{"id":546611,"date":"2026-03-26T15:09:28","date_gmt":"2026-03-26T15:09:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/546611\/"},"modified":"2026-03-26T15:09:28","modified_gmt":"2026-03-26T15:09:28","slug":"collin-morikawa-back-targeting-return-at-valero-texas-open","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/546611\/","title":{"rendered":"Collin Morikawa (back) targeting return at Valero Texas Open"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Mar 24, 2026, 08:03 PM ET<\/p>\n<p><a data-player-guid=\"68ba7252-dda8-08cb-6161-7930f3f163e7\" href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/golf\/player\/_\/id\/10592\/collin-morikawa\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Collin Morikawa<\/a> told ESPN&#8217;s Marty Smith that his recovery from a back issue that forced him to withdraw from the Players Championship continues to go well and he is targeting a return at next week&#8217;s Valero Texas Open.<\/p>\n<p>According to Smith, Morikawa said he &#8220;feels really positive&#8221; for the Masters, which is the following week.<\/p>\n<p>Editor&#8217;s Picks<a name=\"&amp;lpos=story:editorspicks:inline:1\" href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/golf\/story\/_\/id\/48183622\/collin-morikawa-wds-players-championship-back-injury\" class=\"img-link\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/1774537768_229_r1627281_1296x1296_1-1.jpg&#038;w=130&#038;h=130&#038;scale=crop&#038;location=center.jpeg\" width=\"65\" height=\"65\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Morikawa, a two-time major champion, was forced to exit the Players earlier this month after playing only one hole in his opening round. He took a full-speed practice swing on the 11th tee, backed off and then withdrew.<\/p>\n<p>The world No. 8 hasn&#8217;t played competitively since, slowing a season that has seen him land three top-10 finishes and a victory at the Pebble Beach Pro-Am.<\/p>\n<p>Morikawa also is part of the Los Angeles Golf Club TGL team that took on Jupiter Links in the finals this week but wasn&#8217;t able to take part because of injury.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mar 24, 2026, 08:03 PM ET Collin Morikawa told ESPN&#8217;s Marty Smith that his recovery from a back&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":519419,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[71],"tags":[427,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-546611","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-golf","8":"tag-golf","9":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/546611","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=546611"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/546611\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/519419"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=546611"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=546611"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=546611"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}