Billy Horschel Goes Low Saturday While Still Fighting New Swing Changes

Horschel will return to Florida next week to work on his swing tweaks, which he hopes will lead to a Ryder Cup team and major championship.

KAPALUA, Hawaii – Don’t be fooled by Billy Horschel. Yes, he shot a 9-under 64 that would lead you to believe that he’s found his swing. But according to the Florida Gator, he’s still hitting it like crap.

Horschel came to Maui on a mission: take a new swing out for a spin.

He used the relatively short offseason to work on change with long-time instructor Todd Anderson. The subtle tweak focused on how he was loading the club in his backswing. It showed promise at home before coming to Hawaii and looked good on Sunday and Monday when he hit the shores of Maui.

But as the week went on, promise turned to despair and the swing that Horschel hoped would work in Hawaii became more of an anchor as he shot a 3-over 76 in Thursday’s first round of the Sentry Tournament of Champions.

Adding insult to injury, the rest of the field was happily shooting low numbers, with leaders Collin Morikawa, J.J. Spaun and Jon Rahm lapping Horschel with 9-under 64s.

Horschel made some headway on the scoreboard in Friday’s second round, but it was more a myth than real, as the 36-year-old still was struggling with his swing. He shot 2-under 71.

“Well, I'm hitting like crap still,” Horschel said Saturday after his bogey-free 64 that included seven birdies and a finishing eagle. “But I've realized the last two days that it ain't gonna get any better swing-wise. So, I've got to figure out how to some way to get around the golf course.”

Since it’s a new swing, Horschel is really flying blind on how to adapt the changes effectively when his swing starts to abandon him.

So, he has decided that one last round on the Plantation Course will be enough experimenting, and he will skip the Sony Open next week and fly home to work more with Anderson to prepare for the Waste Management in Phoenix at beginning of February.

“I can piece things together and make it work,” Horschel said. “And I can still compete. And I could probably still win doing it that way. But I feel like for the rest of the year and trying to prepare for the bigger events, I feel it's more beneficial for me to go home.”

Horschel made his first cup team last year, when he played on the victorious USA Presidents Cup team. He wants another cup appearance, and with this a Ryder Cup year, Horschel is keenly focused on the task at hand.

That’s another reason his swing issue needs to be addressed quickly.

“It's a massive goal,” Horschel said of making the Ryder Cup team. “If it’s not one A it’s one B, the other being winning a major on my list this year. I've done a lot of really cool things and won a decent amount of events and key events. But there's a couple of things that need to get on that resume before I'm done which is a Ryder Cup and a major.”