5 Things for the RBC Heritage: Big names and some big results needed

A week after the Masters, the PGA Tour will head to Harbour Town for the RBC Heritage. 

Scottie Scheffler won’t be on Hilton Head Island to try and become the first player since Bernhard Langer (1985) to win a tartan jacket and a green jacket in back-to-back weeks. But this event still has plenty of star power, with five of the world’s top 10 in the field.

Here’s five things you need to know for the 2022 RBC Heritage.

High Five

Those OWGR top-5 names are: No. 2 Collin Morikawa, No. 5 Cameron Smith, No. 6 Patrick Cantlay, No. 8 Justin Thomas and No. 9 Dustin Johnson. Other notables include Jordan Spieth, Billy Horschel, Joaquin Niemann, Tyrrell Hatton, Abraham Ancer, Daniel Berger, Matthew Fitzpatrick, Sungjae Im and Shane Lowry.

The field of 132 players has 15 major winners and 12 past champions. Stewart Cink fits the bill in both categories and its the defending champ. He won last year’s edition, at age 47, for his third Heritage title. He’s one of 10 repeat winners, but still two trophies shy of Davis Love III (more on him below).

Full-field tee times from RBC Heritage

The Hoff Returns

Morgan Hoffmann, 32, hasn’t made a Tour start since the 2019 Shriners Hospitals for Children Open. The former No. 1 amateur in the world stepped away from the sport and moved to Costa Rica to battle Facioscapulohumeral Muscular Dystrophy, which he was diagnosed with in 2016. Hoffmann will be playing at Harbour Town on a major medical exemption, which the Tour extended for him. He has three starts left on the exemption to gain 238 FedExCup point by the end of the season.

For more on Hoffmann’s unique journey, click here.

Win to Get Back In

Wesley Bryan, 32, won this event in 2017. It’s his lone Tour victory and he hasn’t had a top-10 finish since that season. The South Carolina native is playing this week on past champions status. Last month at the Valspar Championship, Bryan played in his final medical-exemption start, needing a top-50 finish. He dramatically made the cut, but didn’t finish high enough over the weekend to retain conditional status.

“Been a long few years, spent most of it rehabbing shoulder and wrist. Thank you to everyone for the support this week….definitely felt the love out there. I tried my hardest….came up short. It stings, but I’m not done trying,” Bryan tweeted after the Valspar’s final round. 

His only start since then came at the Corales Puntacana Championship, where he tied for 15th.

A win this week by Bryan — or Hoffmann — would be equivalent to what Ryan Brehm did last month at the Puerto Rico Open. 

Hometown Hero

Bryson Nimmer, 25, grew up roughly eight miles from Hilton Head, in Bluffton, South Carolina. After receiving one of the event’s final sponsor exemptions, he’ll be back at Harbour Town for the second straight year (he missed the cut in 2021).

“I had a great time. I obviously didn’t play very well at all, and it was a tough day, but it was just so cool,” Nimmer said after Round 1 last year. “I had so many people out here following me and just to have the backing of everybody was awesome. We had people cheering. I told my caddie on 10, if I make this putt I’m pretty sure it’s going to be a roar as big as Tiger [Woods] gets. It was awesome.”

Nimmer starred at Hilton Head Christian Academy and Clemson University before turning professional in 2019. He has eight career Tour starts, with his best result a T-11 last month in Puntacana. 

It’s been that long?

Nobody is more synonyms with the RBC Heritage than Davis Love III. The 58-year-old has the most Tour wins of anyone at Harbour Town (five) and it’s been 35 years since the first one came in dramatic fashion.

In 1987, Steve Jones, who made it into the field as an alternate, needed a par on the 72nd hole of the tournament to win. But his drive landed out of bounds and after re-teeing, he made a double and gifted Love the first of his 21 PGA Tour wins. 

Love won again in 1991 and ’92, becoming one of only three players to successfully defend his title. Payne Stewart did it right before Love, in 1989 and ’90. Boo Weekley did it in 2007 and ’08. Love added a four plaid jacket to his closet in 1998 and capped his winning ways in spectacular fashion with by chipping in on the 72nd hole to force a playoff with Woody Austin, which Love won on the fourth extra hole.