Two things stand out from Billy Horschel’s unlikely triumph in the 2014 FedEx Cup playoffs – the garish plaid pants he wore on Sunday when he sealed the title by winning the Tour Championship at East Lake and the “gator chomp” he did on the 18th green to celebrate his biggest career success.
It’s enough to make one wonder how Horschel might respond if he can win the European Tour’s Race to Dubai on Sunday.
Only Henrik Stenson and Rory McIlroy have won both the FedEx Cup and the Race to Dubai (Stenson won both in his extraordinary 2013). Horschel can make it a threesome with a big finish this week beneath the Dubai skyscrapers.
Horschel starts the final event – the DP World Tour Championship – in second place behind fellow American Collin Morikawa in the season-long race. World No. 1 Jon Rahm, third in points, announced he will bypass the finale to spend time with his family.
For Horschel, having a chance to win the Race to Dubai (the overall champion will receive a $1.5 million bonus) is an unexpected opportunity he created for himself this year.
“At the beginning of the year was one of my goals to win the Race to Dubai? No,” Horschel said last week.
“It’s a hard thing to do when you don’t play a lot over there. You’re playing a limited schedule. After I (finished) second at the WGC-Concession and won the Match Play, it did become a goal. It was like, ‘Wow, this is something I really want to try to do.’”
Horschel’s schedule is PGA Tour-centric, but the majors, the Players Championship and the World Golf Championships count toward the Race to Dubai. Finishing 2-1 in the first two WGCs this year allowed Horschel to think realistically about adding a bookend to his FedEx Cup victory.
“Mentally I’m a better person in the way I conduct myself on the golf course. … I still have the fire and the emotion inside me but I harness it in a more productive way on a regular basis.” – Billy Horschel
What accelerated the opportunity was Horschel’s victory in the BMW PGA Championship at Wentworth in September. It is the signature event on the European Tour (soon to be the DP World Tour) and it validated Horschel’s long-standing goal of winning outside the United States.
“I’ve always wanted to be considered a global player, a worldwide player, and you have to play well and you have to win. It was my first win outside the United States which was fantastic,” Horschel said.
“To win an event I’ve grown up watching for many years, their flagship event, and to see the names who have won that event, the Hall of Famers and the legends – to add my name to that list and be only the second American to do it was special.
“I fell in love with the place when I first played (Wentworth) in 2019 and to accomplish the goal of winning that event … to knock that one off my list was pretty special.”
Horschel’s big 2021 was built around an overall refinement in his game and his approach to golf. He has spent an abundance of time working on his short game and while Horschel says he will never be among the PGA Tour’s best short-game players, he’s much improved from when he won the FedEx Cup.
The same goes for his attitude.
“I understand my game better. I understand what I need to do to play well week in and week out. I’m more efficient,” Horschel said.
“Mentally I’m a better person in the way I conduct myself on the golf course. I don’t let certain things bother me nearly as much. I still have the fire and the emotion inside me but I harness it in a more productive way on a regular basis.”
While Horschel has no plans to leave his Florida base – he’s a native Floridian as well as a Gator – he has developed a secondary attachment overseas. He became a fan of Premier League team West Ham after watching a video about the football club when he was in college.
Horschel likes the team enough that he put a West Ham logo on his golf bag at the Open Championship and he has kept it there this fall.
“I’ve connected with the UK fans, the European fans, fans of soccer in general,” Horschel said.
“They think it’s pretty cool that an American loves what they call football and he’s supporting a club that’s not a big club. It’s a mid-table team. It’s known but it’s never had a great deal of success. I think fans of other Premier League teams think that’s pretty cool.”
Adding a Race to Dubai title to the FedEx Cup that Horschel won seven years ago would be pretty cool, too.