Culture
You read it here first: 22 predictions for the 2025 men’s golf season
The PGA Tour season begins Thursday at The Sentry in Hawaii, with many of the top players in the world — but not an injured Scottie Scheffler — playing the obscenely hilly Plantation Course at Kapalua. So let’s have some fun. Here’s what will happen in golf in 2025.
Jon Rahm wins a major: There’s a middle ground between “Yeah, Rahm didn’t emotionally handle the criticism from his LIV departure well,” and “Rahm is still one of the three or four best golfers in the world.”
He had a strange, frustrating major campaign. That included missing Pinehurst with a foot infection. But take a look at the whole year. You’re welcome to downplay LIV results, but at some point, you’re just playing golf. Ten top fives. He should have won an Olympic gold medal but gave it away. He’s still Jon Rahm. He’s just getting over the change from being loved to being criticized.
Scottie Scheffler remains the best golfer, but the honeymoon ends: People are going to start getting irrational. He’s going to remain the clear best player. He’ll rack up top fives and top 10s and win multiple tournaments. He might even win a major!
But it’s going to be the year the masses start forgetting that nobody wins at Tiger Woods levels in this era, and they might never again. It will become, “Oh, Scottie, why aren’t you winning more majors?” … “Oh, Scottie, is your hand bothering you?” … “What’s up with the putting?” each time he finishes third instead of winning. Because that’s his standard now. The discourse will take the horrible transition from the coronation of 2024 to the unfair new expectations of 2025.
A repeat strange run of early winners: Last year, the entire start of the year was filled with journeyman winners or super-young surprises. This year will be the same.
Everything for the top stars will be about easing into form for the majors, and you’ll see tournaments like the Sony, the American Express, Torrey Pines and others won by cool rising studs like Max Greyserman or grinders like Denny McCarthy, and we’ll have the same conversation we had in March before all the top stars went on runs.
A PGA Tour-LIV deal will still not be finalized: But! Reports of an agreement will come out early in 2025. We just won’t get any details or real information until it goes through government approval, which will drag on until 2026.
Viktor Hovland will work with many more coaches: At the time this was typed, Hovland told a European outlet he is no longer working with coach Joe Mayo. After the wild 2024 season of Hovland working with four different instructors (that we know of), he’ll have another bizarre year of tinkering and trying to have the perfect season. It will be a better year than 2024, but still not near what we hoped in fall 2023 when he looked like the best player in the year.
Justin Thomas will have a big year: (We talked about this already).
Jordan Spieth will not: Wrist injuries are tough!
The Waste Management Open will be much less chaotic: It jumped the shark last year, and now tournament organizers know they have to rein it in or players will stop wanting to come.
The Ryder Cup will be more chaotic than ever: After hat-gate. After LIV drama. After events like the Waste Management and the general American golf social media culture only make the heckling, bro-ey, debaucherous fan experience seem like something to strive for to large chunks of the population — on top of the very real conversation already happening about the New York crowds at Bethpage being unruly — and the U.S. fans will play up to the fears. They’ll treat it as a challenge, and it will lead to a chaotic Ryder Cup week that goes perhaps too far. Something bad might happen.
A Højgaard will win a PGA Tour event: But not the one you think.
Bryson DeChambeau won’t have quite the same major success: DeChambeau as a top-10 golfer is here to stay. But there is a gap between DeChambeau’s returning to form and the discussion that he’s in the same conversation as Scheffler, Xander Schauffele or Rory McIlroy. He’s not quite in that group, and he won’t have a major top five.
Collin Morikawa again takes his place in golf’s top tier: Morikawa was the best golfer nobody talked about last year. He had 14 top 20s and seven top fives. He played in the final Sunday group at the Masters and the PGA Championship. He finished second behind Scheffler at the Tour Championship. He was as steady as anyone not named Scheffler or Schauffele. But he didn’t win once, and those Sunday struggles at Augusta and Valhalla were concerning.
But in 2025, Morikawa will win more tournaments than Schauffele or McIlroy. There’s always a mini-pantheon at the top of golf each year. In 2023, it was Rahm, Scheffler, McIlroy and Hovland. In 2024, it was Scheffler, Schauffele, McIlroy and arguably DeChambeau. In 2025, it will be Scheffler, Rahm, Schauffele and Morikawa. The question is, will Morikawa win a major?
Scottie Scheffler, left, winner of the 2024 Masters Tournament, sits with Jon Rahm at the Green Jacket Ceremony. (Warren Little / Getty Images)
Xander Schauffele wins the green jacket: This is the only specific prediction we’ll make. It’s golf. Predicting specific tournaments is nonsense. But Schauffele is suddenly a guy you know you have to fear in majors, and Augusta is the one major he plays best at. He’s gone T2, T3, 8, T10. And now he knows how to win. Schauffele wins a competitive Masters, and suddenly people will be recontextualizing his going from no majors to three in four starts. (Then, he won’t win again for a bit.)
