At Chubb, a new swing and some old magic as Mediate leads by three
By Jeff Babineau
NAPLES, Fla. – A year ago, Rocco Mediate was showing up to tournaments with a golf swing that was reliable in only one sense: It was, well, massively unreliable. Always a jovial guy at heart, he was getting little joy from his golf. In 21 starts, Mediate’s best showing was a tie for 10th.
Blah.
Now 61, the former Naples resident has started 2024 with a completely new slate. New swing. New attitude. Most importantly, he says, he has grander expectations. Friday in the opening round of the Chubb Classic presented by SERVPRO, Mediate liked what he saw.
He followed a poor early drive by holing a 5-iron for an eagle-2 at the par-4 third at Tiburon’s Black Course, surely a bonus, then tacked on eight more birdies, firing 9-under 63 to sprint to a three-shot lead.
For the first time in a long time, Mediate, whose last Champions Tour victory came in 2019 (Sanford International), had an absolute blast.
“It’s shocking, actually,” Mediate said Friday, ever-present cigar in tow. “My wife kind of looks at me and says, ‘What is wrong with you? You’ve been doing this for like 5,000 years.’ And I’m like, well ... I’m trying to find some things. I have to figure this out.”
Candidly, he added, “I don’t know what else I would do. I still love to do this, but not the way I was doing it. It was horrible.”
South Africa’s Ernie Els, four-time major champion and another man who has grown weary of watching others hoisting trophies, started solidly despite his back giving him trouble, shooting 6-under 66. Els, who birdied all the par 5s, was one of three players to shoot 6-under, joined by Australia’s Mark Hensby, a first-time winner last season, and Germany’s Alex Cejka.
Els had a clean card before an untidy bogey at the par-4 17th, but bounced back with a closing birdie at 18, where he got up-and-down from a greenside bunker. Els did not win in 2023, and owns three victories on the PGA TOUR Champions. Clearly, at 54, he wants to win at a rate he did on the regular tour, and if his health cooperates, he believes he can. He’d like to make a big early splash this week.
“Are you kidding me?” Els said when asked about his fast start. “I’ve won three events out here. Been in contention quite a few times. But some of these guys, when they get hot, they go low. ... I’ve just got to get one better than them at some point, and get some confidence.”
A group at 67 included Steven Alker of New Zealand, the 2022 PGA TOUR Champions Player of the Year, who is attempting to win a third consecutive start; Canada’s Stephen Ames, a four-time winner in 2023 (only Steve Stricker won more); and former Florida Gator Scott Dunlap, who resides not far up the coast, in Sarasota.
For all the good scoring and interesting stories, Friday at the Chubb belonged to Mediate. Until Els birdied his final hole and others then rallied late behind him, Mediate was leading by four. Billy Andrade was asked how he played as he left the scoring area: “I thought I played good,” Andrade said after his 71. “Just not Rocco good.”
Frustrated by his overall performance in 2023, Mediate decided to return to the labratory. Every few days this offseason, Mediate, a six-time PGA TOUR winner (and four-time winner on the PGA TOUR Champions), found himself tinkering with something new, making adjustments, experimenting. He was doing so the way an Italian grandmother tinkers with different herbs in her secret pasta sauce.
Mediate would try something with his swing, then abandon it completely to head in another direction. This went on for about two months, and purposely. (“Five or six different ways,” he said. “All the stuff I know.”) Until two weeks before he left for Hawaii and the season opener, that is, when something actually “clicked” and he decided to ride with it. All tinkering ended right there.
The bullet points to Mediate’s revamped swing are as follows: More width in his stance; handle “up” at address; stand taller; then finish. “Then I do what I normally do,” shrugged Mediate, whose career nearly ended 30 years ago with a severe back injury. “No pain. Zero.
“I keep waking up doing the same thing, and kind of the same thing is happening. That’s good.”
Once he found a swing he liked, and his longtime swing instructor, Rick Smith, confirmed some “motion” numbers Mediate wanted to see, Mediate showed up to Hawaii to open the 2024 season and posted his first top 10 “in 100 years” (a tie for eighth) at the Mitsubishi Electric Championship at Hualalai.
Friday at Chubb was another strong outing to build upon. Mediate got a huge break at the 378-yard third hole, where he hooked a tee shot left and presumed his ball had reached the hazard. ("That's where it belongs," he thought.) To his surprise, his ball had struck a tree and caromed 80 yards backwards, leaving him 174 yards to the hole. Caddie Pete Bender talked Mediate out of a 6-iron, handed him the 5, and Mediate hit his second shot into the jar. Eagle.
From there, his play was torrid. He birdied four of his last five holes on the front to shoot 29, then ran off four consecutive birdies (14-17) coming in. He hit 9-iron to 15 feet at 14; two-putted the par-5 15th after reaching in two; struck “a nice looking” 7-iron to 6 feet at 16, and then ripped a 4-iron into the 465-yard 17th that finshed 3 feet behind the hole.
“So it was good,” he said. “Those don’t come around for me very often, a driver and a 4-iron.”
He did not birdie the par-5 18th after a 15-footer slid by wasn’t about to complain. He was not about to be greedy.
Steve Stricker, the 2023 Player of the Year and a champion at Chubb in 2021, shot 3-under 69, along with Padraig Harrington, who will be inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame this summer. Twenty-one players shot in the 60s. John Daly, making his first appearance at Chubb, shot 70 with a double-bogey at par-4 ninth.
Mediate finally says he expects some things from his game, and that in itself is a positive development.
“I want to win in my 60s,” Mediate said, having turned 61 in December. “I actually came out this year with expectations. Having no expectations is giving up, almost.
“Will it work every day? Of course not. But it’s simple. And it’s been fun.”
Ah, yes, fun. On the golf course, he’d been missing that. That made Friday feel so good.
