The Sub-60 Air Isn't As Rare

Knapp's round is the ninth in nine years on PGA Tour

A round under 60 on the PGA Tour used to be to golf what a blue lobster is to malacostracans.

Al Geiberger shot the circuit’s first 59 in 1977. It was 14 years until Chip Beck recorded the second, then eight years until David Duval carded the third. Eleven years went by until the fourth.

Through 2013, there were just six sub-60 scores all-time on the PGA Tour.

With Californian Jake Knapp’s 59 Thursday in the first round of the Cognizant Classic in The Palm Beaches, there have been nine in nine years.

Breaking 60 has all the shock factor of finding a plus-sized prawn in your seafood platter.

Perhaps Knapp knows the numbers, and that’s why, after making birdie on No. 18 at PGA National’s Champion course in Palm Beach Gardens, Fla., he raised his arm with all the vigor of someone saving par for a 71.

Yes, it was Thursday. Yes, it was a tap-in for 59, not a double-breaking 45-footer. But subdued doesn’t begin to describe Knapp’s immediate reaction/celebration.

Maybe Knapp’s calm had something to do with how neatly he stitched the 59. The dynamic swinger whose action could be described as revved-up old school, hit 12 of 14 fairways, 16 of 18 greens, was 2 for 2 scrambling and had 25 putts with a putter he was using for the first time. He two-putted each of the three par 5s for birdies. Aside from a 61-foot chip-in on No. 2 and a 31-foot putt on the 15^th hole, his other birdies were from 12 feet or closer. The tone of Knapp’s day was set with five birdies to start his round on an unusually calm day in southeast Florida.

There was hardly a zephyr during Knapp’s morning round. “When the wind was down, I knew that it was going to be gettable,” said Knapp, whose four-stroke cushion marks the first time he has led after the first round on the PGA Tour. “When this place gets windy, it can get really challenging. It’s one of those where you know you have to play pretty aggressive when it’s not windy, so I just did my best to do that.”

Knapp wasn’t alone in taking advantage of a meek PGA National, whose teeth also were dulled by wall-to-wall winter overseed. Forty-seven players shot 67 or lower on a day when the stroke average was 68.62. Only 29 of 144 players failed to break par.

“There’s no real goofiness to it or anything like that,” Knapp said of the Champion course. “It’s just kind of right in front of you … I don’t hit a lot of drivers out here. It’s more of a positional course for me. And I try to make sure that from pitching wedge to 6-iron, I’m hitting the ball well.”

I’m still partial to judging Geiberger’s 59 as being the best of the sub-60s, given the difficulty of Colonial Country Club in Memphis and the equipment of that era. (Geiberger shot 13 under on a course 115 yards longer than what Knapp played Thursday.) Duval’s closing-round 59 to win in Palm Springs, at what is now called The American Express, was fantastic. Jim Furyk will always stand out as the first to card a 58, at the Travelers Championship in 2016 on par-70 TPC River Highlands.

“I’ll still think tonight about how it should have been 58 or 57 or 56,” Knapp said. “Fifty-nine is great, but you always could technically do better.”

Get to one of those last two numbers, and we’re back in blue lobster territory.