Draft Day Party Hangover Live Feed, Day Three

 Today marks the last day of the 2024 NFL Draft. I stand corrected as to the time limit on each pick, as each selection in Round 3 was allotted just five minutes, rather than the seven I reported earlier. It'll be so again today for all four rounds.

Disclaimer: I will try to get each pick recorded as it comes in. However, I can't guarantee that I'll be available to do so right away, given that I have some errands to run today. Not to mention that I'll need a bite to eat shortly after the draft resumes. And of course, the rapidity of pick selections makes it difficult to keep up anyway, what with 157 picks today! If necessary to report a case of Draft Day Party Hangover that occurred while I was gone, I will try to phrase it in such a way that you'll recognize.

11:08am: The first pick of Day 3 is Ja'Tavion Sanders of Texas to the Panthers.

11:16am: BREAKING NEWS! Layden Robinson of Texas A&M goes to the Patriots, putting the Aggies at the minimum twelve points for Draft Day Party Hangover. Since A&M had only seven points a year ago, that's enough to satisfy the criteria.

12:13pm: While I was away, Khyree Jackson of Oregon went to the Vikings, putting the Ducks at eighteen points. That was two more than a year ago, good for Draft Day Party Hangover.

12:45pm: The compensatory picks for Round 4 have begun.

12:46pm: And the first comp pick is Sione Vaki of Utah to the Lions, which puts the Utes at twelve points. But that's just one little point short of last year.

12:50pm: The final pick of the fourth round is Jacob Cowing of Arizona to the 49ers. Since there's more compression of the picks today, I'll condense my summaries. Fifty-nine schools had a pick in the first four rounds (six fewer than a year ago). Ten of them have Draft Day Party Hangover. Alabama and Michigan are the only schools with a pick in each round so far.

12:55pm: Nehemiah Pritchett of Auburn is the first pick of the fifth round, going to the Seahawks.

1:57pm: Apologies for the lack of updates of late, but it's been pretty quiet on the Draft Day Party Hangover front the last hour or so.

2:06pm: There are now 100 picks left.

2:22pm: BREAKING NEWS! Jacob Monk of Duke goes to the Packers, putting the Blue Devils at thirteen points. They go from zero picks to Draft Day Party Hangover in a year.

2:35pm: The compensatory picks for Round 5 have begun.

2:54pm: The defending FCS champion South Dakota State Jackrabbits have become the first small-school team to produce two picks this year, as Isaiah Davis goes to the Jets.

3:10pm: Qwan'tez Stiggers of the Toronto Argonauts is the final pick of the fifth round. So far, 66 schools have had a pick (again, down six from last year). Eleven Draft Day Party Hangover cases, and Michigan is the only remaining school with a pick in each round.

3:16pm: Walter Rowse of Oklahoma to the Vikings opens the sixth round.

3:16pm: Logan Lee of Iowa goes to the Steelers, bringing the Hawkeyes to twelve points. But that's barely above half the 23 they had a year ago.

3:18pm: BREAKING NEWS! Sataoa Laumea of Utah goes to the Seahawks, bringing the Utes to thirteen points. That's the same as a year ago, giving them Draft Day Party Hangover.

4pm: The Tom Brady pick is Khristian Boyd of Northern Iowa, who went to the Saints. I say Tom Brady pick because of where Brady went in 2000 (No 199).

4:19pm: Mike Jerrell of Findlay is the first Division II player off the board, going to the Seahawks at No 207. Also, fifty picks remain.

4:21pm: The compensatory picks for Round 6 have begun.

4:43pm: BREAKING NEWS! Devin Leary of Kentucky goes to the Ravens, giving the Wildcats Draft Day Party Hangover on the minimum twelve points.

4:47pm: If Michigan does not send another pick to the Bucs, it will end the hopes of a pick in each round for any school.

4:49pm: It's official: Elijah Klein of UTEP is the final pick of the sixth round. This means no school will have a pick in each round. With one round to go, 77 schools have had a pick selected, six fewer than last year at this point. Thirteen of them have Draft Day Party Hangover.

4:55pm: Travis Clayton launches the final round of the 2024 NFL Draft. He is the second non-collegian to get picked, having passed through the International Pathway Program.

5:29pm: While I was taking care of the horses, USC became the fourteenth case of Draft Day Party Hangover courtesy of Brenden Rice going to the Chargers, giving the Trojans seventeen points--the same as last year.

5:46pm: The last dozen picks are upon us, and for teams with twelve or more points, I will be eliminating teams that can't get to Draft Day Party Hangover due to fewer points than last year.

5:50pm: Ohio St cannot reach Draft Day Party Hangover.

5:51pm: Iowa cannot reach Draft Day Party Hangover.

6pm: No school can rack up fifty points heading into the last run of compensatory selections of this year's draft.

6:02pm: Alabama cannot reach Draft Day Party Hangover.

6:07pm: Illinois cannot reach Draft Day Party Hangover.

6:10pm: Iowa and Georgia cannot reach Draft Day Party Hangover. Teams that can reach it with Mr Irrelevant are Arizona and Oregon State. It would be a fitting requiem for the Pac-12 if either one did.

