Among the many echoes from 19-year old Blades Brown’s playoff victory in the World Wide Technology Championship on Sunday, two may resonate the loudest.
The first is obvious – Brown is still a teenager, not much older than the fictitious Ferris Bueller, who famously took a day off from school years ago and mastered the art of mayhem.
Brown is the youngest player to win a tour event in 95 years and the fourth-youngest ever – 18-year-old Charles Kocsis won the 1931 Michigan Open in case anyone in the grillroom wants to know the youngest PGA Tour winner.
Beyond that, Brown’s victory in his 22nd tour start (not bad for a kid who could be a freshman in college) reconfirmed his place among a group of young players that may one day resemble “The Outsiders” movie cast that included Matt Dillon, Ralph Macchio, Tom Cruise, Patrick Swayze, Rob Lowe and Diane Lane, among others, in the nascent stages of their careers.
Brown is the youngest in a peer group that includes Ben James, whom he beat in the Sunday playoff, Jackson Koivun, Michael Thorbjornsen, Michael Brennan and Akshay Bhatia, among others.
Having already secured his 2027 PGA Tour card by virtue of his finish on the Korn Ferry Tour this year, Brown has a jump start on a career before he’s old enough to legally buy a beer. If it seems to have happened remarkably fast, Brown feels the same way.
“I mean, it still hasn’t sunk in yet. I just go back to 5-year-old Blades that was watching the TV and watching Tiger Woods and all those great players win major championships, and to think that I’m now in a similar spot with having won a PGA Tour event is mind blowing,” Brown said Sunday evening in Mexico.
Brown started the final round seven strokes behind James, who has flirted a handful of times with winning. After going backward most of Sunday, James holed a 20-foot eagle putt on the 72nd green to force a playoff, only to see Brown (who shot 63 in the final round) holding the trophy.
“I mean, I’ve got a long way to go. There’s so many shots that I want to learn. Golf, I don’t think you ever can master, but I’m going to do my best to see how close we can get.” – Blades Brown
When Brown elected to bypass college to pursue his pro golf career, some questioned his decision. But he finished ninth on the season-long Korn Ferry points list to earn his PGA Tour card and now he’s exempt through 2028 with a spot in the Championship Series when it debuts in two years.
“I can’t give the Korn Ferry Tour enough praise. I needed to play on the Korn Ferry Tour in order to be in the position I am now. It taught me how to go low, it taught me how to handle my emotions. It taught me how to be, as my dad would say, a man, and it’s really special,” Brown said.
“I mean, I’ve got a long way to go. There’s so many shots that I want to learn. Golf, I don’t think you ever can master, but I’m going to do my best to see how close we can get.”
It is an admittedly premature possibility but when Ryder Cup conversation amps up next year, Brown has at least added his name to captain Jim Furyk’s candidates list. Brown would obviously have to build significantly on what he’s done so far but he seems to be blessed with the big-moment gene, something not every player possesses.
The youth versus experience discussion happens every two years and fresh faces have a way of impacting the outcome. Since 2010, every victorious Ryder Cup team has had at least one player 25 years old or younger and five of those winning teams had two players no older than 25.
The past two U.S. Ryder Cup teams – in Rome and at Bethpage Black – have not included a player younger than 26 and both teams lost.
To be fair, the 2014 and 2018 U.S. Ryder Cup squads had three players 25 or younger and both teams lost so finding the right blend remains an inexact science. Given the Americans’ continuing struggles in the Ryder Cup, Furyk would be wise to lean into finding a fresh face or two, whether it’s Koivun, Brennan or someone else.
As he demonstrated last week, Brown may have already found his way.
“[Monday] I’m going to wake up and I’m going to be the same person. Next week teeing it up in Austin I’m going to be the same person,” Brown said.
“I’m going to still pick out the same targets, wear the same clothes, eat the same food, but it is extremely special to be a PGA Tour winner now.”