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MELBOURNE — To discuss Adam Scott’s smile, you must first discuss Adam Scott’s looks. Please don’t fire a bullet through your computer screen or throw your phone into the nearest full bathtub—I swear the rest of this post will be less unsettling than the first line. It’s not my fault, anyway. It was the inescapable

1:49 AM ET MELBOURNE, Australia — Tiger Woods figured he had a team more than capable of cruising to another Presidents Cup victory without him. Little did he know that all the off-course effort he put into his Presidents Cup captaincy over the past several weeks and months would be a backstory to his play

MELBOURNE — Along with the customary red, white and blue, the American team’s outfits at this week’s Presidents Cup feature a tinge of yellow. Multiple members of both the U.S. and International teams are wearing the “Leuk the Duck” pin on their hats, an homage to Jarrod Lyle, the Australian PGA Tour pro who died

1:59 PM ET Associated Press BARTOW, Fla. — A professional golfer was one of 124 people arrested in Florida in a prostitution and human-trafficking sting. Tommy “Two Gloves” Gainey, 44, was arrested Sunday and charged with first-degree misdemeanor solicitation, news outlets reported. The Polk County Sheriff’s Office said Wednesday that Gainey was arrested in an

Wednesday prime-time golf is something we can get used to. Though the fireworks were sparse in Day 1 of the 2019 Presidents Cup, the surprises were not, with the Internationals holding their largest-ever Day 1 lead, 4-1. That might be a surprise, unless you read our Day 1 analysis, which predicted the “upsets” by Adam

1:39 AM ET MELBOURNE, Australia — Perhaps out of necessity, Tiger Woods will play again Friday during the second day of the Presidents Cup. He’ll again partner with Justin Thomas, with whom he won his opening match Thursday — the only American victory in what was a surprising 4-1 deficit after the first session at

MELBOURNE — Ernie Els is bracing for an American resurgence during the second session of this 13th Presidents Cup on Friday. He knows his International team might have stirred the heavily favored U.S. squad out of its slumber after taking a surprising 4-1 lead Thursday at Royal Melbourne. “We have to keep our jets down.

It will be a surprise to nobody that Tiger Woods has provided the early highlight of the Presidents Cup. The 15-time major champion selected himself as a captain’s pick for this week’s matches, and then put himself out in the first match alongside partner Justin Thomas in their four-ball match. Tiger and JT have led

9:47 AM ET The U.S. has the bigger names. After all, Tiger Woods is the captain. Oh, and he’s a player, too. Then there’s Justin Thomas and Dustin Johnson and Rickie Fowler and Patrick Reed and … well, you get the point. Every player on the U.S. roster is in the top 23 in the

PGA Tour player Tommy (Two Gloves) Gainey has been arrested for soliciting a prostitute, according to the Polk County (Fla.) Sheriff’s Office. Gainey was one of 124 people arrested in a massive, a six-day undercover sting, dubbed “Operation Santa’s Naughty List,” targeting prostitution, human trafficking and child predators in central Florida. According to jail records,

MELBOURNE — This may shock you, but Dustin Johnson is not stressing about the Presidents Cup being his first event since knee surgery. “I’ll play as much as Tiger wants me to play,” Johnson said ahead of Thursday’s four ball matches, when he and Gary Woodland will face Abraham Ancer and Louis Oosthuizen. “I wouldn’t

1:51 AM ET MELBOURNE, Australia — He may have been left in the locker room for the opening Presidents Cup pairings but Australian Cameron Smith did not retreat from his comments about United States team member Patrick Reed. Just an hour before Els and U.S. captain Tiger Woods took to the stage to announce the

MELBOURNE—Earlier this year Justin Thomas was trying to wrap his head around the idea of playing for U.S. captain Tiger Woods in the Presidents Cup, saying, “If you would have told me when I was a kid that I could play on a Presidents Cup team with Tiger Woods as my captain, I probably would

5:42 PM ET MELBOURNE, Australia — Nobody has finished second to Tiger Woods more than Ernie Els, a testament to the South African’s stature in the game over the years as well as the frustration he faced in trying to beat the game’s top player. Els now has a different task in trying to bring

MELBOURNE — Adam Scott was onto something, whether he knew it or not, when he recently advised his fellow Australians to curtail their enthusiasm for Tiger Woods at this week’s Presidents Cup. “Last time it was too friendly,” the amiable Scott told the Herald Sun of Melbourne, referring to the 2011 Presidents Cup at Royal

