Will Zalatoris

American holds one-shot lead over Mito Pereira at Southern Hills · Rory McIlroy hits 71 but still in picture five shots off leader.

Those to miss the cut included the world No 1 and Masters champion Scottie Scheffler, who whacked his bag with a club during a Friday morning fit of pique. I felt I did a great job of that and am glad to have a good round to show for it. Hopefully it’s a sign of things are changing a little bit for me and open a few more doors on other golf courses.” Fitzpatrick’s 68-69 means a three-under aggregate. Thomas has played in by far the most severe of the Tulsa weather. A 64 from Pereira, the 27-year-old Chilean, was already in the books before Zalatoris putted out for a 65. He explained why having his father as a coach was sometimes problematic on the basis of an occasional lack of blunt analysis.

Will two winless golfers hold off a pair of stars with a combined 34 PGA Tour victories ... at a major?

He has a 65 in him on Saturday, and if it happens, he could play his way into one of the final few pairings on Sunday afternoon. He'll have to improve that approach play on Saturday and Sunday for a chance, but the upshot here is that he's probably in the best position to potentially join J.T. in the final pairing on Sunday -- if the top two fall off -- in what would be one of the most-anticipated final round major duels in the last 10 years. 4. A third for Bubba? Two-time Masters champion Bubba Watson has just three other top 10s in 55 major championship appearances and just one since he won the 2014 Masters (2018 Masters). He shot the round of the week so far with a 63 on Friday, a round in which he made two bogeys, played for the field average with his putter and did pretty much all his damage from tee to green. It's almost certainly not going to happen, but the story of Cink trading that nightmare in 2001 for a dream ending to his major championship career would be exceptional. The only two players in front of him have never won at all, and they'll be on equal footing in terms of conditions for the duration. He decimated the field with driver in Round 1 but didn't give himself any scoring opportunities in Round 2 -- he only had two looks for birdie inside of 15 feet and made one of them. While he's not the favorite, perhaps he should be after the way he flighted his ball and thought his way around Southern Hills over the first two days. The narrative around Zalatoris is whether his sometimes-shaky (to put it kindly) putting stroke can hold up on the low-oxygen final few rounds at the top of a major leaderboard. Let's take a look at the six other most important narratives with two days remaining in the second major championship of the year. This year, however, while the two leaders are a headline with two days remaining in Tulsa, there are plenty of other storylines (including a few that just sneaked into the weekend) surrounding them. TULSA, Okla. -- It always takes a few days at majors before the heart of the tournament emerges, and the 2022 PGA Championship is no different. Each will be looking for his first PGA Tour victory, which is a monumentally difficult ( not to mention rare) feat to accomplish at a major championship.

Will Zalatoris shot a bogey-free 65 in the PGA Championship on Friday, leaving him at 9 under for the tournament and giving him a one-shot lead over Mito ...

Watson had never scored better than 68 in his previous 49 rounds in the PGA Championship. And then he dropped nine birdies and goes into the weekend with a chance. He hit another through a gap in the trees to 7 feet. "They're tough golf courses that allows my ball-striking to really give me the best chances," he said. He was 10 shots behind in his bid to get the major keeping him from the career Grand Slam. Rory McIlroy was on the good side of the draw and failed to take advantage. He opened with a shot from the rough that tumbled across the length of the green to 2 feet. "We're going to see a completely different golf course the next two days because of the wind direction. "Sometimes you get the bad draw, sometimes you get the good one. Justin Thomas concentrated on every shot, even short putts, in gusts that topped 30 mph in the morning and he was rightly proud of another 67 that put him atop the leaderboard. "I think it was lucky to get that draw," Pereira said. "We lucked out with the draw, for sure," he said. Of the 22 players under par going into the weekend, only five had to endure the worst of Oklahoma's notorious wind.

Zalatoris leads Mito Pereira by one shot, but players who teed off early on Thursday and late on Friday caught much softer weather at Southern Hills.

It wasn’t just the wind that affected the leaders. Zalatoris ranks with the tour’s best iron players but he struggles with the putter at times. It wasn’t like it was a walk in the park then. There is a chance of rain on the weekend, considerably cooler temperatures and more wind from the north/northwest bringing the colder air. Ernie Els was the winner, one of the few times he got the better of Woods. JT and Fitzy, some pretty good golf in the conditions they faced. The guys on the short end here felt hosed while the guys who got the good break don’t think it was that big of a difference. He was in the Early-Late Club, too. Friday, he rolled putts in all day, usually not the strongest club in the bag. Remember the 2002 Open Championship at Muirfield in Scotland? Tiger Woods was on a roll, had already won the Masters and U.S. Open and was possibly headed for the third leg of the Grand Slam, two shots off the lead through 36 holes, until a freak storm blew in shortly before his afternoon tee time and crushed his portion of the field. The players who caught the late-early draw must’ve felt like they got poked in eye with a sharp stick and poked in the stick with a sharp eye, which would probably also be unpleasant. You can’t buy it (not including that cereal with the leprechaun and the four-leaf clover charms), you can’t count on it and if you don’t have any, you can’t do anything about it. It may also be the most underrated part of winning a major.

