The Zurich Classic, which gets underway this Thursday in New Orleans, always turns up on the PGA Tour calendar unexpectedly, quietly, and out of the blue. It seems like a minor tournament. One could honestly say, and we’d all probably agree, that it is a minor tournament. However, it is undeniable that in recent years, since it has been played in a pairs format (2017), it has a strange paranormal effect. It is as if it waves a magic wand over one of the two winners. As if it blessed them.
In 2025 Ben Griffin and Andrew Novak won. All the good fortune went to Griffin. After conquering the Zurich he won two more tournaments, one of them Signature, and ended up in the world top 10 and on the Ryder Cup team. All in record time.
In 2024 the winners were Shane Lowry and Rory McIlroy. Here the big prize fell to Rory. You will agree. He hadn’t won in the United States since 2022 and from there, in less than a year, he won the Wells Fargo, Pebble Beach and completed the Grand Slam at Augusta. Quite something.
In 2023 Nick Hardy and David Riley prevailed. Barely a year later, Riley had also won his first individual PGA Tour event, at an iconic venue like Colonial. In 2022 the trophy went to Xander Schauffele and Patrick Cantlay. Schauffele had gone three years without a PGA Tour win and from there he took off, winning the Travelers, the Scottish Open and in 2024 crowned his career with his first two Majors.
The story goes on and it’s astonishing. Cameron Smith won in 2021 alongside Marc Leishman and in just over a year he also prevailed at the Sentry, THE PLAYERS and the Open Championship. He achieved all that in 2022, apparently still, it seems, under that magical Zurich influence. In 2019 Ryan Palmer and Jon Rahm won. If we take into account that there was no tournament in 2020 due to the pandemic, you’ll allow us to ‘attribute’ to the Zurich that first Major of Jon’s, the 2021 US Open. One could say he was still in its sphere of influence.
As you can see, whether you believe in these things or not, it seems very clear that something happens with the Zurich Classic; this tournament does something that brings good fortune to one of the winners. The strangest thing is that in every case, the other winner did not do remotely as well as his partner. A bit of witchcraft, very New Orleans, by the way.
That said, one must wonder who the wand will touch this time. Among the most attractive pairings this week are:
– Koepka and Lowry
– The Fitzpatrick brothers
– Aaron Rai and Theegala
– Blades Brown and Luke Clanton
– Pavon and Couvra
– Jacob Skov Olesen and Rasmus Neergaard Petersen
– Casey Jarvis and Aj Ewart
– John Parry and Dan Brown
And, of course, the defending champions: Griffin and Novak. No pair has managed to repeat the title so far
