Cameron Young Seeks Successful Title Defense at Wyndham Championship

One year ago this week, Cameron Young returned to the Wyndham Championship as the most snakebitten man in professional golf. Despite his oft-heroic efforts in a still-burgeoning career, he led the league in close calls, near misses and abject heartbreakers, posting seven runner-up finishes, nine top-threes and 22 top-10s without a single trophy to show for it all.

Just in case observers weren’t aware of those numbers, though, they could usually see ‘em written all over his face.

Young regularly wore a look of unbreakable forlornness, as if he was forever preemptively preparing himself for a bad lie, or a cruel bounce, or an untimely lip-out.

In the year since finally winning for the first time in Greensboro, he’s altered that exterior demeanor and similarly changed the trajectory of his career.

All of which begs this age-old question: Does a player in better spirits have more success, or does success lead to the player being in better spirits?

I’m not sure we’re going to uncover an answer to such existentialism within the confines of this page, but in the specific case of Young, that initial victory has cleared the way for better results, as he’s won this year’s Players Championship and Cadillac Championship, while posting top-three finishes at both the Masters and Open Championship.

“It seems to certainly have been positive for me,” Young said this week about that win in his usual understated way. “I always believed I was capable of winning a tournament, but I hadn’t yet, so it’s nice to be able to say I believe that I can win a PGA Tour event and also be able to look back and say I’ve done it before. Yeah, I think it’s all positive for me having the win here and moving on to play some really nice golf.”

His version of “really nice golf” has him smack dab in the middle of a crowded race for PGA Tour Player of the Year, alongside the likes of Matt Fitzpatrick, Wyndham Clark, Chris Gotterup and Scottie Scheffler, the last of whom has won each of the four most recent editions of this award, highlighting just how few opportunities a player like Young might have in his career.

A win at last week’s Rocket Classic might’ve given the Wake Forest product a leg up on the competition; however, his second-round 61 was followed up by scores of 68-70 on the weekend, leaving him in a share of eighth place.

Perhaps a successful title defense or – more importantly – a deep playoff run or even a FedEx Cup title would vault Young past those other contenders.

Whatever the case, he’s taking things in his usual even-keeled manner, albeit with a bit more of a smile than he might’ve had a year ago.

“I played really well [last week] and I feel like if I can continue to do that, I’m going to continue to be in position and that’s how you win tournaments,” he explained. “You can’t force them, you just keep putting yourself there and they do go your way here or there.”