Brett Quigley feels like he belongs at number one

Jim Furyk turned to Brett Quigley after winning in his PGA TOUR Champions debut at the Ally Challenge at Warwick Hills in Grand Blanc, Michigan, on Sunday and told him it had been a great battle.

Furyk had overtaken Quigley, the second-round leader, on the back nine. He played the final stretch in 2 under while his counterpart shot 2 over.

It wasn’t the first time Quigley had battled Furyk and earned similar praise. The words rang in Quigley’s ears by the time he had flown home to South Florida on Monday.

“We had played in the 2007 WGC Match Play,” Quigley recalled. “I think I was ranked 63rd in the world and he was No. 2. That’s how they did the matchups back then.

“I lost on the 17th hole (2 & 1 in a first-round matchup). He said, ‘Man, you’re a top player and you should be out here all the time and you should be doing this.’ It was pretty cool coming from him. A couple of injuries derailed me from there. I thought I could do it then, but now I’m believing I can do it.”

Quigley never found his stride on the PGA TOUR. His best year came in 2009, when he posted three runner-up finishes and won $1.4 million. But the only wins of his professional career were a pair on the Korn Ferry Tour (1996, 2001) until his breakthrough on PGA TOUR Champions at the Morocco Champions in February.

Injuries derailed him after 2009. A stress fracture in his leg cost him the 2010 season and most of 2011, and just as he was prepared to come back in 2012 he fell off a ladder and fractured three vertebra. And golf and back injuries go together like amateurs and 220-yard par-3s.

Now, after six events of what will be a wraparound season that concludes with the Charles Schwab Cup Playoffs in 2021, Quigley finds himself alone atop the Schwab Cup standings. He has played in five events (he wasn’t eligible for the season-opening Mitsubishi Electric Championship at Hualalai, but will be in 2021) and has the win, the T2, a T3, a T9 and a T31. Which is not bad at all for a guy who just wanted to secure his playing status.

Now with the victory he’s assured of entry into every event through the end of the 2020-21 season, and after his play for most of The Ally Challenge it looks as though he won’t be stopping at one win.

So just how did Quigley go from PGA TOUR journeyman to first-year force on PGA TOUR Champions? He says it started with some TV work for FOX as an on-course reporter in 2018.

“What I learned from being inside the ropes and not playing was a real eye-opener for me was that I always thought you had to be perfect to win, and that’s clearly not the case,” Quigley said. “Players hit bad shots and I just think … I always had this picture of the player who wins is playing perfect golf. In golf you get so wrapped up with your own stuff and the search for getting everything right and I just ended up trying too hard.

“I'm really, really thankful I have a different perspective on it this time around.”

The win in Morocco came in just his second PGA TOUR Champions start after he teed it up at the Shaw Charity Classic toward the end of 2019 (he finished T64). It immediately took away any pressure Quigley felt to perform to keep his status from week to week, and it showed him he could, in fact, compete with anybody out here.

He has been playing with house money since. He looks like a guy freed from his own mind.

“I think now I'm really believing that I can go out there and relax and play well,” Quigley said. “I want to be ready every single week. I want to be prepared, both mentally and physically. And I think if I do that then I’m very happy.”

Quigley says he will not allow his early success to push him to change his modest goals for the season.

“For me, setting goals and wondering ‘Can I do this, I need to do that … ‘ It just hasn't been a great formula for me to perform well,” Quigley said. “I'm just so fortunate to be able to play golf. And the silver lining to the whole (pandemic) has been the time I’ve been able to spend with my wife, Amy, and our girls. And now I’m ready to compete. I’m fresh and hungry, so it's a pretty good combination.”