6:13pm: And Mr Irrelevant is...Jaylen Key of Alabama to the New York Jets. New in 2024: I have a YouTube channel! I just need some time to collate the numbers, and then my first video will be the Draft Day Party Hangover Review Special, dropping (with any luck) tonight. For my longtime readers, a copy of said video will be embedded in this blog.

NFL Draft Day Party Hangover Live Feed, Day 2

 You know the drill. For those just joining the feed, read the frickin' prologue. For the rest of you, here's the second part of the 2024 Draft Day Party Hangover live feed. Rounds 2 and 3 are more rapid-fire than the first, as seven minutes are allotted to each pick tonight.

Day 1 feed

6:11pm: The Bills, having traded out of last night's first round, kick off the second...or will they?

6:14pm: The answer to my post-ellipsis question is "yes."

6:17pm: BREAKING NEWS! Florida State's Keon Coleman is the first pick of the second round, and that's enough to put the Seminoles in Draft Day Party Hangover territory with the minimum twelve points! One year ago, only one pick came from FSU, and that was a fifth-round selection.

6:28pm: Ruke Orhorhoro of Clemson has gone to the Falcons, which puts the Tigers at the minimum twelve points. However, that's only half of what they incurred last year.

6:45pm: BREAKING NEWS! T'Vondre Sweat of Texas goes to the Titans, putting the Longhorns at nineteen points, three more than a year ago.

7:09pm: Jackson Powers-Johnson of Oregon has gone to the Raiders, putting the Ducks at the minimum twelve points. However, that's four fewer than a year ago.

7:21pm: The first Minnesota Gopher and first (pure) safety off the board is Tyler Nubin to the Giants. Five straight years that my alma mater has produced a first- or second-round pick!

7:26pm: Kris Jenkins of Michigan has gone to the Bengals, which puts the defending national champs at the minimum twelve points. But that's fewer than half of what the Wolverines had last year.

7:46pm: Michael Hall of Ohio St has gone to the Browns, putting the Buckeyes at the minimum twelve points. But that's well fewer than half last year's haul.

8:08pm: BREAKING NEWS! Blake Fisher of Notre Dame goes to the Texans, giving the Irish twelve points and one more than a year ago.

8:16pm: BREAKING NEWS! The host Lions select Ennis Rakestraw out of Missouri, giving the Tigers the minimum twelve points for Draft Day Party Hangover. That's quadruple the points of a year ago for Mizzou.

8:28pm: The 49ers conclude Round 2 with Renardo Green out of Florida State. So far in the draft, 34 schools have had a pick, but that's six fewer than a year ago. Only two Group of Five picks and no smaller programs have had picks so far. As for the Power Five (2023 alignments), seven Big Ten schools, six from the Pac-12, nine from the SEC and six from the Big 12 (same number of ACC schools as before, including Notre Dame, which competes in the conference in other sports except ice hockey) have had at least one. A dozen schools have had a pick in both rounds so far.

8:36pm: While I was typing the above, Malachi Corley of Western Kentucky became the first G5 player from outside the MAC to be picked, as he went to the Cardinals to kick off the third round.

9:01pm: And now both CFP finalists have had a pick in each round so far, as Bralen Trice goes to the Falcons after Junior Colson followed his college coach Jim Harbaugh to the Chargers.

9:06pm: Kiran Amegadjie of Yale is the first small-school pick, going to the Bears.

9:27pm: Tip Reiman of Illinois has gone to the Cardinals, giving the Illini thirteen points. However, they are still five points away from a year ago.

9:32pm: BREAKING NEWS! Roman Wilson of Michigan goes to the Steelers after his college teammate Blake Corum went to the Rams with the pick immediately before that. The national champs have 29 Draft Day Party Hangover points, one more than last year, giving the Wolverines the condition.

9:47pm: Marshawn Lloyd of USC has gone to the Packers, giving the Trojans fifteen points. However, they are still two points away from a year ago.

10:03pm: BREAKING NEWS! Adisa Isaac of Penn St goes to the Ravens, giving the Nittany Lions 22 points. That's the same as last year, which is enough for Draft Day Party Hangover.

10:08pm: We are into the compensatory picks, as the Dolphins forfeited their normal pick this round for tampering with Tom Brady. I thought he was retired!

10:22pm: Luke McCaffrey (Christian's brother) is the final pick of Round 3 and the second night, going to the Commanders. After two nights, 47 schools have had a pick (seven fewer than a year ago), including seven from beyond the Power Five. Two are FCS members in Yale and Houston Christian. In addition to the MAC, Conference USA is represented twice over by WKU and, of course, Rice. As for the Power Five, eight cases of Draft Day Party Hangover have been diagnosed with one day remaining.

Power Five breakdown, two nights in: ACC + Notre Dame 9, Big Ten 8, Big 12 8, Pac-12 (RIP) stays at 7, SEC 8. Seven schools, including three participants in last year's College Football Playoff--Michigan, Washington and Alabama--plus Florida State, Georgia, Mizzou and Notre Dame, are eligible to "shoot the moon." That's a term I use for having a pick in every round of the NFL Draft.

