Justin Thomas, Smylie Kaufman and Rickie Fowler during the Quicken Loans National in 2016.
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PGA Tour, video-editing troll?
Believe it. Justin Thomas, he of 14 Tour wins, and Smylie Kaufman, he of one, once shared something just as memorable, apparently, as any victory — a scramble bogey. And the Tour’s social media team reopened the wound.
It all started Thursday, when the Tour’s Twitter feed, in advance of this week’s QBE Shootout, tweeted out a picture of the host site, Tiburon Golf Course, with the caption: “Casual tee shot down a hallway @QBEShootout.” Which prompted this response from Kaufman just over a half-hour later:
“Do yall happen to have the live footage of @JustinThomas34 and I on the 4th hole lipping in a putt for bogey in the scramble format?”
For context, just one of the 12 teams at this year’s QBE made a bogey during the scramble round, which tends to create more circles than squares on the scorecard. But in 2016, in Thomas’ and Kaufman’s only appearance at the event, they were inches from a double.
And Thomas wanted to see it again, too.
“RT need that like I need air to breath,” he wrote in response to Kaufman.
Unfortunately for those who enjoy seeing pros play like your Sunday buddies, the footage was gone. But fortunately for those who like a good laugh and a good video edit, the Tour made due. It scratched together the best of Thomas’ and Kaufman’s worst to recreate the hole.
Kaufman tweeted the hole went something like this: “From start to finish that hole was a debacle. We had 2 balls that landed in the middle of the lake. 2 hiya’s. 2 chips from “unknown” and 2 shaky 5 footers. Meanwhile @Lexi @b_dechambeau made the easiest birdie of all time.” From there, the Tour concocted the following:
First, it showed videos of Thomas and Kaufman hitting tee shots into water. Then it showed videos of Thomas and Kaufman hitting into trees. Then it showed a video of Kaufman hitting from the rough, and Thomas from the trees. Finally, it flashed a video of Kaufman rolling in a putt.
“No luck in the archives,” the Tour’s account tweeted. “Hope this recreation will suffice.”
To Thomas and Kaufman, and the 40,000 who viewed it as of early Saturday afternoon, it did.
“Hahahahahaha yes,” Thomas tweeted.
“Idk if we even made it look that good tbh,” Kaufman tweeted. “Top 5 at the end of the week after that start was a win for the program”
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