“Did so many good things this week, and I’m just going to keep reminding myself of that and try to get myself back in this position.”

That was Ben Kohles’ reaction two years ago after he melted down on the final hole of the CJ Cup Byron Nelson to hand Taylor Pendrith the title. That day, Kohles arrived at the final hole, a par-5, with a one-shot lead. He ended up making the only bogey on that hole of the day and wound up losing by one after Pendrith made a birdie.

Two years later, the 36-year-old Kohles found himself in the position that he vowed to return to, this time at the John Deere Classic. After making birdie at the 16th hole at TPC Deere Run, Kohles found himself tied with Chris Gotterup — who posted 20 under after a sizzling Sunday 62 — with two holes to play. Kohles needed to play the final two holes, one of which was the par-5 17th, in one under to secure his first-ever PGA Tour title. Kohles made a sloppy par at the par-5 17th and arrived at the final hole of the tournament needing a birdie to win or a par to go to a playoff with Gotterup.

He striped his tee shot down the fairway. Then, everything unraveled. Playing partner Lucas Glover hit his approach shot, and just seconds after it landed, a sped-up Kohles sent his approach into the air. It immediately started drifting left, hit the fringe on the front left of the green, kicked further left and bounded into the water.

Four years ago, Gotterup wrote a letter to John Deere Classic tournament director Clair Peterson asking for a sponsor invite. Gotterup, who had recently turned pro, promised to make the tournament proud if they gave him a spot. They did, and Gotterup continues to come back on an annual basis to tee it up in a tournament that helped kickstart his PGA Tour career — one that continues to be on the rise.

“I got a spot here in ’22 from Clair. It really kick-started my whole career, honestly,” Gotterup said after the win.”At that time, I had no status anywhere. To get a fourth here was the biggest tournament of my life at that point. Obviously, we’re biased towards places that we play well at and that we like, and this is one of those for me. To be able to come back and win makes it even more special.”

A year ago, Chris Gotterup stared down Rory McIlroy to win the Genesis Scottish Open. Since that point, he has won three more times and ascended to become a top-15 player in the world. It’s a journey that started when he was given a chance to peg it at the John Deere Classic four years ago; a tournament with a long history of great winners that he now shares.

“I just put in a lot of hard work and have a lot of people that put time into me and care about me,” a teary-eyed Gotterup told CBS’ Amanda Balionis of his transformation over the past year. “I go out there, and even if I’m in 40th place, I give it everything I’ve got. When I come down the stretch, I like to think that I’m going to close it out, and I did a great job of that today.”

The newest John Deere Classic champion will jump on a plane tonight and head over to Scotland, where he will defend his title next week and hope to continue his ascent.

As for Kohles, it has been a long month of golf. He won on the Korn Ferry Tour, qualified for the U.S. Open the next day, contended at the RBC Canadian Open and then played at Shinnecock Hills.

All that led him to this week in the Quad Cities, where he entered Sunday promising to “sack up” and win his first PGA Tour title. He stood on the 18th tee box on Sunday with the outcome in his hands. Win, lose or head to a playoff. A poorly executed three-quarter punch shot sunk his dreams.

But Kohles exited the John Deere determined that he’ll be in Gotterup’s shoes one day. He just has to keep following his path and believe it’ll eventually lead him to his dreams.

“This was my third final group on Sunday on the PGA Tour,” Kohles said. “Honestly, this was the best I’ve felt out of the first two. I felt good in Dallas a couple of years ago, as well. Just going to keep building from that and use it to go forward.”

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Padraig Harrington had a thought about thinking. 

He’d just made history on Sunday, becoming just the second player to win a trio of U.S. Senior Open titles, when he was asked by a reporter at Scioto Country Club for his “biggest lesson” from his journey. What would the three-time major winner like younger players to know?

After Harrington overcame a one-shot deficit to start the day, his answer reflected the way he won. 

“You know, it’s so easy to become good at this game physically now with the technology that’s out there,” he said. “What will set young people apart going forward will be their imagination, their resilience.

“It’s become — right at this moment, the game has become more physical than it’s ever been. Well, that’s going to change once it gets to a saturation point of everybody is a good swinger of the golf club. It’s going to revert back to who’s got the mental fortitude, the imagination.