Sam Burns plays in two major final Sunday pairings: He doesn’t win.
Quail Hollow will strangely deliver: Quail Hollow has become one of the more dunked-on big courses in the U.S., which will only increase at this year’s PGA Championship. The reason is probably just overexposure. It has an annual PGA Tour event. It hosted the 2022 Presidents Cup. And a lot of golf nerds just don’t like it. But it tends to create great winners and good golf tournaments, and Quail will give us a strangely riveting PGA that leads to some referendums on what we use to determine “good” professional courses.
Much will be written about Oakmont returning us to above-par U.S. Opens: It will not. That is just not how the USGA seems to set up the U.S. Opens anymore. Somebody will win at 8-under. The majority of the field will be above par, and it will be an incredible Open, playing with the perfect mix of risk and reward, but most of the contenders actually shoot below par most days.
Rory McIlroy does not win a major: I’m sorry. Pinehurst pushed me too far. I cannot predict it until it happens.
Brooks Koepka and Jordan Spieth will be left off the Ryder Cup team: Neither will play well enough to truly be in contention at all, leaving captain Keegan Bradley’s hands tied.
Aaron Rai makes the Ryder Cup team: There’s always one or two “Huh, really?” golfers on the European team, and this year it will be an Englishman who can play some of the hottest rounds on tour. He’s an exceptional ball striker and has been around for a long time. He’ll be this year’s version of Russell Henley on the U.S. Presidents Cup team. Speaking of …
Russell Henley remains the Scheffler partner: Henley and Scheffler were a surprisingly perfect pairing at Royal Montreal, and Bradley was on the team to see it up close. He sticks with it, and they still thrive.
Keegan Bradley will play well enough to earn a captain’s pick, but he won’t do it: Chaos prediction! Bradley will end the year as one of the seven to 12 best American players and put himself in a position to easily make the team most years, but he’ll be so focused on not being the guy who picked himself he will leave himself off. And the man he does pick instead will end up being what costs the U.S. Bradley’s selflessness will be his most criticized choice.
That’s right. The U.S. loses on home soil: After the last few years when the golf world has seemed to conclude the Ryder Cup is broken because nobody can ever win overseas anymore, the Europeans will knock off a messy U.S. team at Bethpage.
The world will melt down.
(Top photo of Collin Morikawa, right, with Patrick Cantlay: Sarah Stier / Getty Images)
“Window seat with garden view / A perfect nook to read a book / I’m lost in my Jane Austen…” sings Kristin Chenoweth in “The Girl in 14G” — what could be more ideal? Well, perhaps showing off your literary knowledge and getting a perfect score on this week’s super-size Book Review Quiz Bowl honoring the life, work and global influence of Jane Austen, who turns 250 today. In the 12 questions below, tap or click your answers to the questions. And no matter how you do, scroll on to the end, where you’ll find links to free e-book versions of her novels — and more.
On Dec. 16, 1775, a girl was born in Steventon, England — the seventh of eight children — to a clergyman and his wife. She was an avid reader, never married and died in 1817, at the age of 41. But in just those few decades, Jane Austen changed the world.
Her novels have had an outsize influence in the centuries since her death. Not only are the books themselves beloved — as sharply observed portraits of British society, revolutionary narrative projects and deliciously satisfying romances — but the stories she created have so permeated culture that people around the world care deeply about Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy, even if they’ve never actually read “Pride and Prejudice.”
With her 250th birthday this year, the Austen Industrial Complex has kicked into high gear with festivals, parades, museum exhibits, concerts and all manner of merch, ranging from the classily apt to the flamboyantly absurd. The words “Jane mania” have been used; so has “exh-Aust-ion.”
How to capture this brief life, and the blazing impact that has spread across the globe in her wake? Without further ado: a mere sampling of the wealth, wonder and weirdness Austen has brought to our lives. After all, your semiquincentennial doesn’t come around every day.
By ‘A Lady’
Austen published just four novels in her lifetime: “Sense and Sensibility” (1811), “Pride and Prejudice” (1813), “Mansfield Park” (1814) and “Emma” (1815). All of them were published anonymously, with the author credited simply as “A Lady.” (If you’re in New York, you can see this first edition for yourself at the Grolier Club through Feb. 14.)
Where the Magic Happened
Placed near a window for light, this diminutive walnut table was, according to family lore, where the author did much of her writing. It is now in the possession of the Jane Austen Society.
An Iconic Accessory
Few of Austen’s personal artifacts remain, contributing to the author’s mystique. One of them is this turquoise ring, which passed to her sister-in-law and then her niece after her death. In 2012, the ring was put up for auction and bought by the “American Idol” champion Kelly Clarkson. This caused quite a stir in England; British officials were loath to let such an important cultural artifact leave the country’s borders. Jane Austen’s House, the museum now based in the writer’s Hampshire home, launched a crowdfunding campaign to Bring the Ring Home and bought the piece from Clarkson. The real ring now lives at the museum; the singer has a replica.
