Top Junior Bhatia Will ‘Play To Win’ Valspar Championship

Akshay Bhatia is the world’s top-ranked junior golfer and one of the very best amateurs (along with OSU player Matthew Wolff). The 17-year-old made news twice over rules infractions for using a rangefinder (before it was legal) and for cart use by his caddie. Hey, we all make youthful mistakes.

Flash forward to this week when Bhatia accepted a sponsor exemption into the Valspar Championship. Is the teenager nervous about competing against seasoned Tour players? It doesn’t appear so as Tampa Bay Times Rodney Page reports.

This will be his first PGA tournament. No teenager has won the Valspar Championship. Very few have entered. No amateur has won a PGA Tour event since Phil Mickelson in 1991.

Don’t tell Bhatia that.

“It’s another tournament to me,” said Bhatia, who received a sponsor’s exemption. “I’m not here to just show up and make the cut. I’m here to win.”

Okay!

He plans to bypass college to go straight to professional cut-throat level golf. 

Bhatia’s father, Sonny, knew even before then that his son might have a future in golf. When Akshay was 11 years old, he made it known to his dad that golf was his passion. Sonny doesn’t remember the exact day, but he remembers the exact time.

“In the morning at breakfast I said, ‘Shay, I have your answer. You have to be the first one to the course and the last one to leave.’ I thought an 11-year-old would understand that. He just totally committed to that statement. It went from there.”

On Tuesday, he played nine holes with Jon Rahm, the 10th-ranked golfer in the world. He asked him advice and even needled him a bit.

“On the second hole I hit a 3-iron and he hit 5-wood,” Bhatia said. “He hit it way by me and then said, ‘You might want to tee it up here to catch up with me.’ I had 210 yards and I hit a four-iron to 4 feet. I told him to try to hit inside of that. He didn’t.”

GolfChannel’s Will Gray offers up a more extensive background check.

“I just have so much self-belief in what I do. I mean, that’s the biggest thing in golf,” he said. “I’m stepping up and performing at the level I need to perform. I feel like I have a really good plan, and I’m ready to do it.”

Kids. Gotta love ’em.