NFL Draft Day Party Hangover Live Feed, Day 1

 Okay, I hope you read my prologue before checking out this live feed! If you haven't, I solemnly exhort you to do so now. But if you have, welcome aboard!

With each input in this live feed, I have included a timestamp (CDT, US/Canada) of the action. So, it's time to get your refresh button ready in 3...2...1...

7:12pm:

7:19pm: Caleb Williams (USC), as expected, is headed to the Bears.

7:38pm: Marvin Harrison Jr of Ohio St is the first Big Ten product off the board. Only the Big 12 has yet to produce a pick among last year's Power Five.

7:52pm: Malik Nabers of LSU has gone to the Giants. He is the second Tiger off the board, giving his alma mater fourteen points. However, LSU is one pick away from Draft Day Party Hangover due to having racked up fifteen points a year ago.

8:13pm: BREAKING NEWS! Washington is the first Draft Day Party Hangover case of the 2024 NFL Draft. After having produced zero picks a year ago, the Huskies have produced TWO first round picks!

8:14pm: The first trade of the 2024 draft has occurred, as the Vikings trade up one spot and also get a sixth-round selection in exchange for the 11th and fourth- and fifth-round picks. Most expect J.J. McCarthy of Michigan to be selected by Minnesota.

8:45pm: As I was waiting for the Saints to hear their selection, I put on Gentle Giant's song "Words from the Wise" from their 1978 nadir, Giant for a Day. That band's worst will always kick the ass of your best.

9:04pm: Every power conference has had at least one pick with Byron Murphy II of Texas going to the Seahawks.

9:07pm: Dallas Turner of Alabama has gone to the Vikings as the second Alabama Crimson Tide player off the board, giving his alma mater fourteen points. However, Bama is far from hangover as they racked up 45 points a year ago.

9:17pm: Amarius Mims of Georgia has gone to the Bengals as the second Georgia Bulldog off the board, giving his alma mater fourteen points. However, Georgia is far from hangover as they racked up 38 points a year ago.

9:39pm: Chop Robinson of Penn St has gone to the Dolphins as the second Nittany Lion off the board, giving them fourteen points. However, PSU is not quite at hangover as they racked up twenty-two points a year ago.

9:47pm: Quinyon Mitchell is the first non-Power Five player off the board, coming from Toledo to the Eagles. Gotta love the MACtion on the draft stage.

9:53pm: BREAKING NEWS! A second case of Draft Day Party Hangover emerges with Brian Thomas Jr putting LSU over last year's total of 15 points (21 this year so far)!

10:04pm: The draft host Lions traded up to get Terrion Arnold out of Alabama, who was actually in the draft theatre. Despite his being the third Crimson Tide player this year, Bama is still less than halfway to hangover.

10:31pm: A Make-a-Wish recipient and Chiefs fan named Justin just welcomed Xavier Worthy of Texas to Kansas City. This means the Longhorns have racked up fourteen points. However, they are still two points short of hangover.

10:52pm: And that's the first round! Xavier Legette of South Carolina stays in the Carolinas by going to the Panthers, and his alma mater is the 23rd school represented this year so far (same as a year ago). Conference breakdown (2023 alignments): ACC plus Notre Dame 5 schools, none with more than one; Big Ten 3 schools, four selections; Big 12 1 school as Texas had two picked; Pac-12 (RIP) six schools, eight selections with Washington stricken with hangover; SEC eight schools, thirteen selections with LSU stricken by hangover. Next live feed drops around 6pm CDT tomorrow for rounds 2 and 3!!!

Edward the Scop

NFL Draft Day Party Hangover Live Feed Prologue

After two and a half months of mock drafts, player and position rankings, scouting-combine analysis, college pro days and just plain anticipation, the 2024 NFL Player Selection Meeting is afoot. In a matter of minutes, the din of boos will be raised when Roger Goodell walks upon the draft stage in Detroit for the first time.

Normally a draft analysis would concern draft needs for the teams taking college players and whether the players actually taken fulfill such needs. But I'm not like other draft analysts. Rather, I've committed to taking a page from the great college football writer and prognosticator Phil Steele, who has documented a phenomenon he has referred to as Draft Day Party Hangover since 1998.

The system he adopted assesses the immediate impacts the draft has had on college teams by assigning a point value to each pick, depending on the round in which he was taken. Every first-round pick has a value of seven points, but this drops to five points for second-round selections. Each of the next four rounds decreases the per-pick value by one point, but all sixth- and seventh-round picks are one point each, owing to the lack of significant difference in prospect value at that stage of the event.

What you see here is part of my running table of last year's draft according to Steele's metric. To "achieve" Draft Day Party Hangover, a school must rack up a dozen points' worth of draft picks and at least match its total points from the year before in any given year. The point of the exercise is that, although schools can benefit in terms of recruiting, NIL fundraising and transfer-portal abjuration from having their football programs' players selected in the draft, heavy losses to the draft can create issues in the short term.

As for me, I have been tracking the phenomenon since 2011 in my own right. My data first went public in 2013 on Facebook, but I switched to Twitter these last two years before the Devilish Rake became (I hope) the permanent home of my annual live feed this year.

