Who is Alex Smalley? The 2026 PGA Championship contender whose mom is always watching

The Athletic has dwell protection of Round 3 of the 2026 PGA Championship at Aronimink.

NEWTOWN SQUARE, Pa. — Maria Smalley is hustling up the fitting aspect of the green, an urgency to her motion essential by her son closing in on the lead on the PGA Championship.

“It’s all finally coming together,” she mentioned as she scurries towards the sixth inexperienced at Aroniminkthe place her firstborn ultimately bought up-and-down for par.

But Maria is not simply Alex Smalley’s mom. She’s far more than that to the slender 29-year-old who sits at 4 underneath par at Aronimink, tied for the lead and immediately a high contender to win his first main championship in simply his fifth main begin. She is Smalley’s former caddie. She is typically referred to as his “momager.” And most significantly to the Smalley operation, she masters his intricate statistical system. Maria walks with function to get a great vantage level, so she will be able to correctly doc her son’s spherical.

As the morning wave rolled on, she watched intently for what would change into a rollercoaster of a day. Smalley posted a 33 on his entrance 9, just for his group to get a slow-play warning from an official guidelines as they made the flip, instantly adopted by three bogeys staining his scorecard. But Smalley pressed on, combating Aronimink’s tastes and tough greens to make one other two birdies in his remaining six holes. He in the end carded a 1-under 69. Good information: Smalley has his first main championship lead, tied with Maverick McNealy, and the entire context can be in a post-round log accessible to him earlier than he takes to the course once more Saturday afternoon.

“I’m very pleased with 4 under. It played really difficult the first couple of days with the wind,” Smalley mentioned.

Smalley’s mom has been monitoring his event spherical information since his senior yr of highschool. She did it all through his Duke profession and continued as Smalley rose by means of the ranks {of professional} golf. The ritual may be traced again to a school recruiting journey, when a coach instructed Maria about an app known as Shots to Hole. She’s used it for her son ever since.

At each occasion, on each gap, and over each shot, Maria notes down Smalley’s distance to the flag, his membership choice, and the wind path. All types of variables are logged if accessible — altitude, lie, slope. The major objective is to create an enhanced and what they consider to be a extra correct model of the PGA Tour’s shot-tracking system, ShotLink, so Smalley can consider his play with extra info.

Then eat the iPhone movies. When Smalley desires to evaluation a shot from a earlier spherical or a earlier yr, Maria has them on the prepared. Thousands of movies of Smalley’s swing fill her digicam roll.

“Luckily, I got a new phone back in December,” she mentioned, “Because my other one, I was constantly backing up and deleting stuff. Sometimes I go back and delete certain ones, but it’s funny, because his coach asked me, ‘Do you have anything since like, 5 years ago?’ and I’m like, yes, I do!”

This is the sort of preparation that has led Smalley to put together one of his best runs yet in the professional game. Headed into this week’s PGA Championship, Smalley had four top-10 results this season, including tying for second at the team-format Zurich Classic, and tying for 17th at last week’s Truist Championship. He has qualified for the PGA Championship via the Official World Golf Rankings, where he is ranked No. 78.

Smalley has quietly gained confidence in both himself and his swing over the last several months. He’s happy with the tempo that he’s honed in his move, trying to emulate Adam Scott, and is ranked 12th in proximity to the hole on the PGA Tour. And he’s slowly starting to adjust to the three-ring circus that is life as a professional golfer. Playing in front of crowds like those packed in at Aronimink is a relatively uncomfortable experience for Smalley.

“It’s a special feeling when you could have lots of or 1000’s of eyeballs on you directly. It is usually a little overwhelming. So I simply attempt to go about my enterprise as finest as I can and notice that there is most likely individuals that do not know who I’m, and that is positive, and I simply attempt to preserve going from there,” he mentioned.

Smalley prefers to remain underneath the radar. So when he finds himself in rivalry, he speaks into the microphone with a timid professionalism, as if interviewing for a summer season internship. Golf was always the plan for Smalley, however he was dedicated to Duke, figuring out he’d admire the rigorous lecturers, too. He studied environmental science with a deal with local weather research and gained the Duke’s 2019 Scholar Athlete of the Year award. His father, Terry, spent 22 years working within the pharmaceutical trade, and now works in medicinal chemistry, educating as an assistant professor of biochemistry at Wake Forest on the aspect. Maria obtained her Ph.D. from Duke in 1995 and labored in chemical evaluation: “I used to say, he makes the drugs, and I’d tell him how good of a job he did,” she mentioned. Both mother and father have caddied for Smalley sporadically all through his golf profession.

Smalley graduated from Duke with a 3.6 GPA, All-American honors and three collegiate victories. He made the 2019 Walker Cup group and turned skilled shortly after, incomes his PGA Tour membership by means of the Korn Ferry Tour finals in 2021. He’s maintained his card since, posting 15 top-10 finishes in his final 5 seasons, however has but to carry a trophy as knowledgeable.

Success on a grander stage within the sport is not out of attain for Smalley, though he would not like to speak about it. His caddie, Michael Burns, mentioned Smalley doesn’t vocalize results-oriented objectives. “We try to stay in the moment as much as possible,” Burns mentioned.

As a chance to achieve the highest of the professional golf mountain presents itself this weekend, Smalley can be leaning firmly on that mindset, along with his constant play. And if issues do not pan out? Not to fret. It’ll all be available for a full statistical evaluation, because of Maria.