Josh Schrock
April 28, 2025
Blade Brown has a wise reason to reject Byron Nelson this week
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Even for the biggest star of the game, sponsor waivers on the PGA Tour are not easy to participate: free passes, facing the best (or all) of the best events in the world, a good four-round match that can serve as a springboard for more opportunities.
The 17-year-old phenomenon blade Brown has accepted four waivers this year and has received another waivers in this week’s CJ Cup Byron Nelson, but he passed.
On the surface, this seems like a strange decision, but Brown’s decision is likely to be a wise move for the Rising Star.
Over the past week, Brown has won his third Korn Ferry tour of his career in the Veritex Bank Championship. He scored second with 61, 66, 67 and 63, behind winner Johnny Keefer. T2 takes Brown’s vault level from 140 to 44 in the Korn Ferry Tour Point List. As Brentley Romine of the Golf Channel pointed out, Brown is now only 53 points away from getting a special temporary identity on KFT. The end also gave Brown a spot in the Talum Championship in Mexico this week.
It’s important for Brown to get KFT in Mexico, which has used three KFT waivers this year. Only four are allowed in non-members, so Brown gave up a place to play in the Nelson Championship, which would guarantee that he would have at least two more KFT starts this season instead of passing a waiver.
Brown hopes that in both starts he will be able to win the 53 points required to earn a special temporary identity and then run at the end of the first 20 seasons of the KFT points list, which will win him the PGA Tour Card.
Brown worked as a professional in January as a professional PGA Tour. He missed the heartbreaking way, but did shoot the second round 64 times, the lowest score for those under the age of 18 on the PGA Tour in the past 40 years.
In the absence of cutting in Palm Springs, California, Brown showed few children who should focus on prom rather than grinding the highest level of cuts.
“Golf is a weird, fun game,” Brown told the Golf Channel after his third round. “You’ll get a nice break from bad shots and nice shots. But I’m going to look up. It’ll be a little stinging, but I’m looking forward to the next step.”
Brown cuts the entire round midway, but the 17-year-old water polo (a product of “mentally exhausted”) blocked his fate that day and became an early class in the type of spiritual focus needed to play consistently advanced golf on the PGA Tour.
“It’s an explosion of competition in the PGA Tour,” Brown said. “I can’t turn around, unfortunately, but, I mean, a lot of practice. I’m glad I’m doing it now; that way I can learn. My dad always said, ‘You win, you learn,’ I’ll definitely learn from this experience.”
Brown responded with a layoff at the next time at Vidantaworld’s 2025 Mexican Open. He missed the next two cuts at the Puerto Rico Open and Valspar Championships.
Brown easily sent the waiver to the CJ Cup Byron Nelson and played it against Scottie Scheffler and Jordan Spieth. But the 17-year-old’s ultimate goal is to become a full-time PGA Tour player, which he believes is the best way to achieve.
Brown played a long race in the KFT competition in Mexico and decided to go the path he thought was his best entry to the PGA Tour. It also makes the case a championship on Byron Nelson and plays well and opens the door faster than the KFT Grind.
In 2013, Jordan Spieth faced a similar dilemma. Spieth won the fresh innings of T7 in the then-Web.com Tour opening game and the fourth place in Colombia, winning the Web.com Tour status for just $4,000 for the rest of the season. Colombia’s fourth-place champion won the start of Chile in the following week. However, Spieth has already received a sponsor exemption for the Puerto Rico Open. Spieth chose to play in Puerto Rico and finished second. This earned him a spot in the Valspar Championship, where he finished seventh in the seventh place, thanks to the 18-year-old Spiethian who received a special temporary status on the PGA Tour. Later that year, he went on to win the John Deere classic and never looked back.
There is no correct answer.
Brown chose to chase KFT identity, Spieth chose to use the save, and it became very hot, and the rest was history.
Given Brown’s age and great talent, he might feel destined to play a PGA Tour ticket, regardless of the path he took.
Josh Schrock
Golf.comEdit
Josh Schrock is a writer and journalist at Golf.com. Before joining golf, Josh was an insider of Chicago Bears in NBC Sports. He has previously reported 49 people and fighters in the NBC Sports Bay area. Josh, an Oregon native and UO alum, spent time hiking with his wife and dogs, pondering how ducks will be sad again and trying to become half-mature. For golf, Josh will never stop trying to break the 90s and never lose Rory McIlroy’s major drought will end (update: he did).
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