I mentioned my running table, which is excerpted above. Each round is numbered 1 through 7 with the points accrued in each round noted to help me recall which school produced how many picks in each round of a given draft. The second-last column includes the total points for each school represented in that year's draft. The last is marked "DDPH," which is the initialism for the condition described in this live feed. Each school that produced twelve or more points' worth of draft picks is marked with either an X or an asterisk. If it's an asterisk, it means that the school had at least a dozen points but fewer than last year. If it's an X, that's at least as many points as last year and, therefore, a hangover case.

Got all that? Good! When you understand, do proceed to the next post, which is the live feed itself.

Edward the Scop

FA Cup Replay Eulogy + Semifinal Picks

 THIS IS THE LAST STRAW!!!

When it was announced yesterday that the FA Cup was going to get rid of all remaining proper-stage replays starting next year, I locked myself in my room and bawled for a good ten minutes. It had finally happened: The proliferation of European competition fixtures, coupled with the Premier League's cop out culture, had finally committed the anathema of anathemas against football's oldest competition, regardless of format.

When I mention the Premier League's cop out culture, I mean that player safety and welfare are used as an excuse to reduce the number of domestic fixtures. Yet these concerns are aired despite the fact that teams in the six divisions immediately below the Premier League (National League North and South divisions are both at the sixth tier of the pyramid) are supposed to play eight more league fixtures per season than their top-flight brethren and, again, are muddled by the proliferation of European fixtures.

When I was born in 1989, the big three European competitions (which most Americans didn't know jack about) were straight-up two-legged, home-and-away knockouts (except for the European Cup and Cup Winners' Cup finals, but the UEFA Cup final continued to be home and away until 1998). But some butthurt suit in the early 1990s at, I think, Real Madrid noticed that out-of-nowhere Red Star Belgrade was doing numbers on Europe's club ball royalty, so the bigwigs of Europe implemented a group stage to restrict the little guy. It initially backfired, as Barcelona beat relative backwater club Sampdoria in the 1992 European Cup Final. Undeterred, Big Football added a second progression from each group, renamed the competition the Champions League and, after successfully opening up the transfer market in light of the Bosman ruling of 1995, got UEFA to violate the name of the competition.

Hitherto the Champions League had been just for champions, whether national champs or the champions of Europe. But in 1997-98, UEFA caved in again and allowed eight national runners-up to enter the Champions League. A limit of two plus champions became a limit of four by 2000 and five in 2015. Now, starting next year, as many as seven clubs may represent a given country depending on the performance of the nation's clubs that were involved in European competition the previous year, as well as the outcomes of the Champions and Europa Leagues. (The UEFA Cup, a few years after introducing a group stage of its own, rebranded to its current name in 2009. As for the Cup Winners' Cup, it folded into the UEFA Cup in 1999, but the competitions became three in number again with the advent of the Conference League in 2021.)

It is natural to seek a higher high, but what good is a mansion with gold trim and gilded fixtures if its foundation is built upon shifting sand? The storms will come, and it will fall--and great will be its downfall! Evidence of this in England includes the deaths of the Bury and Macclesfield football clubs, as well as other clubs' flirtations with oblivion (i.e., Bolton Wanderers). I cannot imagine that any supporter of a club in European competition who has a heart does not feel a twinge of guilt and remorse for what their love of European glory has done to the grassroots or even lesser pro clubs--or to the competitions that were greatly beloved in their respective countries.

And few competitions in world football have surpassed the romance of the FA Cup. You want diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI)? Well, the DEI of the FA Cup lay in its accessibility and the possibility that any club could defeat another club. Over 700 clubs from the top nine-plus divisions on the pyramid--in other words, almost every FC of importance in England, plus a few in Wales and some offshore islands--might not all get that far, but the hope of a replay and the financial reward that came with doing it all again portended a good chance that a given small-town club would not only survive but thrive for a while. It was a beautiful thing, whether or not the little-guy club pulled a giant-killing against some bigwig eleven (as most famously befell Newcastle United at the hands of host Hereford United in a 1972 third-round replay, a clip of which I have embedded below).

I mentioned that, as an American, I didn't know a thing about the Cup and its lore growing up. During the transition from my failed first attempt at grad school to the successful second, though, I immersed myself imperceptibly in the "magic of the Cup" and typed up a file (sadly now lost) containing all the results, attendances and payouts for each team involved in the 2015-16 edition. I even included red cards and goalscorers for the proper stage! Having committed to West Ham as my Premier League club of choice, I followed their narrow escape over Wolverhampton Wanderers in the third round...and then came the first replay, where they beat Liverpool in added time! Love of the Cup was sealed in my soul for years, even after the Hammers lost another replay, this time to Manchester United in the quarterfinals that season in what proved that round's last-ever replay. (It was also the last-ever FA Cup match at Upton Park.) Not even the Conference League title in 2023 for the Hammers felt as good as being able to spread my love of the Cup, both personally and academically. I wrote a thesis with the Cup as its sporting foundation, graduating from Minnesota State Mankato in 2021 with my master's degree.

