With all due respect to Frys.com winner Sang-Moon Bae, the best story of the week at Silverado Country Club finished a bit down the leaderboard.
Jarrod Lyle was making his first start on the PGA Tour in over thirty months. Lyle is coming off his second bout with leukemia and trying to make his comeback complete by earning back his PGA Tour card.
Lyle had plenty of success this week as he got into the Frys by Monday qualifying with a birdie on the second playoff hole to earn his spot. He shot rounds of 72-70 to make the cut and finished strong with three birdies in his last four holes on Sunday. His T31 finish earned him $33,300 for the week and he needs solid paychecks to earn his card back. He needs $283,825 to secure his card for next season. 
He is playing in next week’s Shriners Hospitals for Children Open in Las Vegas on a sponsor’s exemption and he’ll need more of them for the opportunity to earn that tour card.
Lyle was thrilled with his performance this week.
“To come out here without a tournament to play, and then to get through on Monday, and to make the cut and then to play reasonable golf for four days, I couldn’t have asked for anything better,” he said. “It’s something to build on now for the rest of the year.”
“Just playing golf is a success,” he said. “To get four rounds in was pretty special. It’s something that I can go away now and assess this week…and then just build on it from now.”
For the life of me I can’t imagines any tournament director not extending a sponsor’s exemption to Lyle. He is currently playing on a major medical exemption and he needs those exemptions to play. Why he isn’t offered exemptions to every tournament is dumbfounding. Is there a better, more heartwarming story on tour?
To be honest, this week when I could tear myself away from the NFL and college football games all I was interested in at the Frys was Lyle. And I am sure I am not the only one feeling that way.
I understand there are plenty of considerations when awarding exemptions to players. And each director is bombarded with requests but how can anyone turn down a request from Lyle?
Following Lyle this year will be one of the best stories in golf and it is up to those tournament directors to help him out so he can complete a miraculous comeback.
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