at No. 75 in the season-long standings. This the first year that 70 players – down from 125 – qualify for the first of three post-season events. Being on the outside looking in is unchartered territory for Thomas, who has five top-five FedEx Cup finishes in the past six seasons. This stretch of bad golf constitutes the longest slump of Thomas’s career. He hasn’t won since last May and has recorded just three top-10 finishes this season after never having registered fewer than seven in a season. Some of his stats help explain what has gone wrong: he ranks 159th in Strokes Gained: Putting and dropped from third two years ago to 40th in SG: Approach-the-Green.
With just two regular season FedEx Cup events remaining, Thomas had little choice but to sign up for the 3M Open and he’s already registered for the Wyndham Championship next week to give himself his best chance of qualifying for the FedEx St. Jude Championship, where he counts one of his 15 career Tour titles, and to improve his odds of advancing to the BMW Championship (top 50) and then the Tour Championship (top 30).
“I really feel like great things are coming,” Thomas said during his Tuesday pre-tournament press conference. “I have a lot of faith and belief in myself to know that this is just a challenge and an opportunity for me to grow and get better and really come out of this even better than I have been in the past.”
Not only does Thomas need to play well if he wants a shot at the playoffs, but he also is attempting to show some form ahead of…
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