Patton Kizzire punts his putter at PGA’s Valspar Championship, then withdraws
The punt traveled 20 yards with three seconds of hang time, 30 feet high. It was a bomb. This was not the first time that Kizzire rendered a club unusable at a tournament.
PALM HARBOR, Fla. — The rough was up, the wind was rising, and the greens were getting slick. The Valspar Championship isn’t a PGA Tour Signature Event, a playoff event, or a major, but the narrow, uneven fairways and small, undulating greens can bring out the worst in golfers.
Just ask Patton Kizzire.
Sitting at 1-over par after five holes of the first round Thursday, Kizzire missed a putt from just outside of five feet on the par-3 15th hole. (He started on the back nine.) He’d been on the course less than two hours, but he’d had more than enough.
He took a step toward the hole, wound up with his right leg, and punted his putter. It flew a full 20 yards, with about three full seconds of hang time; it had to reach 30 feet in the air. Spectators gasped. The club nearly landed off the green. The blade scarred the surface where it landed. The kick bent the shaft.
Kizzire finished the hole by putting for bogey with a wedge. He played two more holes, scored a bogey and then a par, then withdrew from the tournament, citing a bad back.
More like a bad back nine.
Five players finished Thursday tied for first at 4-under par after a day that began warmly benign, became windy, then rainy, and then cool. Four of the leaders played in the calmer conditions that favored the morning wave, even if Kizzire didn’t take advantage. That included Sepp Straka, at No. 2 the highest-ranked player in the FedEx Cup standings, who finished at 1-under, the same score as Xander Schauffele, who, at No. 3 in the world golf rankings, is the highest-ranked player in the field.
That’s 125 spots higher than Kizzire.
If Kizzire rendering clubs unusable rings a bell, that might be because he snapped his driver across his own back after hitting a bad shot in the 2021 Northern Trust. In that instance, Kizzire claimed that he wasn’t trying to injure the driver. He even asked to be allowed to replace it during the round, since clubs broken in the normal course of use can be replaced. His request was, of course, denied.
He made no such request Thursday.
He did not stick around to explain his reaction on No. 15. That’s OK. The impetus for the incident seems self-explanatory.
Since winning the Procore Championship in Napa, Calif., in September, Kizzire has missed the cut in seven of the 10 tournaments he has played in that have a cut, including the last five in a row. The Procore win pushed his world ranking to 99th from 257th, but it was an outlier: He had spent most of the previous two years outside of the top 200. He entered the Valspar at 128th and now will continue to fall.
He’ll also assuredly be assessed a fine for his inappropriate, if hilarious, behavior.
However, it’s free agency season in the NFL.
So if any team is in the market for a fading 39-year-old golfer with a surprisingly live leg, Kizzire might have a second career.