Putting Well Again, Keegan Bradley Authors One of Year's Feel-Good Stories

A win at his beloved Travelers Championship was another sign of how far Bradley has come from some down years on the greens.

Keegan Bradley produced one of golf’s feel-good stories of the year, winning the event outside of the biggest tournaments that he views with the most esteem.

The Travelers Championship outside of Hartford is the first PGA Tour event he ever attended, one he viewed as special as a native of New England. So special that it hindered him to from doing well there in his early years.

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Now 37, Bradley became just the second player since Francis Ouimet won the U.S. Open in 2013—in Bradley’s native New England—to capture a major championship in his first appearance.

His victory at the 2011 PGA Championship in a playoff over Jason Dufner was his first major attempt. He had three victories through 2012, including a 3-1 record at the Ryder Cup.

And then things started to fall off. A big reason was the impending anchored putting ban, which gained a lot of momentum after Bradley became the first player to win a major using the method with a belly putter. Ernie Els and Adam Scott were other examples.

Although the ban of the anchored stroke did not take place until 2016, it was a subject of considerable debate and conjecture. Bradley began trying other methods in order to comply and the results were poor.

He went from 35th in strokes-gained putting in 2012 to 183rd by 2016. He didn’t add another tournament victory until the 2018 BMW Championship and then not again until last fall at the Zozo Championship.

Bradley has made clear over the years his frustration with the United States Golf Association over the issue. In an interview last year, he recounted how difficult the change was on his game and career.

"It stinks," Bradley said. "What’s most disappointing about it is there’s such a small group of guys. What, three or four guys who did it at a high level? The worst part is I had thousands of hours worth of practice and sort of go-to feels. What I have to do when things are off.

"All of a sudden it’s done. I had to start from scratch really. And I thought it was really silly. Such the small amount of guys who did it and even smaller guys who did it at a high level. I would always see someone using it and thinking they would be done in a week."

Bradley started using the technique when he was in college at St. John’s. It wasn’t due to any major issues in his putting, but he simply liked the way it worked and when he became a pro Bradley was able to get more dialed in with the technique.

No matter how you feel about the rules change, it’s true that anchored putting had been around for decades, mostly employed by senior players. But there was rarely any move to ban the practice; Bradley had no reason to believe that working on it would be good for him in his career.

With the change imminent, Bradley began experimenting with different forms of putting.

"Left-hand low ... I’ve done everything," Bradley said. "I haven’t done the broom but it’s been a bummer. Sometimes I look at that belly putter sitting in my house. It’s right there. And I did that at a very high level. But it’s not up to me. A lot of things would be different if it were up to me."

For now, things are working out fine for Bradley. He’s 23rd in strokes-gained putting. He’s moved to seventh in the U.S. Ryder Cup standings. And he’s now fifth in the FedEx Cup standings, having won twice in the same season for the first time since 2011.