No quit in players at or near top at World Wide Technology Championship

The World Wide Technology Championship is turning into an object lesson in resilience.

Kramer Hickok, Justin Lower, Carson Young, Doug Ghim, Jefferey Kang – the surprising names at or near the top speak to the power of persistence in the face of golfing calamity.

And, in at least one case, the grace in having a sense of humor about it.

“Just bladed a chip shot in front of Tiger Woods, so that’s how my days going,” Lower (68, 11 under) tweeted earlier this week from El Cardonal at Diamante, the first 18-hole course designed by Woods, and his first design to host a PGA TOUR event.

Lower has had a bumpy road in trying to establish himself as a pro, missing out on earning his TOUR card by a shot at the 2018 Korn Ferry Tour Championship. Last year he three-putted the 72nd hole at the Wyndham Championship and was in tears after he thought he’d failed to keep his card by a single stroke. (He got a reprieve and kept it.)

This year, alas, Lower is 110th in the FedExCup Fall, almost a lock to retain privileges in ’24.

Hickok, who shot a second-round 67 to take the clubhouse lead at 12 under after the morning wave, missed eight straight cuts earlier this season. He’s 144th in the FedExCup Fall, with work to do over the next 16 days – two and a half tournaments – to get inside the top 125 and secure his PGA TOUR card for next year. His best-ever result, a runner-up finish to Harris English in an eight-hole playoff at the 2021 Travelers Championship, seems like a long time ago.

“You know, at the time I was really confident and playing really well,” Hickok said after hitting all 14 fairways Friday, “and then I sort of went through like a two-year drought. Was still working really, really hard, I just don't think I was doing the right things.”

Ghim, who shot a 7-under 65 Friday, was a highly decorated amateur but hasn’t totally found his groove on the PGA TOUR. He’s coming to the end of a topsy-turvy year and at 123rd in the FedExCup has little margin for error if he wants to hang onto his TOUR card for next year.

“I just didn't make any bad mistakes like I did yesterday,” he said of his three-shot improvement.

Perhaps we should have known that this was going to be an unusual leaderboard from the start, when Cameron Percy, 49, equaled his career low (62) to seize the first-round lead. No. 152 in the FedExCup Fall, he shot even-par 72 in Round 2 to remain 10 under. He has never made the FedExCup Playoffs and will play in PGA TOUR Champions Q-School in Phoenix next month.

Carson Young is the second most established player in the field with that surname (Cameron, no relation) and is 113th in the FedExCup Fall. He has one top-10 finish (T3, Puerto Rico Open) in 33 starts this season, and is 256th in the world. He shot 64 on Friday to reach 11 under.

“Really, if I just stay hot with the putter, I feel like I'm going to be in a great spot come Sunday,” said Young, whose entire family played tennis, not golf. (He spied a course one day from the courts and begged his parents to let him play.) “Yeah, there's something about coming south of the border, seems like I always play well when it's hot and kind of near the equator.”

Kang got into the field this week via Monday qualifying, the fifth time he’s successfully Monday’d on the PGA TOUR. The first time, which earned him a place in the 2022 WM Phoenix Open (missed cut), he had to survive a pre-qualifier just to get into the qualifier. It’s a hard way to make a living, but on Friday he shot a second-round 68 to get to 11 under par.

Career paths in professional golf meander this way and that, coming together and moving apart. At the 2010 Shriners Children’s Open, the other tournament where Cameron Percy shot 62 before Thursday, he wound up in a playoff with Jonathan Byrd and Martin Laird. Byrd won with a walk-off hole-in-one in the dark. All three are in the field at El Cardonal, but while Percy is contending, Byrd and Laird were fighting to try and make the cut.

At the 2011 Western Amateur, Kang lost to Patrick Cantlay in the semifinals. Their paths began to diverge, though, after USC product Kang turned pro in 2014. He played PGA TOUR Canada in 2016, won a PGA TOUR China event in 2018, and toiled mostly in obscurity.

“Probably like 30, 40 grand,” he said of his winnings in China, the biggest payday of his career.

Kang decided to enter the World Wide Technology Championship Monday qualifier, he added, because it was in Chula Vista, California, close to his home in L.A.

Friday marked the first time he has made a PGA TOUR cut.

Cantlay, meanwhile, has won eight times and captured the 2021 FedExCup.

Might they run into each other again? It’s certainly possible. As the events at El Cardonal remind, it’s almost never too late for those who refuse to give up.