Now all those memories have been strangled by the "money first, football nowhere" ethos of the modern game, to quote Phil Annets (whose work I strongly recommend). Because the Cup doesn't have much prize money despite its international reach on television, and because it doesn't carry a Champions League berth to the winner, it's dismissed as inconvenient by the big clubs and their people. (This despite the fact that all but four Cups in my lifetime have been won by the "big six," for which reason their opposition to a UCL berth for the Cup winner is also largely hypocritical.) Hence, backup players are often thrust into match day squads for Cup fixtures, unless it's the only hope for silverware that a given club has on the campaign. Sadly, their attitudes have seeped into many fans as well, especially those who don't know or have forgotten the pitfalls of forsaking their sporting roots. All this adds up to a bleak outlook for the Cup, one that is even murkier than when Covid-19 struck a few years ago.

All told, this season might be the last one during which I feel comfortable doing FA Cup picks. I cannot abide doing them without replays. RIP FA Cup proper stage replays. May your memory be a blessing to all football fans.

Having said that, here are my semifinal picks:

Manchester City 3-4 Chelsea (actual 1-0)

Coventry City 1-2 Manchester United (actual 3-3, Man United won on pens; 500pt)

Edward the Scop

Upper Midwest Connection of the Week Ending 14 April 2024

 In my last post, I mentioned in passing that Zach Johnson is an Umcee who also happens to be a former Masters champion. Back in 2007, he won the green jacket despite struggling to a +1/289--good enough to beat Retief Goosen, Rory Sabbatini and Tiger Woods by two strokes. Conditions were so horrible that any of the 97 participants that year would've been entitled to laugh at Jon Rahm's complaints about this year's Friday conditions.

But that was then. Fast-forward seventeen years later and ZJ got into trouble for cussing at a crucial juncture. He missed the cut by one stroke (+7/151 after two rounds) and, barring open qualification or other merits for this June's U.S. Open at Pinehurst in North Carolina, we won't see him in another major until the Open at Royal Troon in July. Needless to say, the best of times is behind the two-time major winner. But there was an Umcee who did make the cut at Augusta...

(PGA Tour)

Erik van Rooyen.

You would think that a guy who struggled on all but one day--Thursday's -1/71 opening round--en route to a T55 finish, dropped three places in the FedEx Cup and slipped a spot in the OWGR would not merit to be Upper Midwest Connection of the Week, but there are a couple good reasons for my selecting EVR for the honour. Firstly, that he made the cut at all is a milestone--van Rooyen withdrew after a single round in 2020 due to injury and MC in 2022 on his last visit. Moreover, the ten (even) FedEx Cup points he earned enabled him to pip Grayson Murray (winner of this year's Sony Open) to the final Next 10 place in this week's RBC Heritage. Though to be fair, Nicolai Hojgaard's collapse on the weekend helped as well!

This week features all three PGA Tour circuits in action for the first time this year. The Heritage, in addition to van Rooyen and 67 others (yes, they fell short of seventy again, which means they need to consider adding alternates in 2025 and beyond), Tom Hoge returns from a fortnightly hiatus. Part of it was voluntary, but it made the other part required, as Hoge's decision to skip the Texas Open despite not qualifying for the Masters rendered last week an off week for him. On top of the signature event at Hilton Head Island in South Carolina, the Corales Punta-Cana Resort Championship takes a side stage in the Dominican Republic. Although ZJ won't be in the Umcee contingent, Troy Merritt returns to action, and he'll be joined by former Minnesota Gopher Thomas Longbella, who won the Monday qualifier to make the event for the second straight year. The way in was last week to allow for travel plans, as with most overseas events on the PGA Tour.

Beyond the big tour, the Korn Ferry Tour holds the LECOM Suncoast Classic. North Oaks, Minnesota's Frankie Capan III will be there, and conditional member Van Holmgren of Plymouth, Minnesota will join him in an effort to gain full access to the following four events via the reshuffle. Lastly, the other four Umcees in action this week will be playing the Brazilian Open on the PGA Tour Americas. Derek Hitchner of Minneapolis will be looking to build on his last start, which resulted in a T3 at the Totalplay Championship three weeks ago and got him Upper Midwest Connection of the Week honours, and he'll be joined by George Kneiser, Harrison Ott and Matthew Walker, among others. For the second straight year, dating back to the PGA Tour Latinoamerica last year, the host course will be the same that hosted the 2016 Olympic golf tourney--the first such event since 1904 in St Louis.

Edward the Scop

Masters Review + Various Activity Updates

 The core of the golf season has begun! Well, for those who read this blog, there is no core of the season since the entire campaign matters. But a chapter does seem to be turned each year when the Masters Tournament is played in such a way that you don't get with the fall series or even the Players Championship. Perhaps it's in the way that CBS replaces NBC as the primary U.S. weekend afternoon broadcaster of PGA Tour events through at least the Wyndham Championship every August. (This year, since it's an Olympic year, CBS gets the FedEx Cup playoffs as well so that NBC can concentrate on the Games in Paris.) Especially in recent years, it also matters that LIV member-contractors are back alongside PGA Tour golfers in a way you normally don't see outside the majors. Or maybe it's the fact that almost everywhere you go in the Lower 48, it's springtime, a fact not lost on Augusta National Golf Club. Here in Minnesota, we had temps in the 70s this past weekend!

