NEWTOWN SQUARE, Pa. — It was bound to happen, and Tuesday morning, in a white tent almost in the shade of the massive stone clubhouse of the Aronimink Golf Club, where the 108th PGA Championship is being played this week, it did: The stealth work of the Committee to Resurrect Walter Hagen went public.

It happened during a press conference with Rory McIlroy, a two-time winner of the PGA Championship, both times at stroke play. Hagen won it five times, all at match play.

“Have you heard about this stealth committee, the Committee to Resurrect Walter Hagen?” McIlroy was asked.

That word, again.

There had been speculation, not widespread, that McIlroy knew about the committee’s work. Hagen is one of the great sporting legends from Rochester, N.Y., where Erica Stoll, McIlroy’s wife, grew up. Plus, McIlroy is so in the loop. He knows Jimmy Dunne, for one thing. But McIlroy had not heard.

The reigning Masters champion leaned in (in the modern, figurative sense of the phrase), seemingly eager to learn more.

The Hagen Committee is working to combine the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am with the PGA Championship in a unique stroke-play/match play format by which the PGA Championship would be the first major of the year, played in February.

The PGA Championship — with AT&T as its sponsor and continuing to raise vast sums for the for the many good works done by the Monterey Peninsula Foundation — would begin with a 54-hole qualifier played at the Pebble Beach Golf Links on a Wednesday, Thursday and Friday in late winter. The medalist would receive the Bing Crosby Medal, along with an automatic spot in the fields of the year’s three remaining Grand Slam event, plus a place in the FedEx Cup playoffs and a winner’s check large enough to send all his kids through college and grad school.

(The Crosby Medal, per circulating early artist renderings, depicts the iconic singer and golf impresario in follow-through, pipe in mouth.)

The top-16 finishers from the 54-hole Crosby event at Pebble then qualify for the match play weekend portion of the PGA Championship. Eight matches Saturday morning (loser goes homes), four matches Saturday afternoon (ditto), two Sunday morning (again), one Sunday afternoon. The player who goes 4-0 on the weekend receives the Wanamaker Trophy as the PGA Champion, the player’s named etched on it, alongside Walter Hagen’s, Rory McIroy’s and other luminaries of the game.

The weekend play would be held down the road (17 Mile Drive) from Pebble Beach, at the golf course of the Cypress Point Club.

Tied matches would be settled in by sudden-death playoff beginning on the pitch-shot par-3 15th hole, sometimes cited as the most aromatic hole in golf.

The committee’s work was explained to McIlroy.

“Sounds amazing,” he said.

You might want to let that comment settle in you for a moment before you continue.

“I thought we didn’t like 54-hole tournaments, though?” McIlroy asked.

The reporter reiterated that was the 54 holes of stroke play was the qualifying portion of the five-day event, the preamble to the match play weekend at Cypress Point.

“Ah — OK,” McIlroy said. “That’s just the qualifying? OK, that’s nice.

“Any opportunity to play Cypress Point would be good with me, absolutely,” McIlroy added, warming to the subject. “And match play has been a big talking point, possibly talking about it for the Tour Championship at the end of the year going forward.”

“I think match play is the purest form of the game,” the career Grand Slam winner and Ryder Cup stalwart said. Some have speculated that Tiger Woods’s greatness at stroke-play stems from uniquely adapting a match-play mentality to 72-hole stroke-play events. “I think it’s a shame that we don’t have any match play really on the schedule apart from the Ryder Cup or the Presidents Cup. It would be nice to get some more match play on the schedule, for sure.”

Per a committee source, McIlroy is expected to receive an invitation to join the committee before the U.S. Open. This website, and likely other news sites devoted to golf, will have updates as warranted.

Michael Bamberger welcomes your comments at Michael.Bamberger@Golf.com.

Welcome to our weekly PGA Tour gambling-tips column, featuring picks from GOLF.com’s expert prognosticator, Brady Kannon. A seasoned golf bettor and commentator, Kannon is a host and regular guest on SportsGrid, a syndicated audio network devoted to sports and sports betting, and is a golf betting analyst for CBS Sportsline. You can follow Brady on X at @LasVegasGolfer, and you can read his picks below for the 2026 PGA Championship, which gets underway Thursday in Pennsylvania.

Two days before the second major championship of the golf season begins, there are still some questions about how this golf course will play — one of which involves the weather.

The forecast currently looks beautiful with mostly sunshine, but there are a couple of areas of interest that figure to have an impact on this tournament. Around midnight ET on Wednesday evening, there is a better than a 50 percent chance of some showers, expected to last for a few hours. This could, of course, make for a soft and very vulnerable golf course come Thursday’s opening round. As the day goes on, the sun is expected to shine with winds in the 15 mph range. This not only looks like the early tee times could see an advantage but that the golf course could also dry out over the course of the day. At the same time, the early wave looks to experience chilly temperatures with an expected high for the day only in the low 60s — a stark contrast from Sunday’s final round expected high temperature in the high 80s.

