🏌🏻 Is Your Tee Too Low?

Good morning. So much action in the world of golf running up to the next major - why are LIV Golfers allowed to play PGA Championship and those that qualified, PGA pros that aren’t playing other tournaments running up to the majors, and there’s more on helping you improve your game.

☕ So, grab your favorite morning beverage, and let's get into the swing of things!

⛳️ This Day In History: On this date in 1950, Ben Hogan won the Greenbrier Pro-Am, at the golf club in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia, winning $1,250 after shooting 64-64-65-66—259.

ALBATROSS
Why Are LIV Golfers Allowed To Play PGA Championship?

While Augusta National featured 13 LIV Golf professionals, the PGA Championship will feature two fewer players. All professionals qualified via different eligible criteria set by the tournament.

Some of these criteria include:

• Former PGA Champion

• Masters Champion in the last five seasons/editions

• US Open Champion in the last five seasons/editions

• Open Champion in the last five seasons/editions

• Won the Players Championship in the last five season/editions

• Top 100 in OWGR

• Top 70 in PGA Championship points list

• Finished in the low 15 in the recent PGA Championship

• Part of the recent Ryder Cup

🏌🏻 Among the nine selected players, Brooks Koepka, Martin Kaymer, and Phil Mickelson are former champions.

🏌🏻 Cameron Smith and Bryson DeChambeau qualified as they won Majors in the last five editions and finished inside the top 15 last year. Smith also won the Players Championship (2022) in one of the past three editions.

🏌🏻 Tyrrell Hatton got in for being among the low 15 in 2023 and inside the top 100 OWGR.

🏌🏻 Jon Rahm and Dustin Johnson are eligible to compete at the PGA Championship for being Major champions in the last five years.

🏌🏻 Joaquin Niemann has earned a special invite for the second Major of the season. For the uninitiated, he also earned a special invite to the Masters Tournament last month.

🏌🏻 Talor Gooch also received an invitation to play in the PGA Championship next week, due primarily to his performance on the 54-hole team-format tour.

🏌🏻 The PGA of America also extended an invitation to LIV’s David Puig, the 22-year-old Arizona State product who recently won the Malaysian Open and qualified for the Open Championship.

TWEET
Worth Mentioning

EAGLE
Scheffler, Aberg Pull Out of Wells Fargo Championship

Two of Texas’ favorite golfers will not be competing in this week’s Wells Fargo Championship in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Scottie Scheffler, the former Longhorn on a Tiger Woods-esque run through the PGA Tour, will miss his fourth-straight PGA Tour event as he awaits the birth of his first child with his wife Meredith.

Meanwhile, Swede Ludvig Aberg, the No. 1 amateur in the world while at Texas Tech and currently ranked fifth in the FedExCup standings, is withdrawing from the event as a precaution due to some knee soreness.

All eyes will be on Scheffler next week to see whether he will compete in the PGA Championship, the second major of the year, which begins on May 16.

LOCKER ROOM
What else is making news

TGL: Reigning U.S. Open champion Wyndham Clark and Sweden's Ludvig Åberg headline the roster of the Bay Golf Club, the California-based team in TGL presented by SoFi, the tech-infused golf league being fronted by Tiger Woods and Rory McIlroy.

CJ Cup Prize Money: Here's how much every player made at the CJ Cup Byron Nelson, which included a $9.5 million purse and $1.71 million for the winner.

LIV Cursing: PGA Tour pro Padraig Harrington calls out LIV Golf players for excessive cursing at Masters.

BIRDIE
How High Should You Tee Up The Golf Ball?

If the goal is to swing upward with the driver, it makes sense that you’d want to have the tee positioned higher to account for the positive angle of attack. In most cases, teeing the ball 1.5 inches off the turf will situate the equator of the ball near the top of the face in the address position.

The height varies depending on whether you’re playing a driver with a deep or shallow face, so focus on getting the equator of the ball near the top edge of the crown.

With regards to a fairway wood, unless you’re playing a Mini Driver or something with an incredibly deep face, the general rule of thumb is about half an inch above the ground. If you can see the cone of the tee sticking out of the ground, you’re in good shape.

As for the hybrid, embrace Jack Nicklaus’ sage advice: “Air offers less resistance than dirt.” As much as you might be inclined to try and hit a hybrid “off the deck” (without a tee), you should still use a tee in most cases so the club can lift the ball into the air, even with a descending angle of attack. Only the top of the tee should be visible — similar to how you’d tee it up with an iron — in this case.

Read the full article.

DRIVING RANGE
9 Simple Golf Tips Most Golfers Don’t Know

Rick Shiels shares his 9 really simple tips ALL golfers need to know.