Brendan Steele moved well up the leaderboard Sunday with a 3-under-par 69 at Torrey Pines South in the Farmers Insurance Open. For the tournament, he posted a 6-under-par 69-74-70-69 — 272, good for his fourth top-20 finish in six starts this season, the other three being two T6s and a win.
The native Idyllwilder had his approach irons and wedges working for him last week; for the tournament, he was No. 1 in approaches to greens, gaining 7.441 strokes against the field in that category.
Brendan found 62.5 percent of the fairways with drives averaging 297.7 yards, the longest being 314 yards on the par-5 6th hole in Sunday’s windless round, producing a birdie. He hit 69 percent of the greens in regulation, picking up 8.933 strokes against the field, tee-to-green. The weakest part of his game was putting, although he still managed to gain a tiny 0.069 strokes against the field even in that category.
Brendan gained 38 FedExCup points last week, maintaining his position as fourth on the tour on that list. He also moved up the Official World Golf Ranking to 55th position.
By the way, Jason Day, the No. 1 player in the world, didn’t make the cut at Torrey. Neither did Dustin Johnson, Jimmy Walker, Rickie Fowler and Tiger Woods.
B plays again this week in the $6.7 million Waste Management Phoenix Open. He tees off Thursday from No. 10 at 11:16 a.m. PST and Friday from No. 1 at 7:06 a.m. PST.
