The excitement is just now starting to die down from Tiger Woods’ astonishing win at the 2019 Masters but the PGA Tour continues. This week, the tour stops in New Orleans for the only team event of the season as the 2019 Zurich Classic will be held at the TPC Louisiana Course beginning on Thursday, April 25. This tournament dates back to 1938 and has undergone many name and format changes with sponsors coming and going. Until 2004, it was played at several New Orleans area golf courses including the City Park Golf Course, the Lakewood Country Club and the English Turn Golf and Country Club. It has been played at TPC Louisiana in Avondale since 2005 though damage to the course from Hurricane Katrina forced a temporary move back to the English Turn course for 2006.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For most of it’s history, the Zurich Classic and predecessors have been a traditional individual stroke play competition. In 2017, the format switched to a team event with eighty teams of two golfers competing. The original format was alternate shot for the first and third rounds and best ball (aka ‘fourball’) for the second and fourth rounds. In 2018, the format was reversed with rounds one and three contested under best ball rules and rounds two and four under the alternate shot format. The winners of the tournament earn FedEx Cup points and two-year exemptions but do not receive invitations to the Masters. There has been some grumbling about the format, more specifically the decision to switch out the ‘best ball’ and ‘alternate shot’ days. Some think that the final round of the tournament would be better for players and spectators if it would revert to the ‘best ball’ arrangement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Zurich Classic might not feature the star studded field that competed at the Masters several weeks back but it should be an entertaining event and a nice break from the routine of the PGA tour. Golf futures odds<\/a> have the team of Jason Day and Adam Scott installed as the +700 favorite to win the event right ahead of the team of Sergio Garcia and Tommy Fleetwood at +800. Five teams feature two winners of PGA Majors–in addition to the Day\/Scott paring there is David Duval and Jim Furyk (+20000), Ernie Els and Trevor Immelman (+15000), Henrik Stenson and Graeme McDowell (+2000) and Louis Oosthuizen and Charl Schwartzel (+2500). Another intriguing pairing is the brother team of Brooks and Chase Koepka at +3300. Brooks Koepka is the current #3 ranked player in the world while brother Chase has struggled of late missing 18 cuts in his last 28 tournaments. There’s also a father\/son team among the longshots as Davis Love III and Dru Love are priced at +25000.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The PGA Tour will get back to serious business next weekend with the Wells Fargo Championship beginning on May 2 at the Quail Hollow Club in Charlotte, NC. Jason Day is the defending champion of the Wells Fargo Championship and the event will receive even more attention than usual as it is the scheduled next stop on Tiger Woods’ 2019 tournament calendar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n