The first two rounds at the NGA Tour event here in McCormick, SC are done. I ended up missing the cut today by one shot! The first round played very difficult with a stiff breeze throughout the day. I bogeyed my last two holes yesterday to finish at one over 73. What was frustrating was I played steady for the majority of my round, but missed two routine birdies from short distance on 15 and 16. This angered me enough that I lost my composure on the last two holes and made two bogeys. I went to bed last night realizing that these tiny mental errors are completely unnecessary. Today was the most flawless I have ever been in my entire career as a pro. I missed countless 10 footers all day and I never let it bother me. I shot a 70 that easily could have been in the low 60s. What's disappointing is that I missed my second consecutive cut by a shot, but I did so this week happy with the way I executed down the stretch. I came unglued for 2 holes yesterday and it cost me, but the ramifications of that became a learning experience. I'm going to chalk this up as a blessing in disguise, because I will now be able to play a full practice round Sunday in Athens, Georgia to give myself a great chance to put together a game plan to successfully make it through the Nationwide qualifier. I've told you once, I'll tell you twice. I'm playing great golf. My results are soon to follow. Forward I go, and I refuse to let a few poor results define who I am as a golfer. I am a champion and I'm ready to go prove it soon. Stay tuned.

    I am alive and well.  The past two weeks have found me in San Antonio, Texas and New Orleans, Louisiana for two PGA Tour Monday Qualifiers.  As most of you all are aware, the Monday qualifier for someone in my shoes is painstakingly annoying when you first arrive because I have to deal with the pre qualifier that eliminates the riff raff and terrible golfers that have no business being there for the Monday qualifier.  I shot a 73 in the San Antonio pre qualifier and a really nice 68 in New Orleans to breeze through the pre qualifiers at both sites.  Unfortunately, I shot identical 75s at both Monday qualifiers.  The knockout punch during both Mondays were two carbon copy blocks to the right that left me in the weeds.  I had to write down a triple bogey on my scorecard in both rounds and in a one day shootout, this forces you to play basically flawless golf for the rest of the 17 holes.  The annoying thing is that the other 17 holes I was playing steady, solid golf.  Unfortunately one bad tee shot during both rounds got me in trouble.  My miss pattern has to be better, even if it only creeps up 1 out of 50 swings, the big miss with the tee ball has to be eliminated from my rolodex of shots.  PERIOD. 
    I have been trying my hardest to use my brain to figure out what it is mentally and physically that is causing this and am working hard to solve it.  So far, I am chalking it up to needing to be more patient from start to finish and realizing that I don't have to put the full court press down on every shot.  I don't have to hit the heroic shot and birdie every hole.  If I did that,  I would be legendary because noone has ever come close to making birdie on all 18.  I am human, and I will continue to make mistakes, but I absolutely have to minimize my mistakes to a much lesser degree.  I feel really good about my game, and I have felt really good about my game for about 2 months now.  With that being said, I have to keep improving and start getting results.  I'm not going to be happy with just making cuts and getting by.  I'm ready to start winning and getting through these Monday qualifiers successfully.  That is how good I feel about my game, and I think it is 100% crazy if I felt otherwise.  I'm driving to McCormick, South Carolina for a 4 day NGA Tour event that starts as usual on Thursday.  I'm ready to go out and play well and get the ball rolling.  From there, I head to Athens, Georgia for my first Nationwide Monday qualifier of the year on April 30th.  I'm ready to take the next step, and I hope you all are ready to enjoy the ride.  Thanks for reading.