Masters Week began in earnest Tuesday night (after the usual practice round for all 89 participants, of course) with defending champion Jon Rahm serving up a Basque-style Champions' Dinner in the ANGC clubhouse, four decades to the year after Seve Ballesteros served his second and final Masters Club. Rahm collaborated with his countryman, the legendary chef Jose Andres, to feed what by all accounts was a tasty meal to 32 fellow past champions--including one Umcee, 2007 champion Zach Johnson--and ANGC chairman Fred Ridley. The only non-attendees among past champs were Angel Cabrera (2009), who is still dealing with visa issues stemming from his domestic-abuse past in Argentina, and Bernhard Langer (1985/1993), who injured his Achilles while playing pickleball. (Langer has vowed to make 2025 his last Masters actually playing--a fitting swan song forty years after his first win.) Of course, most of us will never know what it was really like, as the only elements historically made known to virtually everyone who isn't a past Masters champion have been a picture of the past surviving champs and a copy of the menu. In any case, the night's fun and unity ended when Tom Watson (1977/1981) said: "Ain't it good to be together again?" Raymond Floyd (1984/1995) apparently felt his blood run so cold that he left the dinner. The remaining attendees sat there in silence, as Watson himself attested two days later following his ceremonial tee-off with Jack Nicklaus and Gary Player.

The Masters' past champions betray little sign of dissension in their ranks (Golf Magazine).

Controversy and gastronomy aside, the next day was marked by the par-3 contest. It is said that you don't want to win the event if you want a green jacket come Sunday evening, for no par-3 contest winner has gone on to win the main event the same year. This year, the fun but unfortunate burden dropped upon Rickie Fowler. He needed others to struggle in the tough conditions of Friday to avoid the same MC fate that befell Johnson's fellow-Umcee Tom Hoge last year. Fowler at least went -1/143 at the weekend to finish T30, but it obviously wasn't nearly enough to end the curse. He earned $124 200 for his week.

In the end, the winner was surprisingly predictable. Scottie Scheffler, who came in at 4-1 odds--having lost the Houston Open a fortnight earlier by missing a short birdie try to Stephan Jaeger of Germany--pulled away from a tie at -7 through three rounds with Collin Morikawa (who remains a green jacket and U.S. Open title away from the career grand slam) to beat Masters (and major championship) newbie Ludvig Aberg by four strokes, -11/277 to -7/281. Morikawa finished third alongside Max Homa and Tommy Fleetwood (who remains winless stateside despite seven DP World Tour wins) on -4/284. The top LIV member-contractors were Bryson DeChambeau and Cam Smith, two shots back at -2/286. Percentagewise, it was a pretty good showing for the LIV contingent. Let me explain:

Thirteen LIV member-contractors participated in the 2024 Masters Tournament out of 89 total competitors. If you divide 13 by 89, you get a proportion of ~14.6067 per cent affiliated with LIV at Augusta National.

Fifteen players--the top twelve and anybody tying for twelfth--are expected to be back next year at Augusta. If you multiply 15 by the proportion of 14.6067 per cent, you get about 2.191 LIV golfers expected to finish in that range on average. Rounded up to the next whole number, it's safe to say three would have been a decent expectation. In the end, four--DeChambeau, Smith, Tyrrell Hatton and past champ Patrick Reed--were among the free invites. Of course, it's not like the first two were in need of a qualifying mechanism anyway, as DeChambeau is exempt at all majors through next year's U.S. Open and that one alone for five years thereafter, while Smith is exempt to them all through 2027. That said, given how far LIV member-contractors have fallen down the OWGR for lack of points for the circuit or access to points-bearing events better than those on the Asian Tour for the most part, I'm sure Hatton will be especially grateful for the opportunity to come back next year.

Other, more PGA Tour-loyal beneficiaries of the expected top-12 rule are Xander Schauffele, Cam Young, Will Zalatoris, Cam Davis, Matthieu Pavon and Adam Schenk. Given the tough conditions, it's no surprise that only Xander finished under par for the week.

Questions for next year's tournament: Will Angel Cabrera be let back into the United States? How will Bernhard Langer fare in what's expected to be his final Masters? Will the mainstream tours--including, but not limited to, the PGA Tour--be any nearer a rapprochement with LIV Golf, rendering Watson's quip redundant? How many Umcees will be in the field? Perhaps above all, will Scottie Scheffler retain the green jacket; and if so, will he have to put it on by himself?! (If not, of course, whom will he invest with it?)

As a postscript, I should note that as I write this, one of the busiest fortnights of the blog year is upon me. My next post, scheduled for Wednesday or even Tuesday, recognizes the top Upper Midwest connection of Masters Week. By Friday, you can expect to see my FA Cup semifinal picks, and then the next week sees another Upper Midwest Connection of the Week post. And of course, I'll need to get tuned up for the golf season at my local course. But the biggest part of these next two weeks for the blog is my NFL Draft Day Party Hangover live feed. See the Glossary that I put up during the weekend for more details on the system and its inspiration, but I will reiterate the details in all likelihood in some future post here.

