Twofer Tuesday: Sony Open

Twofer Tuesday makes the short hop from Kapalua to Honolulu for the Sony Open.

As courses go, Waialae Country Club doesn't sound so tough. A par-72 measuing a mere 7044 yards, it's been the site of the Sony Open since 1965 and it's a course that any player can dominate if their game is in shape... and the wind doesn't blow. But the wind is predicted to be around 6-7mph the first two days and 13-14mph over the weekend, and the course is flat, narrow, has longer rough this year and is on the coast. That could present some problems.

But again, it's not so long. Defending champion Kevin Na is a two-time winner at Waialae, and both long and short players have won here. This is definitely an equal opportunity event.

I'm going all Aussie this week, as Aussies have traditionally played well this time of year in Hawaii... but I'm probably not picking the Aussie you expect.

• My first pick is Matt Jones. He has yet to post a Top10 at the Sony (his personal best was a T11 last year) but he's coming off a third place finish at Kapalua last week. Bear in mind that his third was one of the scores to break Ernie Els's scoring record and he was six shots ahead of fourth place.
• And my other pick is Marc Leishman. While Leish only finished T10 last week (an aggregate score of 269) he posted a T3 in 2019, T28 in 2020 and T4 last year. Those aggregate scores of  263, 276 and 261 were 5, 7 and 2 shots respectively behind the winners. He plays consistently well at the Sony and I see no reason he shouldn't play well this week as well.

GC's live coverage starts Thursday at 7pm ET but PGA TOUR LIVE starts at noon ET. One of the benefits of January golf is prime time coverage and we get to enjoy another week of it.