{"id":1311693,"date":"2019-06-21T19:00:01","date_gmt":"2019-06-22T01:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.postindependent.com\/sucher-leads-travelers-championship-as-big-names-struggle\/"},"modified":"2019-06-21T19:00:01","modified_gmt":"2019-06-22T01:00:01","slug":"sucher-leads-travelers-championship-as-big-names-struggle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/local-news\/sucher-leads-travelers-championship-as-big-names-struggle\/","title":{"rendered":"Sucher leads Travelers Championship as big names struggle"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
Keegan Bradley putts on the 18th green during the second round of the Travelers golf tournament in Cromwell, Conn., Friday, June 21, 2019 (Patrick Raycraft \/Hartford Courant via AP)<\/strong>
AP | Hartford Courant<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

CROMWELL, Conn. \u2014 Zack Sucher found wrestling with chronic leg problems on the PGA Tour harder than wrestling alligators.<\/p>\n

The 32-year-old from Alabama says he\u2019s finally feeling healthy again after knee surgery sidelined him for 13 months following the 2017 Travelers Championship.<\/p>\n

He shot a 5-under 65 in the rain Friday morning at TPC River Highlands and his 11-under 129 total held up in the afternoon sunshine for a two-stroke lead midway through the Travelers,<\/p>\n

Sucher, who said he grew up in south Alabama doing \u201cswamp stuff\u201d like wrestling alligators and also played high school basketball. Chronic leg problems from that sport led to the surgery for a torn knee tendon and cartilage. Sucher worked his way back and is playing in just his fourth tour event this year. He gained a share of the lead on his final putt Thursday night and kept that momentum going with a 30 on his front nine Friday.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s nice,\u201d he said. \u201cFirst year I can remember in a long time where I\u2019m pain free and it\u2019s feeling really good.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chez Reavie and Keegan Bradley were two shots back. Reavie, coming off a third-place tie last week in the U.S. Open, shot a 64. Bradley had a 66, making an eagle in the rain from about 80 yards on the par-4 15th.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was talking to my caddie about how wet it was and it was going to skid,\u201d he said. \u201cWe landed a little short of where we normally would and it went right in the hole.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jason Day made some adjustments to his putting game after an even-par first round. He made four straight birdies after opening with a par, shot a bogey-free 63 and was among seven players at 7 under.<\/p>\n

\u201cBirdieing four early in my round kind of settled everything, because I was on the outside looking in,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Defending champion Bubba Watson was 5 under. He switched putters after a first-round 69 and had a 66, with bogeys on his final two holes. He had six birdies, including four in a row to start the back nine, rolling in putts from 28 feet on the 11th and 38 feet on the 12th.<\/p>\n

\u201cKnowing that we can make birdies in a hurry around here, you know that you have a shot,\u201d he said. \u201cTomorrow, the wind is expected to pick up in the afternoon, so come up and do the same thing, shoot another 5 under. Always, 15 under is going to be around the lead.\u201d<\/p>\n

Brooks Koepka said exhaustion after his runner-up finish at Pebble Beach played a role in his 71 on Thursday. He shot a 66 on Friday to get to 3 under.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel good and I feel like I had way more energy today which was nice,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Patrick Cantlay lipped out a 2-foot putt on 15, but made a 43-footer on the 17th to just make the cut at 2 under.<\/p>\n

Two-time champion Phil Mickelson was among the big names left on the outside of the ropes this weekend. Mickelson, playing in Connecticut for the first time since 2003 and looking for the 45th win of his career, shot a 67 on Thursday, but had a 76 in the second round.<\/p>\n

He hit his first tee shot onto the cart path and out of bounds to the right and then missed an 18-foot bogey putt. He hit his second shot on the 17th hole into the water and ended up shooting a 41 on his front nine.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a little bit of a surprise,\u201d Mickelson said. \u201cI have not played great the last three months but I really keyed in on something about 10 days ago that I thought my performance at the U.S. Open and this week was going to be a lot better. Some of the shots I hit and the way I struck it yesterday, I thought I was going to have a really good day and get myself into contention, so that front nine kind of threw me for a loop.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jordan Spieth, the 2017 winner, shot 73 and 69 and also missed the cut.<\/p>\n

via:: Post Independent<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Keegan Bradley putts on the 18th green during the second round of the Travelers golf tournament in Cromwell, Conn., Friday, June 21, 2019 (Patrick Raycraft \/Hartford Courant via AP)AP | Hartford Courant CROMWELL, Conn. \u2014 Zack Sucher found wrestling with chronic leg problems on the PGA Tour harder than wrestling alligators. The 32-year-old from Alabama […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[160],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-1311693","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-19 12:16:23","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSKE Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1311693","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1311693"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1311693\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1311693"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1311693"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/kske\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1311693"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}