Recently, there have been rumors of European players feeling uncomfortable on the Pga Tour due to heckling. Despite these concerns, it has not stopped some Europeans from moving over to the PGA TOUR this year.
The Tour announced on Monday that three Europeans, Thomas Pieters, Tyrell Hatton, and Tommy Fleetwood had been granted a temporary Membership. This membership allows all three players to participate in an unlimited amount of sponsor exemptions for the rest of the year.
Pieters seems to have the most potential of the three players now that he has his exemption. After finishing fifth in the WGC-Mexico Championship, Pieters added one of the sufficient qualifications to gain Tour membership. Specifically, this gave him a total of 416 FedExCup points, which surpassed the 150th ranked player from last year’s standings. Pieters was also a captain’s pick for the Ryder Cup in 2016 and will look to continue that success on the PGA TOUR.
Hatton has not taken the same path to gaining membership, as he has not climbed up the ranks of the FedExCup standings. Rather, he gained his temporary membership after finishing in the top-10 of the Arnold Palmer Invitational last month. Hatton is not wasting any time taking advantage of his new membership, as the no. 14 player in the world will take to the course at the Zurich Classic in New Orleans after The Masters.
Fleetwood gained his temporary membership the same way that Hatton did, finishing in the top-10 of the Arnold Palmer Invitational. The 26-year old has had plenty of experience on the Tour, participating in 12 major championships, but has only been able to gain two victories on the European Tour and none on the PGA TOUR. Fleetwood does have one of those wins this year, however, where he held off world no.1 golfer Dustin Johnson for the victory.
With these three Europeans gaining membership to the PGA TOUR for the rest of the season, they will likely look to take advantage of their opportunity, making it interesting to see if any of these players can make a significant impact this year.
Cover Image via Flickr
