Despite falling victim to one of the most ridiculous rules in golf, Jon Rahm held on to win The Memorial Sunday by three strokes over Ryan Palmer. Rahm also fell victim to the difficulty of the Jack Nicklaus course, as did most of the players trying to catch him.

    Rahm headed into round 4 at 12 under par, four strokes ahead of Palmer, and shot what he thought was a 1-over 73 to out-distance Palmer by five. But he found out during his post-round NBC interview with Amanda Balionis that there was a chance he would be assessed a two-stroke penalty. That resulted from an incident with a shot from a side hill lie in the rough where his ball moved so slightly at address that it took video close-ups to discover it. The gurus did hit Rahm with the penalty, but it didn't affect the outcome. Rahm told Amanda he was unaware of what happened until she told him.  

    The difficulty of the course, added to a time out as heavy rain passed through the area, led to just one player breaking 70. That was Matthew Fitzpatrick, whose 4-under-68 moved him up to third place at 5 under. There were two rounds of 70 in the finale, by Xander Schauffele and Carl Pettersson, and a pair of 71s, by Luke List and Patrick Reed. None of the four were in a position at the start of the day to threaten Rahm. 

    Tiger Woods continued his less-than spectacular play and finished with a 4-over 76, but the other scores were so high that Tiger only dropped three spots, from 37th at the start to 40th. Much of Tiger's Sunday woes resulted from poor putting on the lightning-fast greens. 

    Gator Billy Horschel posted an even-par 72 and finished at 1 over par, tied for 13th. 

    The Tour heads for Blaine, Minnesota this week for the $6.6 million 3M Open at the TPC Twin Cities. Ted Potter is on the entry list, as is defending champ Matthew Wolff, who took home a cool $1,152,000 for his 2019 victory.  

     

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