12:39 AM ET MELBOURNE, Australia — The rules violation that cost him two strokes and, perhaps, part of his reputation has followed Patrick Reed from the Bahamas to Australia. The seven-time PGA Tour winner who was deemed to have improved his lie in a sandy waste area last week at the Hero World Challenge heard

Patrick Reed walked in smiling to his Tuesday press conference at Royal Melbourne, and the smile turned into a laugh—shared with Justin Thomas—when he saw the buzzing scrum of reporters gathered in front of his podium spot. Reed can be inscrutable when he wants to be, and this was a case where it was hard

Ask Mike Clayton what he thinks are the best holes on the Royal Melbourne composite layout (12 holes from the West course, six from the East) that this week hosts the 13th Presidents Cup matches and the native Melburnian – one of the most respected voices in golf architecture – is quick to identify all

10:18 AM ET Patrick Reed could be in for a long week in Australia in the aftermath of a rules-breaking controversy that occurred Friday at the Hero World Challenge. Reed was due to arrive Monday morning in Melbourne with the rest of his U.S. teammates for the Presidents Cup. And a couple of members of

The USGA and R&A relaxed their rules in 2012 to allow golfers who won luxury cars or large cash prizes for making a hole-in-one during a round of golf to take them without losing amateur status. Now, the governing bodies are going the next step. On Monday, officials with the two associations announced that amateurs

7:39 PM ET Associated Press ORLANDO, Fla. — Jason Langer made a 16-foot eagle putt on the first hole of a playoff Sunday to give father Bernard his fourth victory in the PNC Father Son Challenge. The Langers closed with a second straight 12-under 60 to match Retief and Leo Goosen and Tom and Thomas

Patrick Reed’s rules imbroglio has caught the attention of his Presidents Cup opponents. Multiple members of the International team have weighed in on the rules dispute that saw Reed receive a two-shot penalty for improving his line of play in a bunker on Friday at the Hero World Challenge. Cameron Smith offered the strongest criticism

In a piece like this, the disclaimer belongs at the beginning: The history of the Presidents Cup has been a history of American domination, to the tune of 11 victories, one draw, and only one loss in 12 installments, a superlative (and a little absurd) stretch that spans 25 years. Most of the matches have

11:28 AM ET Danish teenager Rasmus Hojgaard gave a nerveless display in a tense sudden-death playoff Sunday to win the Mauritius Open in a three-man shootout. Hojgaard, 18, made eagle on the third playoff hole — after Italy’s Renato Paratore had been eliminated at the first — to edge France’s Antoine Rozner, and in so

Say this about the Americans’ 1998 Presidents Cup defeat at the hands of the International Team: It does not stand alone as the worst loss a United States squad has suffered in the history of major men’s professional team competitions. For that, the team can thank its red, white and blue Ryder Cup counterparts of

2:01 AM ET Associated Press SYDNEY — Matt Jones made a testing four-foot par putt on the final hole to hold off Louis Oosthuizen and win his second Australian Open golf championship on Sunday by one stroke after a 2-under 69. Jones, who is a member at the host Australian Golf Club and won his

A working vacation. That’s essentially what’s going on this week at the Hero World Challenge. For those competing in the 18-player, no-cut field, the ask from tournament host Tiger Woods is that you compete in a pre-tournament pro-am, then play four rounds for a $3.5 million purse. Seems pretty reasonable, no? Last place makes $100,000,

NEW PROVIDENCE, Bahamas — Everybody likes a good comeback story. And Henrik Stenson is a man of comebacks, all shapes and sizes. There was the time he lost his game, in 2001, when he developed the full-swing yips. It was so bad that he walked off the course during the second round of the Smurfit

6:00 PM ET ESPN News Services NASSAU, Bahamas — Two big birdies from Gary Woodland gave him the lead in the Hero World Challenge. A closing birdie on a hole that has vexed Tiger Woods put him in range of a third victory this year. Patrick Reed fully expected to be right there until watching

Paul McGinley knows a few things about beating Americans in team events. And nothing at all about losing. Three times the 52-year-old Irishman was part of a winning European Ryder Cup side—he holed the clinching putt at The Belfry in his debut in 2002—and he was the highly-acclaimed non-playing captain when the Old World comprehensively