Golf course restoration specialist Gil Hanse has said Aronimink is at its best when conditions are firm and fast. It looks like we will get there eventually but Thursday could be different. It appears on the surface that there will be an opportunity to get out to a fast start on Thursday morning, taking on a rain-softened golf course.

The other question mark that exists for me is whether or not the bombers will be able to bomb entirely — or will this test be more tilted toward accuracy and positioning off the tee as it seems is the architect’s intention? We may not know this for sure until early on Thursday or even late on Friday — and for our purposes, it certainly matters in which type of player we are figuring will have the best skill set required for what the golf course is presenting.

It is also interesting to note that when Hanse was brought in to perform his overhaul in 2016, he was under the assumption that this PGA Championship would be played in its normally scheduled month of August, when conditions would almost certainly be firm and fast. Of course, the PGA Tour moved this event from August to May in 2019. From a fan’s perspective, I am hoping Mother Nature cooperates and we get the perfect test. We saw Valhalla play soft and receptive in 2024 and Xander Schauffele won with a winning score of 21 under par. I can tell you that one of the finest golf oddsmakers in the world, Jeff Sherman, at the Westgate SuperBook in Las Vegas, has made the winning score proposition bet this week Under/Over 267.5 — meaning 12.5 under par. If he is correct, I believe we get our wish of Aronimink, the weather, the rough, etc., providing the proper test and producing a well-deserving champion.

We provided an early look at Aronimink and a few of our selections to win the 108th PGA Championship last week. I have since come up with five additional players who I believe have a legitimate shot to hoist the Wanamaker Trophy and are being offered at a fair price.

Patrick Cantlay (55-1)

I hemmed and hawed on Cantlay last week but eventually pulled the trigger on Monday. I was concerned with his putting numbers but I do like just about everything else that I am seeing. First, in his last four starts, which include the Masters and two Signature Events, he’s finished 7-12-8-10. Strong. Secondly, he has performed very well at what I believe make sense as correlated courses. He was third at Pinehurst in 2024, 14th at Los Angeles Country Club in 2023, and was fourth, not far away, at the Philadelphia Cricket Club last year for the Truist Championship. He’s been runner-up at Detroit Golf Club and at East Lake Golf Club. Cantlay has finished fifth, seventh, runner-up, and has won the Tour Championship. He ranks 51st on Tour in SG: Approach and in Driving Accuracy. He is 20th for Greens in Regulation and in Scrambling.

Jordan Spieth (65-1)

I have actually seen as high as 90-1 on the three-time major champion. Amazing number. I believe somewhere around 60-1 is the correct price. This will be Spieth’s 10th time trying to win the PGA Championship and thus complete the career Grand Slam. I believe this golf course gives him a good chance and that his game is definitely capable of contending. I said Speith finishing top 15 at the Masters was reasonable and if he found a little magic, that he could win it. He finished 12th. I feel similarly here. He is doing just about everything very well, especially the short game and the mid- to short-iron play. And I believe we will know right away if this is Spieth’s week or not as he has only once in his career completed Round 1 of a PGA Championship inside the top 20 on the leaderboard. If he finds himself as such heading into Friday, I believe he will have a shot.

Adam Scott (70-1)

The veteran Australian has been experiencing a bit of a resurgence to his career in the last couple of seasons, sitting second heading into the final round of last year’s U.S. Open at Oakmont and now twice finishing fourth this season: once at Riviera, and again three weeks ago at Doral. He hasn’t missed a cut since the Open Championship last July. The ball striking is impeccable, ranking third on Tour for SG: Approach, third for Hole Proximity from 150-175 yards, second from 175-200 yards, and third from 200+ yards. Scott ranks 19th on Tour in Total Driving and is 46th in Scrambling. He finished ninth at Pinehurst in 2014.

Kurt Kitayama (80-1)

Speaking of ball striking. Wow. Like his fellow UNLV Rebel golfer, Adam Scott, Kitayama too has been striping it and ranks seventh on Tour in Total Driving. The approach numbers are very similar to Scott’s as is his scrambling, ranking 54th on Tour. Unfortunately, the SG: Putting numbers are similar too as Scott is 90th on Tour and Kitayama 109th. Kitayama was runner-up this year at Riviera and has gone 8-9-19 in his last three starts at Harbour Town, Doral, and Quail Hollow respectively.

Sahith Theegala (150-1)

This is certainly a long shot and we are invested at very low risk. Theegala has been struggling off the tee, ranking 125th on Tour for SG: Off the Tee. However, if the bomb and gouge strategy is in play, it could work for Theegala. Also, if taking something less than driver off the tee for accuracy and positioning purposes works, that too could benefit Theegala. What we know for sure is that his approach play is very solid and his short game can be elite. He’s done well in the past at other Ross designs like Pinehurst, Oak Hill, and East Lake. Some will say the sloping fairways and large greens resemble the Plantation Course at Kapalua where Theegala finished runner-up in 2024. Some will say Aronimink aligns with Silverado in Napa, where Theegala has won, finished seventh, and sixth. At low risk, 150-1 or better is fine and finish position plays for top 40, top 30, or even top 20 could be very lucrative.