Edward the Scop

Upper Midwest Connection of the Week Ending 7 April 2024

 By now, you would expect a piece like this to be published two days from now, as I typically need time to account for the Monday qualifiers for the following collection of events and any late withdrawals. This ensures my preview portion of each such post will include all Umcees participating in a given week and omit any who drop out. However, I don't expect (barring an injury, of course) that either of the two Umcees participating in this week's Masters Tournament will drop, and the Monday qualifier for next week's event in the Dominican Republic has already been decided. More on those matters later.

Anyway, last week was the last chance to qualify for "glory's first shot" at the Valero Texas Open. There was a full field of 156 players. Three of them--Erik van Rooyen, Zach Johnson and Troy Merritt--are Umcees, but only Merritt had yet to qualify for this year's Masters. Van Rooyen won in Cabo for his invite last November, while Johnson, of course, took the maillot vert in 2007, entitling him to tonight's Champions' Dinner in the clubhouse at Augusta National for the 17th year running. Meanwhile, on the Korn Ferry Tour, the Club Car Championship in Savannah, Georgia--down the river Savannah from Augusta--involved 156 more players trying to get to the PGA Tour. Only one Umcee, Frankie Capan III, was among them.

(FGCU Athletics)

As it turns out, the Umcee contingent at TPC San Antonio wiped out--the two Umcees already qualified for this week's major were closest to the cut, finishing round 2 at +2/146 overall--but Capan got his first top-ten finish of 2024, finishing T9! His only poor round was a +2/74 Saturday, and he shot -2/70 or better the other three days, including -5/67 both Friday and Sunday. This performance moved him to #49 in the points list and a new career best of #324 in the OWGR.

This week, as I mentioned above, the Masters Tournament takes centre stage in the world of golf. I called it "glory's first shot" in reference to the fact that, when it was the last major of the season, the PGA Championship was referred to as "glory's last shot." I don't expect ZJ to don the green jacket for the second time or EVR to do so either. But if either can make the cut, I will be satisfied.

Meanwhile, today (Monday, 8 April) was the open qualifier for next week's Corales Punta-Cana Resort Championship in the Dominican Republic. Three Umcees--two former Minnesota Gophers (Angus Flanagan and Thomas Longbella) and a former Iowa Hawkeye (Alex Schaake) --were among the sixty golfers participating. Schaake fell short by four strokes and Flanagan by two. But Longbella won the qualifier, making his second straight trip to the DR to play on the PGA Tour. He missed the cut last year but hopes to improve significantly this year. Of course, he won't be in that week's Brazilian Open at the site of the 2016 Olympic golf tournament won by Justin Rose. I still think it's a desirable tradeoff.

Edward the Scop

All-Umcee Team for 2024 Q1

With one-quarter of 2024 in the books, I thought I would release an All-Umcee Team based on the first three months of the year. Unlike the year-end All-Umcee team, there won't be a second team. The same goes for the midyear team, which will be released around the anniversary of the blog (early July), though that will feature honourable mentions. Furthermore, those named to the quarterly All-Umcee teams will be given with shortened criteria as to why they were named. With that said, here is my All-Umcee Team for the first quarter of 2024:

• Erik van Rooyen. Heading into this week's Texas Open, van Rooyen had missed the cut just twice in three months. He earned three Upper Midwest Connection of the Week honours for his efforts this quarter at the Sentry, the Mexico Open and (especially) the Cognizant Classic in the Palm Beaches (all PGA Tour). He was also Upper Midwest Connection of the Month for January.
• Tom Hoge. The Upper Midwest Connection of Q1 for 2024 and also of the Month for February, Hoge got his first UMCOW honour at the American Express, then followed it up with back-to-back plaudits at Pebble Beach and the Phoenix Open. As if that weren't enough, Hoge also did well at the first two signature events of the year with a cut, although the week of the Genesis featured too few Umcees to warrant an Upper Midwest Connection of the Week, while maintaining strong iron play.
• Kim Kaufman. The only female golfer on this All-Umcee Team and Upper Midwest Connection of the Month for March after two top-ten finishes on the Epson Tour (the women's Korn Ferry Tour). On both occasions, she was Upper Midwest Connection of the Week. So far in 2024, she is off to a much better start than a year ago as she strives to make it back to the LPGA Tour for 2025.

Tom Hoge is my Upper Midwest Connection of Q1 for 2024. (AP)

• Derek Hitchner. The Minneapolis Blake School alumnus and former Pepperdine Wave has moonlighted on the Korn Ferry Tour, but it's on the third-tier PGA Tour Americas that he has made his biggest impact. The final Upper Midwest Connection of the Week for Q1 of 2024, who earned his plaudits by way of the Totalplay Championship in Guadalajara, Mexico, is off to an 11th-place start in the Fortinet Cup standings--the tour's points-based order of merit.
• Thomas Longbella. Between the former Minnesota Gopher from Chippewa Falls, Wisconsin and Frankie Capan III of North Oaks, Minnesota, who competes on the Korn Ferry Tour, it was a pretty tough decision as to whom to include and whom to leave out. In the end, FCIII's three MCs in four mainland Latin American starts were too much to overcome. Meanwhile, Longbella has quietly built a 17th-place start in the Fortinet Cup. While his performance at the aforementioned Totalplay Championship was overshadowed among Umcees by Hitchner's showing, it's expected that if Longbella keeps it up, he'll get to skip the first stage at Q-school this fall.

