The PGA Championship, the second major of the 2025 season, will begin on Thursday at the Quazur Hollow Club in Charlotte, North Carolina. Can Rory McIlroy make two measures in a row? Will Scotty Schaeffler add another major to his resume? What can you expect from Bryson Dedanbeau and other liv golfers?
From favorites to players under the radar, there are six storylines that continue this week in the PGA Championship.
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Who is your favorite?
Mark Schlabach: Scotty Schaeffler is a small bet favorite and is away from his first victory in the 2025 season, but I think we can claim that Rory McIlroy is the best golfer on the planet right now. He has already won the Tour three times this year, each of whom has been the sixth golfer to complete a career grand slam, against the field loaded at the AT&T Pebble Beach Proam, Player Championship and Masters.
McIlroy’s recent form and history at the Quail Hollow Club became a golfer this week as he won four times and finished as runner-up. Schaeffler hadn’t played in one stroke play event there, and his lonely appearance in Cool Hollow at the 2022 President’s Cup was hardly memorable. He went 0-3-1 and scored just half a point in a 17½-12½ victory over the international team of the US team.
Paolo Object: I agree with Mark – Rory should be preferred this week, and no one will enter this tournament in a better way than he does. But it’s amazing how fast the top of the game can shift. Schaeffler has been very consistent this season, but he won only once and hasn’t maintained a passionate pace since last year, essentially opening the door for McIlroy to step back into what is considered the best player in the world. If they come on Sunday and both are fighting to add to their main totals and find themselves in each other’s way, that wouldn’t surprise me.
Apart from Scotty and Rory, who would you choose this week?
Schlabach: Justin Thomas played some of the best golf of his career, winning his final PGA Championship in 2017 at Quazur Hollow. JT ended a nearly three-year drought without winning the RBC legacy that won Andrew Novak on April 20th. Hovland by One Stroke) and 2 strokes behind winner Sepp Straka.
Thomas has a solid history with Quazur Hollow, finishing in the top 26 in five of his six starts. He finished fifth in the stroke: green (1.227) and approach (.896) and 20th putt (.432).
uggetti: This is one of the longest courses professional games have ever faced, requiring driving length due to the healthy rough and plenty of pre-tournament rain. Quail Hollow has become a bomber paradise this year, and no one is bombing it more than Dedanbo. According to Data Golf, DeChambeau is above two strokes with drivers, the number that is the overall stroke before the second-placed player in that category. However, it’s not just the driver. DeChambeau has sharpened the rest of the game over the last few years – he has five top-10 finishes in the last nine majors – and if he can replicate his performance at Valhalla last year, he will definitely be in the mix.
What do you expect from Xander Schauffele (the defending champion) this week?
Schrabach: After missing more than two months with a painful rib injury, Xander Schauffele’s game is heading in the right direction again. He got four straight finishes. This includes 8th tie in the Masters and 11th in the Trust Championship.
He ranks 7th in strokes, but he is 157th from the tee (-.320), 135th (-.155) around green and 140th (-.244) in putting. I think this is mostly due to the lack of staff. Bottom line: Schaufele has won two of his past four majors and has won the top 10 in seven of his past nine. Ah, he’s also tired of it with Quail Hollow the past two times.
uggetti: Schaufele is now a mysterious man in sports. His floor is as high as usual, so he’s clearly not in the form of the season, but still stumbles over a top 20 finish. In his final four tournaments, Shaufele’s worst finish was in the 18th tie at RBC Heritage, and he went 11th in Philly Cricket last week. To be honest, I don’t know what to expect from Kuazul Hollow’s Shaufele this week, but the fact that the defending champion (and two major winners) is flying slightly under the radar right now.
Which liv golfers are you watching this week?
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Who is your favorite at this year’s PGA Championship?
See who prefers to bring home the PGA Championship Crown at Charlotte’s Cool Hollow.
Schlabach: The distance from the tee shirt will be the most important thing at Quail Hollow Club. So how can we not expect Bryson Deccanbeau to join the mix? He was runner-up in last year’s PGA Championship at Valhalla Golf Club in Louisville, Kentucky, losing to Shaufele on one shot. He took the lead early in the Master’s final round before storing 75 over and faded to the tie in fifth. No one will hit it from the tee to the dedanbo. If his iron play is better than the Augusta National Golf Club, you won’t be surprised to see him lifting the Wanamaker trophy on Sunday.
Patrick Reed finished his solo in third place in the Masters, and he has a great track record at Cool Hollow.
uggetti: This answer remains Joaquín Niemann until he finishes in the top ten in the majors. It is beginning to become a sign of the story that players who continue to win LIV Tours appear to be unable to show up when they arrive at major venues against the best players in the world. Niemann has a game that wins multiple majors. DataGolf currently considers him to be the top 10 player in the world. So why can’t you translate this four weeks? It’s a problem that continues to loom on Neiman’s career, and this week will be another opportunity for him to resist that trend.
Which players or two under the radar should you watch this week?
Schlabach: The former University of Georgia Golfers have already won five times this season’s 22 PGA Tour event, as Cepstraca won the Trust Championship for the second time this season.
Another former Bulldog Keith Mitchell is heading in the right direction after a strong struggle at the end of 2024. Mitchell has five straight top 25 finishes, including a second tie at Corrales Punta Cana and seventh in the Tristo Championship. Mitchell ranks 11th on the tour and 21st on strokes in driving distance (313.3 yards): tee to green (.868). He has two career top ten in Quazur Hollow.
Canada’s Taylor Pendris hasn’t played great in the past few weeks, but they’ve had three top 10 at the start of the season. He is another golfer, hitting it far from the tee (307.9 yards) and hitting a lot of greens (70.6%) in the regulations. He wasn’t great around or above the green, but if his putter gets hot this week, he can join the mix.
uggetti: Note the 2-on-1 special: Højgaard Twins (Nicolai and Rasmus). Both have the length to catch up with this course and could be mean and raucous this week. As for other younger players, we throw Michael Solbjornsen into the mix. He has scored two top five finishes this season and has been playing solid golf lately.
Finally, after seeing Akshay Bhatia on the player, it is clear that he has a game to win majors. Perhaps at this stage of his career, where his game is good but not perfect, venues like Quail Hollow could be the perfect place for a breakthrough.
How will Quail Hollow play this week?
Schlabach: Quail Hollow is one of the longest courses on the tour with 7,626 yards, the fourth longest in PGA Championship history and the longest on the PAR-71 course. It is expected that the course will play longer after it gets soaked in the rain on Monday. More rainfall is forecast through Wednesday. If so, I don’t think I’ll get too much rolled on the fairway, and put an even bigger premium from the tee and long iron play.
The candidates will probably miss a significant number, so they should play well around the green as well. ESPN research shows that eight greens reached under 50% in the 2017 PGA Championship. The opening hole was hit just 33% of the time.
The golfer must survive a par 3 (3 of the four are longer than 200 yards), score on a par 5, and survive a three-hole closed stretch known as the “green mile.” According to an ESPN survey, in 2017 there were more than double bogeys or less than birdies (99) than birdies (88) (99).
