Weekly Recap: Carlos Converts

When Carlos Ortiz won something called the WinCo Foods Portland Open presented by Kraft in 2014, it was his third win of the year on the Korn Ferry Tour, a victory that earned him a so-called "battlefield promotion" to the PGA Tour. 

If you win three times in quick succession just one rung down from the big leagues, you'd think greatness will soon follow. It doesn't.

Ortiz has been on the PGA Tour ever since, but it took him six long years for that next win, which came on Sunday at the Houston Open. He won by two strokes over Dustin Johnson and Hideki Matsuyama, with Brooks Koepka and Jason Day in close pursuit.

Stepping to the tee at the par-4 485-yard 18th hole with the most dangerous lead in golf -- one shot -- he calmly piped his drive, put his approach on the green and drained a 22-footer to avoid any and all drama. It was impressive stuff. The limited number of 2,000 fans allowed into a U.S.-based tournament for the first time since the pandemic struck cheered, adding to Ortiz's breakthrough moment at Memorial Park Golf Course.

Ortiz hadn't exactly been playing well coming in. He had had all of one top-25 since February -- and barely that, with a tie for 25th at the BMW Championship. He was listed at 150-1 on golfodds.com. He was ranked 160th in the world, but now stands 65th. He'll be in the 85th Masters next April, among other big events, but not the 84th this week.

It's impossible to tell whether this portends a shift in Ortiz's career or if was simply a one-off week. He had three top-10s each of the last two seasons, including a runner-up at Mayakoba last year, but also missed 22 of 50 cuts. He's only 29. Right now, we're leaning more toward this week being an aberration.

That doesn't make it any less special for Ortiz.

Before moving on to the Backspin, we wanted to note that there have been 11 battlefield promotions – three wins in one season – in Korn Ferry history, according to Wikipedia. Ortiz was the 10th. Not one of them has gone on to what could be considered anywhere close to greatness. The 11 were: Chris Smith (1997); Pat Bates, Chad Campbell and Heath Slocum (all 2001); Patrick Moore (2002); Tom Carter (2003); Jason Gore (2005); Nick Flanagan (2007); Michael Sim (2009); Ortiz (2014); and Wesley Bryan (2016). Only Gore has won in the year of his promotion.

MONDAY BACKSPIN

Dustin Johnson
There are two ways you could look at Johnson's week. First, how could he have not beaten the likes of Carlos Ortiz down the stretch, especially when he held the lead early on Sunday and still a share on the back nine? And that would be a fair question. Second, not knowing what to expect from Johnson on the heels of a positive COVID-19, he clearly showed he is prepared to compete next week at Augusta. And that surely is the more important note to take away.

Hideki Matsuyama
Matsuyama tied for second with Johnson. He did all the things he normally does well tee-to-green and also tied for an impressive 10th in Strokes Gained: Putting. When he can putt like that, there is no place that he can't contend. The greens at Augusta will obviously be more perilous than Memorial Park's, and Matsuyama has finished worse than the year before five years running at the Masters.
 
Brooks Koepka
Like he has done a few times of late, Koepka showed what he's capable of. The thing is, you never know if he's healthy from tournament to tournament. It appears that Koepka has emerged in good health playing for the second time since taking a couple of months to rehab his knee. He was in contention until a couple of late bogeys relegated him to a tie for fifth. He ranked sixth in Strokes Gained: Off-the-Tee and second in Putting, surely good signs for next week. Still, keep in mind that the field was weak and he had more course knowledge than everybody else, having acted as a consultant in Memorial Park's redesign.

Tyrrell Hatton
Hatton quietly tied for seventh, in part because Thursday was his worst round and he got better every day: 71-70-67-65. He now has four top-10s in hist six latest starts heading to the Masters. His Augusta results were T56 last year, T44 in 2018 and a missed cut in his 2017 debut. Not much to see there. However, he's played the best golf of his career in the 19 months since he last was at Augusta, especially in the past 12 months.

Jason Day
He played in the final group on Sunday, managed only a 71 while so many were going so low and ended up in a tie for seventh. That's his best result since a top-5 at the PGA Championship in August and bodes well for his Masters. He tied for fifth last year at Augusta and has four top-10s in nine career starts, having never missed cut (though he withdrew in 2012).

Sam Burns
Even though were focusing on guys who are playing next week, Burns merits attention. He carried the 54-hole lead into Sunday only to bogey the first hole and double the fourth, and he finished tied for seventh. That equaled his third-best result on Tour, matching the Sanderson Farms from two months ago. He also tied for 13th at the Wyndham in Augusts. He's still far from his best ranking of 101st – he's now 152nd – but he appears to be coming. He is only 24 years old.

Francesco Molinari
Maybe the most surprising takeaway from the entire tournament was that Molinari showed a pulse. Actually, a lot more with his tie for 15th. It was only his second event since the March shutdown, and the other was a missed cut at the Shriners. And he wasn't playing well before the shutdown. Molinari now returns to Augusta, where his downward spiral from a top-10 golfer actually began when he splashed into Rae's Creek while holding the lead on Sunday. He's now ranked 85th in the world, but there is a path to see him making the cut this week, and perhaps much more.

Phil Mickelson
The fact that Mickelson missed the cut and missed it badly should not affect your thinking on him for the Masters. If you liked him before, that's fine. He likely would not have played in Houston if Augusta was not this week, he wanted to work on certain things and didn't need four rounds to do so. He might even have preferred playing just two rounds. Mickelson can still make a dent at the Masters, and there aren't too many PGA Tour events for which that can still be said.

Jordan Spieth
Spieth missed a four-footer for par on his final hole on Friday to miss the cut by one. Brutal. Unlike Mickelson, who could get away with two rounds and be ready for Augusta, the struggling Spieth needs any momentum he can get, even baby steps. That said, a good week at Augusta would not be a total surprise, even though Spieth is in his fourth year of futility. His worst Masters finish ever was T21, and that was last year.

Si Woo Kim
After finishing top-10 and then top-20 his past two events, and missing only one cut in almost five months, Kim of course missed the cut. He remains one of the most difficult golfers to gauge because of extreme highs and lows. He now heads to Augusta, where he's finished top-25 the past two years. Good luck deciphering what he'll do this week.

Erik Barnes
Barnes garnered attention at the beginning of the week when, after Monday qualifying to get into a PGA Tour event for the first time, we learned that he was stacking groceries to stay afloat during golf's shutdown. He's 33 years old. He's played the past six seasons on the Korn Ferry Tour, with stints on the Latinoamerica and Mackenzie Tours, as well. He tied for 38th on Sunday to earn $29.750. In the 2016-17 KF season, he made $29,973 total.

Bernhard Langer
Langer tied for fifth at the season-ending Charles Schwab Cup Championship to wrap up the overall title for 2019-20. Of all the amateurs/older champions in the Masters who don't regularly play on one of the big tours, he probably has the best chance to make the cut. He's done so the past two years and three of the past four.

Fred Couples
Couples also tied for fifth at the Charles Schwab to finish 14th in the season-long standings. He missed the Masters cut last year but tied for 38th in 2018 and even 17th in 2017. Like Langer, he stands the best chance of making the cut among the amateurs/older champions.