Austen Onscreen
Since 1940, when Austen had a bit of a moment and Greer Garson and Laurence Olivier starred in MGM’s rather liberally reinterpreted “Pride and Prejudice,” there have been more than 20 international adaptations of Austen’s work made for film and TV (to say nothing of radio). From the sublime (Emma Thompson’s Oscar-winning “Sense and Sensibility”) to the ridiculous (the wholly gratuitous 2022 remake of “Persuasion”), the high waists, flickering firelight and double weddings continue to provide an endless stream of debate fodder — and work for a queen’s regiment of British stars.
Jane Goes X-Rated
The rumors are true: XXX Austen is a thing. “Jane Austen Kama Sutra,” “Pride and Promiscuity: The Lost Sex Scenes of Jane Austen” and enough slash fic and amateur porn to fill Bath’s Assembly Rooms are just the start. Purists may never recover.
A Lady Unmasked
Austen’s final two completed novels, “Northanger Abbey” and “Persuasion,” were published after her death. Her brother Henry, who oversaw their publication, took the opportunity to give his sister the recognition he felt she deserved, revealing the true identity of the “Lady” behind “Pride and Prejudice,” “Emma,” etc. in a biographical note. “The following pages are the production of a pen which has already contributed in no small degree to the entertainment of the public,” he wrote, extolling his sister’s imagination, good humor and love of dancing. Still, “no accumulation of fame would have induced her, had she lived, to affix her name to any productions of her pen.”
Wearable Tributes
It is a truth universally acknowledged that a Jane Austen fan wants to find other Jane Austen fans, and what better way to advertise your membership in that all-inclusive club than with a bit of merch — from the subtle and classy to the gloriously obscene.
The Austen Literary Universe
On the page, there is no end to the adventures Austen and her characters have been on. There are Jane Austen mysteries, Jane Austen vampire series, Jane Austen fantasy adventures, Jane Austen Y.A. novels and, of course, Jane Austen romances, which transpose her plots to a remote Maine inn, a Greenwich Village penthouse and the Bay Area Indian American community, to name just a few. You can read about Austen-inspired zombie hunters, time-traveling hockey players, Long Island matchmakers and reality TV stars, or imagine further adventures for some of your favorite characters. (Even the obsequious Mr. Collins gets his day in the sun.)
A Botanical Homage
Created in 2017 to mark the 200th anniversary of Austen’s death, the “Jane Austen” rose is characterized by its intense orange color and light, sweet perfume. It is bushy, healthy and easy to grow.
Aunt Jane
Hoping to cement his beloved aunt’s legacy, Austen’s nephew James Edward Austen-Leigh published this biography — a rather rosy portrait based on interviews with family members — five decades after her death. The book is notable not only as the source (biased though it may be) of many of the scant facts we know about her life, but also for the watercolor portrait by James Andrews that serves as its frontispiece. Based on a sketch by Cassandra, this depiction of Jane is softer and far more winsome than the original: Whether that is due to a lack of skill on her sister’s part or overly enthusiastic artistic license on Andrews’s, this is the version of Austen most familiar to people today.
Cultural Currency
In 2017, the Bank of England released a new 10-pound note featuring Andrews’s portrait of Austen, as well as a line from “Pride and Prejudice”: “I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading!” Austen is the third woman — other than the queen — to be featured on British currency, and the only one currently in circulation.
In the Trenches
During World War I and World War II, British soldiers were given copies of Austen’s works. In his 1924 story “The Janeites,” Rudyard Kipling invoked the grotesque contrasts — and the strange comfort — to be found in escaping to Austen’s well-ordered world amid the horrors of trench warfare. As one character observes, “There’s no one to touch Jane when you’re in a tight place.”
Baby Janes
You’re never too young to learn to love Austen — or that one’s good opinion, once lost, may be lost forever.
The Austen Industrial Complex
Maybe you’ve not so much as seen a Jane Austen meme, let alone read one of her novels. No matter! Need a Jane Austen finger puppet? Lego? Magnetic poetry set? Lingerie? Nameplate necklace? Plush book pillow? License plate frame? Bath bomb? Socks? Dog sweater? Whiskey glass? Tarot deck? Of course you do! And you’re in luck: What a time to be alive.
Around the Globe
Austen’s novels have been translated into more than 40 languages, including Polish, Finnish, Chinese and Farsi. There are active chapters of the Jane Austen Society, her 21st-century fan club, throughout the world.
