A (low-) rising PGA Tour star, a DP World Tour feat of strength and Tiger Woods' cool party favors

Welcome to another edition of The Grind, where we truly believe in miracles after witnessing the Indiana Hoosiers win the college football national championship. That's right, INDIANA! With a bunch of barely recruited James Madison players! Curt Cignetti just pulled off the greatest coaching job in sports history and it’s just a matter of time before a movie is made about this. But there were some pretty cool stories happening in golf this past week as well. Let’s get to it all, because that's what I do. Google me.

WE’RE BUYING

Chris Gotterup: It’s not quite an Indiana football script, but a Rutgers golfer starting to dominate on the PGA Tour probably wasn’t expected by many a few years ago either. Gotterup’s Sony Open win gives him three PGA Tour titles in the last two years, putting him only behind Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy.

And the tour’s newest rising star is a savant at low-rising shots (It’s funny his name is GotterUP when he loves keeping the ball down so much). We saw this a couple weeks back in a TGL match with this 1.7-degree launch:

But the reigning Scottish Open champ proved once again he can pull those penetrating pellets off in real conditions as well:

We have a new King of Sting-ers. But instead of a crown, he wears gold chains—and now he’ll be a popular pick to win a certain silver jug this summer. In the meantime, Gotterup is all the way up to No. 17 in the Official World Golf Ranking with a bullet. And a low bullet at that.

Nacho Elvira: The Spaniard won his third career DP World Tour title at the Dubai Invitational, holding off a strong leaderboard that included Rory McIlroy and Shane Lowry.

But when it comes to actual strength, what he did in the gym was even more impressive.

The dude broke a freaking medicine ball! What a beast.

Tiger embracing 50: I always love seeing Tiger happy, but I never thought he’d look this happy about getting old. Look at the outfit he rocked to last week’s TGL match:

And then there was his big event last week, which was part a celebration of the 30th year of his TGR Foundation and part 50th birthday bash. How about these cool party favors—custom Upper Deck signed trading cards—that everyone left with?

I bet all the guest got some nice Sun Day Red swag as well. My invite must have gotten lost in the mail. Sigh.

WE’RE SELLING

Shane Lowry’s final hole: Tied for the lead on the 72nd hole in Dubai, the Ryder Cup hero found a greenside bunker with a poor approach and then did this:

Shocking. “That was a disaster, wasn't it?” a visibly shaken Lowry said after. “What can you do? You have to learn from it and move on, lads. This game is ... I don't know. It's the start of my 18th season on tour and I'll never figure it out.” Amen to that, Shane. Of course, had this been a Ryder Cup match, Shane would have holed the bunker shot.

Vijay Singh haters/lovers: First of all, congratulations to the soon-to-be 63-year-old Singh on making the cut in Hawaii and finishing T-40. Very impressive.

But people are going way too crazy about this. For the record, I don’t think Singh should be allowed PGA Tour membership by using a one-time top-50 career money list exemption. I like that rule, but it should have an age limit. I’m also not going to let Vijay wanting to have one final season playing with the youngsters bother me that much. That being said, the people screaming “SEE?! VIJAY DESERVES THIS!” after one week are overreacting as well.

This bunker method: This was really, um, something:

Is Keith Mitchel clip farming as the kids say? No, because as Michael Kim pointed out, it appears Kim was just trying to set up his next shot from the sand because he had no chance holding the green from that plugged lie. Still, what a bizarre sequence. Don’t expect that toe-down sand shot method to catch on.

ON TAP

The PGA Tour season rolls on with the American Express, AKA that one they play on three different courses in Palm Springs, AKA that one that starts the season on the MAINLAND, AKA that one that could wind up as the official season opener if the Hawaiian Swing really says aloha. This week will also mark the season debut of World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler, who missed this tournament last year while still recovering from that Christmas Day kitchen accident. In other words, sorry to defending champ Sepp Straka and everyone else in the field, because it’s going to be a lot harder to win this year.

Random tournament fact: William Mouw made a 13(!) after finding the infamous bunker on PGA West’s 16th hole during last year’s second round. Here’s video proof:

Imagine how bad it woul have been had he tried Keith Mitchell's method? Needless to say, William didn’t make the cut.

RANDOM PROP BETS OF THE WEEK

—There will be another 13 made on that hole this week: 100-to-1 odds

—Scottie Scheffler will win this week: 2.5-to-1 odds (Actual odds LOL)

—You will see a LOT more people wearing Indiana gear this week: LOCK

TWEET OF THE WEEK

Man, I can’t get enough of this guy. Cigs! What a legend.

PHOTO OF THE WEEK

The gold chains with the leis is quite a look.

VIRAL VIDEO OF THE WEEK

After talking so much about golf, this only seemed fitting:

Nice poke by that young man.

THIS WEEK IN PUBLIC DISPLAYS OF AFFECTION(?)

Will Ferrell did the intros for the Atlanta-Jupiter TGL match and it turned into a roast:

Long live Will Ferrell.

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“This was big for me too, because this kicks in, ya know, the five-year… umm… whatever it’s called for retirement reasons. So now I don’t have to worry about that.” —Chris Gotterup. Hey, it's never too early to start planning for retirement.

THIS AND THAT

Congrats to Argentina’s Mateo Pulcini on winning the Latin America Amateur to earn a Masters invite as well as a spot in the U.S. Open and Open Championship. Oh, and congrats on having a cool name as well. . . . Speaking of names, the WTGL, the new women’s TGL, announced some big names including World No. 1 Jeeno Thitikul, Lydia Ko, Charley Hull and Lexi Thompson. Looks like Lexi will be playing even more golf in retirement. . . . LIV announced a nice signing of its own, 2025 NCAA champ Michael La Sasso, who will forfeit his Masters invite this year to turn pro and join Phil Mickelson's HyFlyers GC. After losing a big gym guy like Brooks, the Quad Monster is a solid replacement. . . . And, finally, check out Part 2 of my year-long quest to see how good I can get at golf. This part focuses on tracking your own stats:

I have no clue if that’s what Dustin Johnson was doing in this photo, but you get the point.

RANDOM QUESTIONS TO PONDER

How much would it take for you to give up a Masters invite?

Should I start wearing gold chains on the golf course?

Who will play Curt Cignetti in the movie?