'Easy to have recency bias': Fox taking in full picture after latest milestone

In his return to the PGA Tour after a brief hiatus, Ryan Fox didn’t expect to find himself watching the leaderboard, refreshing the FedEx Cup projected standings every five minutes as the second event of the playoffs played out.

But golf is good like that; it doesn’t take much for a player to go from peak to pit.

After winning the Open Championship in July, his maiden major, the 39-year-old returned from a three-week break for the St Jude Championship in Memphis, the first leg of the playoffs, after three weeks off looking to secure his place in the PGA Tour Championship.

It was among the goals he had for the 2026 campaign, with only the top 30 players in the FedEx Cup standings being invited. He went into the 70-strong Memphis field ranked at No 22 but left at No 25 after struggling to finish in a tie for 58th.

After the field was further cut to 50 for last week’s BMW Championship in St Louis, Fox’s position in the top 30 seemed safe, but a solid week would avoid any nerves about falling outside the top 30.

He played some good golf in the early rounds, but again struggled to hole his putts, before seeing some putts drop but struggling in other areas in his game in the final round.

He finished in a tie for 47th, which saw him projected on the bubble of the top 30. As one of the first players to finish their final round, he had to wait to see if he had qualified for the main event in Atlanta this week.

Ryan Fox qualified for the PGA Tour Championship as a top-30 player in the FedEx Cup rankings. Photo / Photosport

He ended the tournament ranked at No 30 in the FedEx Cup – the last qualifying spot for the Tour Championship at East Lake Golf Club – ticking off yet another milestone in a monumental year.

“The Presidents Cup was probably the number one goal and I would say I’m pretty safe for that now. Then obviously getting to East Lake [for the] Tour Championship was a big goal at the start of the season, something I’d never done on the PGA Tour,” Fox told the Herald.

“To tick that off is massive and then you throw winning a major in there and I’ve accomplished probably far more than I would have ever thought to write down at the start of the year.

“Regardless of what happens this week, it’s been an amazing year so far. It’s easy to have the recency bias and be like, ‘oh, I haven’t played well in the playoffs, it’s disappointing.’

“But I need to be able to look at it properly and say, ‘regardless, I’m really happy with the whole year’ and while we all want more, I can say I’ve achieved everything I set out to do this year and that’s a massive, massive tick and I’ll be able to look back on this year very, very fondly at the end of my career.”

Fox wore a microphone throughout last week’s tournament in St Louis, asked to be one of four golfers to star in Chasing Sunday – an hour-long feature collaboration between the PGA Tour and NFL Films giving fans a glimpse into what goes on in a round.

Americans Wyndham Clark, Ryan Gerard and Jake Knapp were also involved, with Clark winning the tournament. The feature can be viewed on the PGA Tour’s YouTube channel.

“They kind of got the opposite ends of the field there,” Fox said of he and Clark being involved.

“It was a lot of fun and it’s a good insight and it wasn’t too intrusive at all. It was a couple of little things here and there before and after rounds and rides to the golf course. For the most part it was pretty easy to forget you were mic’d up, which I think is what they want.

“They want it to be as honest and open as possible and it was fun to be able to do something like that. Just to get asked meant a lot and it was cool to be able to do it.”

Fox will be among the first group on the course at East Lake this week, pairing up with South Korean Tom Kim in the first round early on Friday morning (NZT).

“It’s a strong golf course. I feel like if you drive it well, you get some chances, but on both nines, there’s a couple of really strong holes that you need to get through without taking too much damage and you can shoot a score out here.

“There are some pretty severe greens as well, a couple of really nasty run-offs that you don’t want to be dealing with and a couple of very, very strong par 3s in 9 and 15, depending on where they put the tee box. I think 9 can play upwards of 240 metres and 15 can play longer than 200 into what feels like an island green.

“So yeah, there’s some pretty strong holes out there, but it’s a golf course I feel like if you play well, you can shoot a score around and if you play badly, it’ll bite you a little bit.

“That’s a sign of a really good golf course for me.”

Christopher Reive joined the Herald sports team in 2017, bringing the same versatility to his coverage as he does to his sports viewing habits.