Bring on the wind, lots of it.
Bring on the brackets.
Bring on the world’s best players at the WGC Match Play to see who is the best at this match play stuff — March Madness for golf.
Starting Wednesday at Austin Country Club there will be five days and 112 contests to delight the match-play junkies.
Some call it the purest form of competition, maybe it is, but it doesn’t exactly make for good television when you get down to two guys for four hours.
Defending champion is one Rory McIlroy, who tumbled to No. 3 in the world rankings yesterday after Jason Day won at Bay Hill. He is one of the four “top seeds” joining No. 1 Jordan Spieth, No. 2 Jason Day and No. 4 Bubba Watson.
The format changed from the straight “one-and-done” format to guarantee that every player in the 64-man field has at least three matches. There are 16 groups of three, headed by 1-16 in the current world rankings.
So let’s check the top four guys:
Jordan Spieth: He drew his good buddy Justin Thomas, Victor DuBuisson and Jamie Donaldson. Tough group for Spieth, it will test him to the max.
Jason Day: Day will have Paul Casey, Thongchai Jaidee and Graeme McDowell in his group. Not as tough as Spieth’s draw, Casey will present a challenge to the rest.
Rory McIlroy: No. 3 drew Kevin Na, Smiley Kaufman and Thorbjorn Olesen. Not as tough as Spieth and Day’s groups, nothing Rory can’t handle there.
Bubba Watson: Bubba has J.B. Holmes, Emiliano Grillo and Patton Kizzire. Kizzire is a first-timer and knocked Ian Poulter out of this event. Watson and Holmes is a battle of the blasters.
One of the most difficult groups this week is Group 9, headed by Patrick Reed. He drew Phil Mickelson, Matthew Fitzpatrick and Patrick Berger. A lot of talent in that group and it is Phil vs. the really young guys.
Speaking of difficult, playing conditions will be winds that could hit 25 miles per hour this week.
“You need your best golf to get through to the weekend,” McIlroy said on Monday. “You can’t underestimate anyone.”
So let golf’s version of the Madness begin.