Edward the Scop

Upper Midwest Connection of the Month for March 2024 + Blog Update

 As with February's Upper Midwest Connection of the Month, the emphasis was on high finishes among Umcees. While not as clear-cut as last month's honour, there was still a leader among the Umcee golf community.

(Epson Tour)

For the first time, a woman emerges atop the month's performances among Umcees! Kim Kaufman has surged to the top five on the Race for the Card, which this year switched to a points-based system as opposed to the money-based order of merit used in years past, on the strength of two top-ten finishes.

All three Upper Midwest Connections of the Month for Q1--Erik van Rooyen (January), Tom Hoge (February) and Kaufman--will be on the quarterly All-Umcee Team. The other two honorees will be revealed in the coming days, hopefully before Masters Week begins.

Also, look for me to finally put up the first glossary entries on a separate page early this month. I mentioned this in my 2024 preview, but I haven't gotten around to it yet. On top of this, the NFL Draft is in three weeks or so. I may publish a mock draft on the Devilish Rake and see how I fared with my predictions come draft week in Detroit.

Lastly, once my new computer is acquired and things at work settle down a bit, I am thinking of setting up a Patreon, also as mentioned in my "state of the blog" linked above. If you have advice on these matters, I strongly suggest you email it to me at edward.genereux@mnsu.edu.

Edward the Scop

Upper Midwest Connection of the Week Ending 31 March 2024

Last week in tour golf treated Umcees much better than the week before or the week before that. Though only seven Umcees were part of eligible fields, four made the cut and did so to the tune of top-20 finishes across the board. Two of these, in turn, recorded top 10s and moved into the top 1000 of the OWGR. In fact, we were close to having as many as SIX Umcees make the weekend, as Wisconsinites George Kneiser (Oconomowoc) and Emily Lauterbach (Hartland) MC by just one stroke each at the Totalplay Championship in Guadalajara, Mexico on the PGA Tour Americas and the Ford Championship near Phoenix on the LPGA Tour, respectively. Another Wisconsinite was also among the unlucky at the PGA Tour Americas event, as Harrison Ott of Brookfield missed out due to a ruinous Friday +5/76.

Of those who made the cut, Tom Hoge was the only one playing the PGA Tour's Houston Open. Playing in the same state (Texas) where he went to college (TCU), Hoge opened his week with a poor +1/71 Thursday. It was his third straight over-par round, dating to the Players two weeks before. But then Hoge put together his best round of the week, carding a -4/66 to make the cut with ease. Though to be fair, an even-par round would have sufficed to get him to the weekend. He then broke 70 again the next two days with rounds of 68 and 67. When the dust settled, Hoge had finished T14, inching up to #13 in the FedEx Cup. Unfortunately, the good showing wasn't good enough to make this week's OWGR top fifty; and since he isn't playing this week, his chances of a third straight Masters appearance are dead. Try again next year, I guess.

As for the Totalplay Championship, Matthew Walker of Ottumwa, Iowa was the least satisfactory, but he still mustered a T17 and moved up to #35 in the Fortinet Cup standings. A +1/72 Friday definitely kept him from doing even better. That leaves the two top ten finishers. Thomas Longbella had an improved finish, going under par all four days (even Thursday, when he was merely -1/70). But he only climbed to #17 in the Fortinet Cup. That means the final Upper Midwest Connection of the Week for March 2024 is...

(Golf Channel)

Derek Hitchner.

The Minneapolis Blake School product and Pepperdine alumnus has yet to win a PGA Tour pyramid event but had one of the best finishes of his short pro career so far, tying for third despite a rough final round of E/71. Indeed, had he even parred No 8 Sunday, he would have had his outright best finish ever as a professional. Of course, it is unlikely he would have beaten Jose de Jesus Rodriguez, who has established himself as the King of Atlas Country Club this decade, dating back to the PGA Tour Latinoamerica 2022 season. Even so, Hitchner's finish enabled him to soar to 11th in the Fortinet Cup standings (up from T59 coming in) and jump to #910 in the OWGR. It's too bad he won't have another chance for a couple weeks, as the circuit doesn't reconvene until the Brazilian Open the week after the Masters.

This week is a bit quieter, at least as far as the developmental tours are concerned. However, the PGA Tour will have three Umcees competing in the same event--the most since the Players three weeks ago--at the Texas Open. Though Hoge has eschewed his last opportunity for this year's Masters Tournament, Erik van Rooyen returns after a fortnightly hiatus, while Troy Merritt and Zach Johnson (both of whom took last week off) return to competing as well. In fact, Johnson is a past champ in San Antonio, having won in consecutive years (2008-09).

As for the developmental side of things, the Korn Ferry Tour finally awakens from its post-Latin American hiatus with the Club Car Championship. Only Frankie Capan III made the field, as Van Holmgren still hasn't benefited from the reshuffle that will follow the LECOM Suncoast Classic two weeks out.

Edward the Scop