Keegan Bradley, who captured the PGA Championship in August last year as well as the US PGA Rookie of the Year award, will be among 28 players in this week’s season opening Tournament of Champions.
Bradley is among six multiple-winners from last season who will tee off starting Friday at Kapalua’s Plantation Course for the US$5.6 million event that traditionally launches the US PGA campaign. The winner will take home US$1.12 million.
Bradley, who also won last season’s Byron Nelson Championship, is among six of seven multiple-winners from last season to enter.
Others include fellow Americans Webb Simpson, Steve Stricker, Nick Watney, Mark Wilson and Bubba Watson.
The only US PGA multi-win no-show was world No. 1 Luke Donald of England, who captured the money title on the US and European tours, an unprecedented feat, and is taking a break after a busy finish to last year’s campaign.
Players Championship winner K.J. Choi of South Korea, US PGA playoff winner Bill Haas and past major winner David Toms are also in the field.
Toms was second to Choi at the Players, losing in a playoff, then bounced back and won the Colonial the following week to earn his eighth trip to the Tournament of Champions, but his first since 2007.
Other players from outside the US among the Kapalua starters include Australia’s Aaron Baddeley, Scotsman Martin Laird, South African Rory Sabbatini and Venezuela’s Jhonattan Vegas.
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