‘The Good Chain’: Emotions high for 44-year-old with 18 holes to play in KFT finale

Josh Teater was in a rut.

The 44-year-old pro had dropped outside the coveted top 30 in Korn Ferry Tour points thanks to a late-summer slump. When he missed the cut a few weeks ago in Nashville, he was No. 43 and struggling mentally.

“You get in these seven or eight weeks, and you get kind of lazy, maybe,” Teater explains, already emotional. “I mean, you go out to the course, you practice, you play, but there’s nothing on the line…”

So, prior to the KFT’s penultimate event, the Nationwide Children’s Hospital Championship in Columbus, Ohio, Teater chatted with his buddy, Kentucky baseball coach Nick Mingione. Teater left that conversation inspired, creating something called “The Good Chain” to garner a little extra motivation.

“Every day that’s what I’m trying to win,” said Teater, who tied for seventh in Columbus to enter this week’s KFT Championship at No. 34 in points. “If you go out there and you compete and you commit to your shots and you do what you’re supposed to do, then you win the chain.

“I think it’s safe to say I can put it on today.”

Teater fired an 8-under 64 to vault into a tie for the lead with Paul Barjon on Saturday at Victoria National. Teater and Barjon, No. 45 in points at the start of the week, are 10 under, two shots clear of David Kocher.

With an initial field of 73 players, Teater needs a minimum finish of a two-way tie for 21^st to move inside the number and earn a return ticket to the PGA Tour. Teater has six seasons of 20-plus PGA Tour starts under his belt, though he’s logged just two starts apiece on the big tour since making 17 starts with just two top-25s in 2020-21.

Wilson Furr (No. 32 to No. 21) and Mason Andersen (No. 42 to No. 29) are tied for fourth as both are also projected to climb inside the top 30 along with Teater and Barjon.

Joe Highsmith, at T-14, is currently on the projected bubble while Jorge Fernandez Valdes (No. 24 to No. 32), Chase Seiffert (No. 28 to No. 33), Carter Jenkins (No. 26 to No. 37) and Jackson Suber (No. 30 to No. 39) are the four who would be dropping out of the top 30 if play ended right now.