00:00So the first you've already mentioned Hideki Matsuyama because we talked you know as we were sort of wrapping up the 2025 year about what a strange year it was for him in a sense he won of course the century started here in Hawaii wins there and he doesn't necessarily have a bad year but just maybe not up to his standards in terms of just week in week out performances not a ton of in the way of top 10s or top 5s or things like that but then in his final three starts of 2025 he has a T7 of the Genesis Championship a T5 the Dunlop Phoenix Tournament and then he won
00:30wins the Hero World Challenge and so now he's coming back to a place here at the Sony where he won 2022 and obviously enjoyed starting his year in Hawaii last year so that's one name that intrigues me the second name you mentioned Steven Yeager being contention last year another guy that people kind of forget this kind of kicked off the year of JJ Spahn he was in the mix there coming down down the finish and and and he's played good here in Hawaii before in fact I think was a maybe two or three years ago now where he had the famous the untucked Puma shirt
01:00uh at the century the century the week prior and wore that and and this was a guy obviously goes on later this year to win the U.S. Open but this was I think for us when when he started kind of landing on our radar I'm like okay JJ's playing some good golf right now maybe he'll kind of make some noise this year and he goes on to do that the third name that I find interesting is
01:18Karl Morikawa who has struggled mightily with the putter but has gone to this this center shaft at the zero torque model I mean he's tried a little bit of everything last year and we talked about he tried a lot of caddies last year he tried a lot of putters last year he tried
01:34taking off his glove for approach shots at one point in time so he was trying everything and I just wonder your thoughts on those three guys like because I think this could be a tone setter for each of those three in very different ways leading into year and I think it's a very important year for all three of those guys
01:50I think a more important year for Colin Morikawa if you're from deciding between any of those three guys
01:59this is a honestly Colin Morikawa should play this golf course every year it's a perfect course for him
02:05accuracy is is so rewarded if you're a player that finds a fairway more often than not
02:11you know he's a guy that will hit 70 percent of his fairways week in and week out on a course that averages about half
02:18so it's you feel like you had a good day if you hit more than seven fairways in the round
02:22but you're right I think Colin just needs more consistency this year try to keep the same routines
02:28keep those processes the same but yeah I'm looking for a big back bounce back week in in year for Colin
02:34Morikawa expect him to have a good week Hideki Matsuyama I thought was interesting year that he never really
02:40showed that beside me gosh he won twice but besides those moments it felt like he never was in contention
02:47he was really good at finishing between 10th and 20th I think I've found that out on air at hero I'm
02:53sitting there going doing some research and I find that uh hey Terry how many times has he finished
02:58between 10th and 20th he's like I don't know how many he's like I'm like 12 like that's for me I
03:04would have been I would have been in love with those finishes but not a bad year but just just you're not
03:08at maybe Hideki standard which was it which was kind of intriguing for us to recap definitely it's it's all
03:14about getting back to precision iron play for Hideki he feeds off of that you know if he's if he's
03:19dialed in with that part of his game and you saw it on the 18th hole at the hero championship in the
03:23playoff where he just sent one right at the flag stick wins with a birdie takes down Alex Noren that's
03:29the type of Hideki that we're used to and saw in his prime where he was just flagging iron shots
03:34left and right but you want to see a healthier Hideki this year I think that's first and foremost if he's
03:39not showing that he's injured quite as much I think that would uh be a good start for Hideki but
03:44he's uh he's a scary player when when you're coming down the stretch if you see his name on
03:49the leaderboard because you know that he is not fearful at all coming down the stretch and he is
03:54not scared to go take it deep on a Sunday winning on two come from behind victories at the Genesis uh I
04:01guess he did that uh the year prior but Genesis being the one where he started about four back from
04:06can't lay it up that thing was a snoozer with about an hour left
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