“If I was working with juniors, I would be fully on — as much as I do my YouTube lessons, if I was working with juniors, it would fully be on the mental side of the game and their attitude and their ability to go out there and enjoy it.”

Throughout the week, there were more ideas from Harrington. He’s as much of a philosopher of golf as he is a player. 

‘That’s how you would become a pro’

This came Tuesday, when Harrington was asked if “there is one right way,” and he said there wasn’t. But he did say what’s needed to become a pro. 

“If you’re chasing being a pro or something like that, I could actually do a massive amount on the psychology of the game, but nobody has any interest in that when I put it out in social media, so I don’t do that. But that’s how you would become a pro with a good coach.

“So like if you sent me out to coach the players here, I’d pretty much leave every one of them absolutely alone with their golf swing. I wouldn’t say a word. Essentially to play professional golf you need to make it to a basic level of ball striking.

“Once you make it to that basic level of ball striking, it’s 100 percent mental. Like once you’re past that, and we see that all the time, especially in the modern game, all these kids hit the golf ball or swing the club unbelievably well. So they should all be the best players, but they’re outplayed by people who own their golf swing with a little funkier swing because of the mental side of the game.

“So once you get past the minimum standard — OK, 100 percent was an exaggeration, but once you get past the minimum standard of ball striking, it then becomes 100 percent mental what you get out of your game on any given day with luck involved, because that’s part of it. But it’s a mental game for us guys; it’s a physical game for beginners.

“So somewhere between those two, it evens out. Nobody is really into my mental game stuff unless it’s a one-on-one. It doesn’t get the viewership when you put it out on social media.”

The takeaway for me and you: Thoughts on the mental game weren’t exclusive to Sunday. Practice it like you would your driver on the range. (Some interesting thoughts on what clicks too.)

‘Like riding a roller coaster’

This came Saturday, when he was asked how much he ‘enjoyed’ being in a final group. 

“Yeah, it’s a little bit like riding a roller coaster. The further you get away from being on it, the more you think you enjoy it. Yeah, look, I’ll be out there tomorrow. I know I want to be there.

“I know this is why we do it, and I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. But I’ll be questioning my decisions at times during it. It’s one of those things; you put yourself out there, you put yourself under pressure. You don’t want to mess up. You wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. But it’s still a tough place to be.”

The takeaway for me and you: Some game, right? Even pros, though, aren’t impervious to pressure. But from the other side of the ropes, that was hard to tell — Harrington shot a four-under 66, the day’s low round. 

‘I’d like to play well on the weekend, but if I don’t play well …’

This came Friday, when he was asked how he was going to lean on his experience over the weekend. 

“Look, as I said, I’d like to play well on the weekend, but if I don’t play well, I’m going to try to win this tournament another way. It’s just one of those things that with experience, I know things don’t go your way at times when you’re leading, and things can feel like bad breaks. You can maybe get — you miss a few more greens, so you have to get up-and-down a little bit more.

“I’ve seen it before. It doesn’t mean I have any perfect ability to deal with it. I’ve certainly seen all these situations. So I won’t be surprised by anything, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that I’m going to handle it that well, either.”

The takeaway for me and you: You’re not always going to have it. But there’s more than one way to do it. 

‘I love playing golf’

This came Tuesday, when Harrington was asked about playing events on both the PGA Champions circuit and the PGA Tour. 

“I’m playing eight in a row at the moment. This is number four. Some people have obviously said it to me, and I kind of go, when I’m 70 years of age, I won’t regret playing an extra event.

“Who wouldn’t want to do what I do? Every tournament I turn up to, it’s in the best condition that golf course can be for us. Everything is looked after. Everything is like as good as can be.

“So each week I play golf — and I have to try and remind myself of this. Each week I play golf is like for a normal person who’s into their golf, they would save all their money to have that one week’s holiday a year, and I get to do it 30 times a year. That’s not lost on me. I love playing golf. I love being out here competing.

“Yeah, so I don’t have a problem playing lots of events. Like when I started as a pro, 28 tournaments was your standard. It’s really got lost in this world, this idea of only playing 20 tournaments or something like that. It was always 28 as a pretty much standard back in the day.”