Playable Persuasions
In Austen’s era, no afternoon tea was complete without a rousing round of whist, a trick-taking card game played in two teams of two. But should you not be up on your Regency amusements, you can find plenty of contemporary puzzles and games with which to fill a few pleasant hours, whether you’re piecing together her most beloved characters or using your cunning and wiles to land your very own Mr. Darcy.
#SoJaneAusten
The wild power of the internet means that many Austen moments have taken on lives of their own, from Colin Firth’s sopping wet shirt and Matthew Macfadyen’s flexing hand to Mr. Collins’s ode to superlative spuds and Mr. Knightley’s dramatic floor flop. The memes are fun, yes, but they also speak to the universality of Austen’s writing: More than two centuries after her books were published, the characters and stories she created are as relatable as ever.
Bonnets Fit for a Bennett
For this summer’s Grand Regency Costumed Promenade in Bath, England — as well as the myriad picnics, balls, house parties, dinners, luncheons, teas and fetes that marked the anniversary — seamstresses, milliners, mantua makers and costume warehouses did a brisk business, attiring the faithful in authentic Regency finery. And that’s a commitment: A bespoke, historically accurate bonnet can easily run to hundreds of dollars.
Most Ardently, Jane
Austen was prolific correspondent, believed to have written thousands of letters in her lifetime, many to her sister, Cassandra. But in an act that has frustrated biographers for centuries, upon Jane’s death, Cassandra protected her sister’s privacy — and reputation? — by burning almost all of them, leaving only about 160 intact, many heavily redacted. But what survives is filled with pithy one-liners. To wit: “I do not want people to be very agreeable, as it saves me the trouble of liking them a great deal.”
Stage and Sensibility
Austen’s works have been adapted numerous times for the stage. Some plays (and musicals) hew closely to the original text, while others — such as Emily Breeze’s comedic riff on “Pride and Prejudice,” “Are the Bennet Girls OK?”, which is running at New York City’s West End Theater through Dec. 21 — use creative license to explore ideas of gender, romance and rage through a contemporary lens.
Austen 101
Austen remains a reliable fount of academic scholarship; recent conference papers have focused on the author’s enduring global reach, the work’s relationship to modern intersectionality, digital humanities and “Jane Austen on the Cheap.” And as one professor told our colleague Sarah Lyall of the Austen amateur scholarship hive, “Woe betide the academic who doesn’t take them seriously.”
W.W.J.D.
When facing problems — of etiquette, romance, domestic or professional turmoil — sometimes the only thing to do is ask: What would Jane do?
A famous poet once observed that it is difficult to get the news from poems. The weather is a different story. April showers, summer sunshine and — maybe especially — the chill of winter provide an endless supply of moods and metaphors. Poets like to practice a double meteorology, looking out at the water and up at the sky for evidence of interior conditions of feeling.
The inner and outer forecasts don’t always match up. This short poem by Louise Glück starts out cold and stays that way for most of its 11 lines.
And then it bursts into flame.
“Early December in Croton-on-Hudson” comes from Glück’s debut collection, “Firstborn,” which was published in 1968. She wrote the poems in it between the ages of 18 and 23, but they bear many of the hallmarks of her mature style, including an approach to personal matters — sex, love, illness, family life — that is at once uncompromising and elusive. She doesn’t flinch. She also doesn’t explain.
Here, for example, Glück assembles fragments of experience that imply — but also obscure — a larger narrative. It’s almost as if a short story, or even a novel, had been smashed like a glass Christmas ornament, leaving the reader to infer the sphere from the shards.
We know there was a couple with a flat tire, and that a year later at least one of them still has feelings for the other. It’s hard not to wonder if they’re still together, or where they were going with those Christmas presents.
To some extent, those questions can be addressed with the help of biographical clues. The version of “Early December in Croton-on-Hudson” that appeared in The Atlantic in 1967 was dedicated to Charles Hertz, a Columbia University graduate student who was Glück’s first husband. They divorced a few years later. Glück, who died in 2023, was never shy about putting her life into her work.
But the poem we are reading now is not just the record of a passion that has long since cooled. More than 50 years after “Firstborn,” on the occasion of receiving the Nobel Prize for literature, Glück celebrated the “intimate, seductive, often furtive or clandestine” relations between poets and their readers. Recalling her childhood discovery of William Blake and Emily Dickinson, she declared her lifelong ardor for “poems to which the listener or reader makes an essential contribution, as recipient of a confidence or an outcry, sometimes as co-conspirator.”
That’s the kind of poem she wrote.
“Confidence” can have two meanings, both of which apply to “Early December in Croton-on-Hudson.” Reading it, you are privy to a secret, something meant for your ears only. You are also in the presence of an assertive, self-possessed voice.
Where there is power, there’s also risk. To give voice to desire — to whisper or cry “I want you” — is to issue a challenge and admit vulnerability. It’s a declaration of conquest and a promise of surrender.
What happens next? That’s up to you.
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