Zalatoris, who's yet to win a PGA Tour event yet and has already had an uncanny touch in major championships, is at it again in a major, in contention.

Watson, who was also the beneficiary of the afternoon tee time, said he was “nervous on every single shot [and] on every single putt. I was focused on what I had to do, and it worked out. I think that’s kind of the same attitude that any of us have out here to win, whether it’s a regular event, a Korn Ferry event, or a major. “We lucked out with the draw for sure,’’ he said. He followed his opening-round 66 with a 65 on Friday and is 9-under, leading Mito Pereira by one shot after the 27-year-old from Chile, playing in only his second career major, shot 64 to get to 8-under. Maybe it’s a fake-it-till-you-make-it attitude, I don’t know.

PGA Championship leader Will Zalatoris has poor stats in putting on the PGA Tour, but the's leading the field this week on the greens.

Masters champion Scottie Scheffler finished in the top 10 in four of his first six major starts. But he converted every putt he needed to in order to keep his card clean and his nose out front. While he leads the PGA Tour in strokes gained/approach, he has been nearly as good through two rounds here, ranking seventh overall and third in proximity to the hole. It’s not surprising that he’s in the mix, seeing how he relishes the challenge of major championship golf. And he’s been close, particularly in majors, where he has finished in the top-10 in four of his first seven appearances, including second place in his Masters debut last year. Zalatoris leads the 104th PGA Championship at the midway point because the playbook has undergone a slight revision.

Southern Hills' weather went from summer to lousy in a day and a number of players came out of the cold, led by Mito Pereira. But who will claim the major ...

You’ve got to go out and get it, everybody’s got to go out and earn it.” “It was a tough place to be at the moment. Zalatoris is in the mix to the finish. What are the odds of Chile producing two world-class players … and possibly a PGA champion? Exhibit III: Will Zalatoris, a former Masters runner-up who seems to make a run only at major championships, is at it again despite a five-bogey day that dropped him out of the lead but left him two back. Chile has about 50 golf courses and a few thousand recreational players, yet has two players in the top 25 in this PGA. Niemann is 23rd. He and Pereira are the only players to shoot under par in all three rounds. Stewart Cink celebrated his 49th birthday and charged with a 1-over-par 71 — that’s right, a 71 was charging in this misshaped third round — into a tie for seventh … Two-time Masters champ Bubba Watson straggled home with four back-nine bogeys when bunkers kept jumping in front of his ball … Cameron Young, a former Wake Forest University star who also is relatively unknown, powered his way into the mix by driving the green at the par-4 17th hole and draining a long eagle putt to slide into fourth. He shot 69 after opening with 68-64 and is three shots up on Fitzpatrick. Exhibit 2: A former U.S. Amateur champion from England you probably don’t remember and who’s never won on the PGA Tour — Matt Fitzpatrick — finished birdie-birdie to materialize out of seemingly nowhere and vault into second place. This guy loves to mash it off the tee and play aggressively. He could have folded Saturday but after four mid-round bogeys, he birdied three of the last six and made a clutch save at the 16th.

After entering the third round 9-under, PGA Championship leader has already given up three strokes to start Saturday's action.

The end." Good balance of both Walking fast and shoulders back. But, all of the sudden, Zalatoris finds himself tied at two behind a surging Mito Pereira.

The Caddie Network's John Rathouz chats with the caddie for Will Zalatoris after a second-round 65 at the 2022 PGA Championship.

He teed off at 2:50 p.m. ET in the final group with Mito Pereira. And that would keep alive a crazy stat: of the seven major championships played at Southern Hills, all were won by a player who led or co-led the tournament through 36 holes. Zalatoris zoomed up the leaderboard Friday with a second-round 65 to take the solo lead at 9 under.

The top six on the PGA Championship leaderboard combine for no major wins and just two PGA Tour victories.

Conversely, if there were fewer players in front of him -- and even if the lead was bigger than it five over him -- I could be talked into that as well. The problem here is that combination of how many players are in front of him and how sprawling the distance is. The putter finally let him down Saturday, but Zalatoris can certainly win this tournament from tee to green Sunday. Of everyone in the top six on the leaderboard, he's gained the most strokes on approach shots. 1. Will Zalatoris (-6): I mentioned that the final four in the pairings have just five top 10s in major championships. And as is almost always the case, there will be a moment or maybe several where the entire tournament is up in the air and nobody knows how it is possibly going to end. He'll bring the fight Sunday in a way that might surprise those who are unaware of his catalog and potential. Regardless, this is his best chance yet to win a major. Zalatoris kicked away his lead early Saturday after going out in 39 and turning a one-stroke lead into a four-stroke deficit by the sixth hole. What's even crazier than Pereira leading is the fact that the entire top six on the 54-hole leaderboard have combined to win just two PGA Tour events and zero majors in their careers. That's the question floating around Southern Hills right now, and the answer is that it's certainly within the realm of possibility. Mito is ranked 100th in the world this week.— Justin Ray (@JustinRayGolf) May 22, 2022 He's also suddenly a nearly odds-on favorite to take home his first PGA Tour win in the biggest spot imaginable.