The takeaway for me and you: This was so good. Perspective and such. 

‘That is the stupidity of me’

This also came Tuesday, when a reporter asked him about a quote that the reporter thought came from Harrington. The quote? That you should chase improvement and not perfection. 

“I think I should write that down.”

He didn’t say that?

“I probably did say it, but ‘do as I say, not as I do’ comes to mind. Look, obviously, I can’t say that I live up to that aspiration, unfortunately. If I hit the very best shot on the range — so if you gave me a 5-iron and I hit the purest 5-iron you could hit, I’d try and hit the next shot better. That is the stupidity of me.

“I would not — in a game that’s all about consistency, I wouldn’t try and hit the next shot the same, I’d try and hit it better, which is kind of mad.”

The takeaway for me and you: There’s a fine line between improvement and perfection. The former can be reached. The latter is terribly difficult to achieve. 

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Check in every week for the unfiltered opinions of our writers and editors as they break down the hottest topics in the sport, and join the conversation by tweeting us at @golf_com. This week, we discuss Padraig Harrington’s impact on golf, Nelly Korda’s Evian chances and Jordan Spieth’s Birkdale return

Padraig Harrington defended his U.S. Senior Open title to win his fourth senior major (to go along with his three others) on Sunday in Ohio. Earlier in the week he also spoke about “busy” pro golfers and the reality check he thinks they need. Does the 54-year-old Hall-of-Famer get enough credit for not only what he’s accomplished in golf but also his stewardship of the sport along the way?

Josh Schrock, associate news editor (@Schrock_And_Awe): Probably not, but we often only appreciate things long after they are in the rear-view mirror. He has not only been a great steward of the game, but his longevity and ability to win on the Champions Tour and to hang around at majors, as he did at Aronimink this year, are impressive. Won’t be surprised if he’s sniffing around entering the weekend at Birkdale, either. 

Nick Piastowski, senior editor (@nickpia): No, he hasn’t. Between what he does with YouTube instruction and the openness he offers in media settings, there may not be a better pro today in … growing the game. (Yeah, yeah, I know.) If you’re to build interest in what you do, you need to let people in, and Paddy’s given everyone a key. He’s as good at his off-the-course game as he is at his on-course game, and he’s pretty damn good at the latter. 

Josh Berhow, managing editor (@Josh_Berhow): He’s had such an interesting career. He’s known for his three major titles he piled up in the blink of an eye, but there’s also this other side of him that most people know as the guy who is always tinkering with bizarre training aids on the range. Paddy’s most recent senior major win comes at an interesting time, too — right when a couple of guys around his age (Tiger and Phil) are drifting away from the sport, at least for now. Harrington is still in the thick of it; kinda like what we thought those guys would be doing too. It’s nice to see Paddy still having success, though, and having the awareness to talk about what a privilege it is to still play pro golf.

Jordan Spieth opened up on sports gambling and its influence on the game (and potentially Wyndham Clark at the U.S. Open) while at the John Deere Classic, although some on social media were quick to point out Spieth’s own role as a brand ambassador for FanDuel. The PGA Tour has also embraced gambling partnerships over the years. “You could impact a shot if you wanted to,” Spieth said. “I don’t know of another sport that you could impact as a fan like you can golf.” While it’s hard to argue with Spieth’s logic, is there a solution to this going forward? Does there need to be?

Schrock: There’s no solution. The genie is out of the bottle, and it’s nearly impossible to put it back in, short of reverting to a universal ban on sports gambling. The PGA Tour is putting protocols in place to protect players from gambling-related harassment, as our Sean Zak detailed a few months back. The PGA Tour has embraced gambling because it can lead to more eyeballs, which every sport is chasing. But this is the byproduct of that chase. I will argue that I don’t think gambling was the main reason the crowd at Shinnecock was hard on Clark. That might have been a side part, but there were bigger things at play.

Piastowski: Hmm. First, I think gambling is only part of the problem here. It’s like blaming a football loss solely on the quarterback when several mistakes lead to defeats. Is gambling to blame? A bit. Is alcohol to blame? A bit. Are phones to blame? A bit. Is social media to blame? A bit. Are new, non-golf fans to blame? A bit. Is the loss of shame to blame (a point my colleague James Colgan eloquently wrote about here)? A bit. Whew. OK, let’s answer the question now. My idea would be to block bets on golf tournaments in the state in which they’re played that week.  

