In September 2025 appearance on the GOLF Subpar podcastPGA Tour analyst-turned-pro Johnson Wagner detailed his best and worst recreations of the year. Golf Channel viewers may recall Wagner’s pick for the worst — a forehand attempt that he dribbled 60 yards over the front of the green during a segment of the PGA Championship at Quail Hollow.
“It was humiliating,” said Wagner in Subpar. “I had my brother, my wife, my son, all his friends were there watching, and it was — it’s brutal to do something like that on live television.”
This week, Wagner returned for another guest appearance at Subpar, and the conversation once again turned to Wagner’s embarrassing moments on the course. But this time, a shot from the open championship at Royal Portrush was top of mind.
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“It wasn’t really a recreation,” Wagner said hosts Colt Knost and Drew Stoltz. “It was earlier in the week, I think it was Wednesday, and it’s like you go out there and make some points.”
Wagner found a nice gap in the game after a group played that included Jordan Spieth and Wyndham Clark and decided to start playing.
“Royal Portrush 16th, par-3 with, it’s down the fairway on the right, just up this massive hill, and our broadcast time is still during the day there and so there’s a lot of people on the golf course playing,” Wagner said. “I think it was Jordan Spieth and Wyndham Clark was 16th, but no one was behind him for about 30 minutes, so I knew I could match it in this time.
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“So as soon as they got off the green, I walked down there, I dropped the ball, and the stands were packed behind the green because of Spieth and Wyndham, but as soon as they got off the green, people started coming out. And so they’re all coming out and I talk about this thing on the hillside and I’m like, just don’t do it in the middle of the front.”
Wagner said he doesn’t like to shout ‘up front’ because of his microphone, but luckily a marshal did it for him.
“The people in the stands, they were like, oh my God, make it stop, make it stop,” he said. “And so I had to go up and talk about this little thing like a bathtub on the left side where you’re going to hit it, and meanwhile my son is with me and he’s like, off camera he had the biggest smile on his face that he had that whole night. It was just, it was catastrophic and it could have, like, been the only time I could have killed somebody.”
For more stories from Wagner, including details on his new role with CBS, watch the full episode of Subpar below.