    Five years ago to the day I was walking the hallowed grounds of Augusta National as a participant in the Masters as an amateur.  Over the past half decade I have spent my life pursuing my dream of finding a place on the PGA Tour.  It has been quite the adventure.  As in any aspect of life, it has been filled with many highs and lows, yet I have enjoyed every step of the way.  Today my competitive golf found me a long way from th prestigious grounds of Augusta National.  I finished up play in the NGA Tour event in Windsor, North Carolina.  I missing the cut today by one shot after dealing with the weather delays all week.  The conditions were very difficult from the start with temperatures hovering at 50 degrees and strong winds off the Atlantic.  I played beautifully for the vast majority of my second round.  Through 16 holes I hadn't made a bogey and I had rallied myself into 33rd place sitting on the 17th tee.  I was in full command of my game, and for whatever reason I decided to three putt the par 5 17th for bogey, then snap hook my tee shot on 18 into the weeds, hack out, then eventually lip out my 45 foot par attempt and settle for another bogey.  By bogeying the final two holes and missing the cut by one, it was very easy to want to puke all over my nicely pressed khaki pants.
    In the end, it is a missed cut and a week filled with disappointment in the end result.  It is imperative that I take away the facts that I was extremely close to playing myself back into the golf tournament.  It really does come down to a matter of feet.  I'll try to explain.  The wet conditions made the rules committee allow the players to play the ball up in the fairways.  On 17 I missed the fairway by one foot, so I wasn't able to play the ball up and clean it.  I had mud caked on the left and top of my ball, which causes the ball to veer off line.  Had I been one foot right, I could have cleaned it off, and took an easy lash at the green in two.  Instead, I pulled out a 5iron for safety to make sure the ball didn't get away from me.  I missed the fairway with my layup by 3 feet, and unfortunately was dealt a flyer lie where I couldn't impart the proper spin on the ball to control it in the wind.  I hit my approach to 45 feet left on the fringe as the wind took ahold of my ball.  My first putt settled to 3 and a 1/2 feet.  As I addressed the second putt, the wind was whipping and I lost my balance just enough to cause my ball to lip out.  Bogey.  On 18, I can take ownership of my bogey as I snapped my ball into the weeds.  It was frustrating to see my huge 45 foot par putt that broke 7 feet left to right lip out instead of lip in, but such is life.  To sum it up, lets theoretically say my ball on 17 is a foot right in the fairway, and I manage to make a pretty stock birdie from there, I would have vaulted into 24th place and been staring down the top of the leaderboard.  So as you can see, my results just flat out have been poor this year, but my game has been painstakingly close to really putting up some seriously consistent results.  It just comes down to those few shots a round that have not been going my way yet.  I'm going to head home tomorrow and keep working hard with a huge smile on my face.  If you let the adversity get the best of you and the challenge the game endlessly throws at you get you down, I will be in for a long career.  I'm really close, and by keeping the right attitude moving forward I am 100% sure that great results will come my way soon.  I am too disciplined, talented, and stubborn to let this game keep my down.  There is no rest for the weary for me as I head to San Antonio on Tuesday for the PGA Tour Valero Open Qualifier followed by the PGA Tour Zurich Classic Qualifier the following week.  I am determined to play my way into San Antonio and get myself into contention.  That's the goal and an ambitious one, but I hold myself to a very high standard and I am ready to go get it.  Thanks for reading and I flat out am burning inside to win.

STOP RAINING!!!

5/5.....what does that statistic represent?  The first five events on the NGA Tour have dealt us rain delays each week.  Sitting around each day with massive weather delays is one thing that is seriously annoying about my profession.  That has happened each of the first five weeks out here.  Today was no exception.  I got to the course to find out we had a 3 hour delay due to inclement weather.  When we finally started play, my game fell flat on my opening nine holes.  I shot 40.  Luckily, I turned it around in 34 strokes on my back nine to salvage something on the day, but at days end my 18 hole score will not suffice.  I hit two shots from the fairway on my front nine that were right at the pin on down wind holes, but I misjudged the wind and my ball flew over the green both times resulting in bogey.  Those two bogeys stung because I made good golf swings.  I had a par 5 three putt par on number 8 and a terrible iron swing on number 9 from the middle of the fairway that resulted in a punishing bogey as well.  As you can see, the front nine really got me today through a couple poor swings and a couple swings that I just misjudged the wind. 
    I was happy that I rebounded on my back nine.  As I teed off number ten, I set a mini goal to play the back nine in two under par and I obtained my goal.  This gives me some momentum heading into tomorrow, however with further afternoon delays today, the earliest I will tee off tomorrow will be 4:48pm.  This will once again challenge my patience.  At the beginning of the year, I always set some goals.  Usually I keep these to myself, but one of the 10 goals I set this year was that I have to be a heck of a lot more patient.  I signed up for this tournament a long time ago, and set aside the entire week on my schedule to be here in Windsor, North Carolina.  So with that being said, what's the hurry?  The answer is there is none.  Whether I tee off at 6am or 6pm, I need to just go out there in stride and take my time and enjoy the ride.  Zero rushing or complaining about the weather.  It is frustrating at time sitting around more than half the day waiting to play and it gets me anxious, but I'm ready to start rolling with the punches of what mother nature often times brings in terms of Spring weather.  There is 100% chance I won't finish round two tomorrow, but I'm ready to enjoy all the shots I get to hit tomorrow until sunset with not a rush in the world.  Thanks for reading and here's to a little more patience.

    Hello from Windsor, North Carolina.  Last week came and went on the NGA Tour and it is time for an update.  I ended up finishing in a tie for 34th place last week in Snow Hill, NC on a course that presented a stern test to each player in the field.  At weeks end, seven under par won the event.  This is about as high a score as I have seen since I have turned pro out here on the NGA Tour, so you can imagine the difficulty that we all faced.  The wind howled and the greens were crusty and fast.  That made for some high scores.  I played steady the first two days, but had too many three putts that set me back.  In the third round, I struggled all day to a 76.  Finally in the last round I got my game in working order and polished off a 70 to jump up the leaderboard.  In summary, had I been able to string together an average third round, I would have been looking at a top 10 finish.  That is why we play four rounds to decide a winner.  It was nice to analyze at week's end that I was just one good round away from really threatening the lead.
    So a new week has arrived.  The course this week actually is a bit tougher layout.  The conditions will more than likely not be as severe as last week, but I would expect scores to once again not be low.  My game really is starting to come together on all facets, and like I said earlier, if I can string together four rounds of golf I strongly believe I can give myself a great chance at doing something great this week.  I was one round away last week, now it's time to go out there and break that door down.  I tee off tomorrow at 7:48am and will be ready to get after it.  I am really excited about having a great week and I look forward to updating you along the way.  Thanks for reading.