Berhow: That’s an interesting idea, Nick. Although I’m not sure there is much of a solution here. When the broadcasts are putting odds on the screens and the Tour is listing odds next to players’ names on their website, you are already in too deep. The real solution to improved fan behavior is just hoping golf fans are decent people when attending tournaments, but for a small population of the public, that’s unfortunately too much to ask.

Speaking of Spieth, he’s skipping this week’s Genesis Scottish Open and heading to the Open Championship and Royal Birkdale — home of his last major victory, in 2017 — a few days early. Will the good vibes of that Claret Jug and the success on that golf course change his season around come Open week? Do you like his chances at the final major of the year?

Schrock: When I spoke with Spieth at the PGA, he said it was best he felt entering a major since his 2017 win and that it was, he said, the best chance he felt he had to win a major since he left Birkdale. How much stock to put in that? I don’t know. His game has been consistently volatile; he’s tinkering with new putters and it just doesn’t seem to be there. But perhaps good memories can spark something. I’m not optimistic, though. 

Piastowski: You know, I think he’s building toward something. He sounds confident. Said Spieth before this week’s John Deere: “I mean that statistically I feel like I could lead every category on a given week, and I have this year. It means that each part of my game can be at the highest level. I just haven’t put it together and put it together consistently enough yet. But my mechanics are mainly what’s significantly better. Then build-up of confidence, trusting in my wrist, simple things. That wasn’t always something that was an issue, but when it was, it was.” We like that. But Birkdale isn’t a pitch-and-putt. A big win is coming for Spieth, but maybe not in two weeks. 

Berhow: The funny thing about Birkdale is that Spieth’s Sunday victory over Matt Kuchar was the most Spieth-like day ever. The ups, the downs, the ball on the driving range, the go-get-that putt. (It’s still, to this day, my favorite major I’ve ever covered in person.) The weird thing about Jordan is that you kinda throw out the stats with him. Some weeks he’s simply just better at getting the ball in the hole than others, which honestly might be one of the dumbest sentences I have ever typed, but I think most people who have watched enough Jordan Spieth golf understand what I’m getting at. When he’s on, there’s a little magic in him. I don’t think he will win at Birkdale, but I do love the storyline and hope he plays well and contends. If there’s a place (not named Augusta) for him to win his next major title, this is as good a bet as any. His game travels well for Open Championships.

Nelly Korda’s next chance at the Hall of Fame (and career Grand Slam) gets underway this week at the Evian Championship in France. Does she get it done?

Schrock: She’ll contend, but I don’t think she wins this week. I think she saves her third major win for the AIG Women’s Open in a few weeks. I’m going to go with Lottie Woad, who contended at last year’s Evian, getting it done for her first major. 

Piastowski: Three major wins in a year are a lot to ask. The Hall will come, but probably not this week. 

Berhow: I think she will have to wait another week. The putter was a little too cold at the KPMG Women’s PGA, and she hasn’t finished in the top 20 at Evian over the last two years (and never better than T8). Regardless, she won’t have to wait long for the Hall, whenever that day comes.

Happy Fourth of July weekend! Our Josh Sens recently wrote about America’s most exclusive (and secretive) golf club, which got us thinking: what’s the best under-the-radar course you have played this year?

Schrock: I admittedly haven’t gotten out as much as I would’ve liked so far this year. But I did play Quail Run Golf Course outside of Bend, Oregon, earlier this year. It’s a fun track that is a brute if you play it from the tips in the wind, as we unfortunately chose to do. 

Piastowski: Man, the question maker of Tour Confidential must think we play golf all the time. I’ll go with the course that I’m going to play in a month — Lawsonia in Green Lake, Wis. We’ve gone there annually, and there’s a reason why.

Berhow: Careful what you say about the question-maker. This year? Nothing comes to mind. Next week? A bunch of courses in Brainerd, Minn., one of the most underrated golf destinations in the States. (And when you aren’t playing golf, you get to hang out on boats. It’s paradise.)