Brendan Steele will kick off the main part of his 2019/20 PGA Tour season this week in the $6.6-million Sony Open on the Waialae County Club course in Honolulu. After beginning the early season in the closing months of 2019, the Idyllwild native is coming back from some time off to once again challenge the best golfers in the world during the main part of the PGA Tour season.
This is Steele’s final year of the three-year PGA Tour eligibility he earned by his victory in Napa’s Safeway Open, the first tournament of the 2017/18 season. He will need to earn eligibility for next year’s 2020/21 season by his play this year. He will strive to finish as one of the top 125 players on the FedExCup list by the close of this regular season in August.
Currently, Steele is ranked 150th, so he has some ground to gain back.
In four current key statistics comparing him to the rest of the tour’s players, Steele stands tied for 79th in strokes gained off the tee, 119th in strokes gained on approach shots, 117th in strokes gained around the green and 143rd in strokes gained putting.
So, in general, it currently appears that as he gets closer to the cup, his ranking declines. Let’s pull for Steele to improve those stats and score really well this season.
Steele tees it up Thursday at 2:20 p.m. PDT and Friday at 9:40 a.m. PDT. He’ll be playing with Pat Perez and Scott Piercy both days. You can follow his shot-by-shot scoring with the PGA Tour app or by going to pgatour.com.