After two laps of The CJ Cup Byron Nelson has a former bouncer in front of everyone of a restaurant. Not more than two years ago Jake Knapp he spent his weekend evenings at work in safety, now he falls asleep at the top of the leaderboard and they dream of their second career victory on the PGA Tour. The American former UCLA University places the second 64 (-7) consecutive to look down on everyone from above overall score of -14, one stroke ahead of Troy Merritt and Matt Wallace. A perfect day in Dallas, on a soft, windless course that was absolutely conducive to low scores.
The rookie revelation of this seasonwho trained between shifts when he had a traditional job for nine months because golf wasn’t profitable, he hit 16 of 18 greens in each of the first two rounds. A -7 for the day brought home with 28 putts (same number as yesterday) placing four birdies from the 14th to the 18th, the close of his front nine considering he teed off on the tenth. The only bogey came at three with a three putt from not too far away, but was immediately redeemed by the other four earned in the last six holes of the day.
Knapp, however, is being hunted very closely. In fact, at -13 we find the American Merrittauthor of the best round of the day in -9 closed with the eagle on the 36th hole, and the English Wallaceleader after the first round and still capable of remaining absolutely in the fight for the victory with a round of 66 (-5), coming very close to the hole in one on the short par 4 of the 14th. On the par 71 course of TPC Craig Ranch we find the American Kelly Kraft in fourth place alonewith an overall score of -12 (66 strokes in the second eighteen holes).
The group of instead is quite substantial fifth at -11: Taylor Pendrith (67), Keith Mitchell (65), Ben Kohles (66) e Davis Riley (67). They close the top-10 at ninth place tied with the score of -10 Aaron Rai (65), SH Kim (64), Taiga Semikawa (68) and the immortal Swede Alex Noren (68). CJ Cup which goes down in history also because it may have seen the debut of a name to remember: Kris Kim.
The English sixteen year oldmaking its absolute debut on the American circuit, in fact, he became the youngest to make the cut on the PGA Tour since 2015. A scary game for him, especially around the greens, after the opening 68 comes a round of -4 which takes him up to 36th place at -7, and who knows what the weekend has in store for us.
