Sergio On Nick Watney: "There's a lot of other people that probably deserved [COVID-19] a lot more than him"

On a white board somewhere in Ponte Vedra Beach, there was a list of reasons why PGA Tour needed to be careful in returning before most American sports.

I think we’d all agree that a top 3 lock sounded something like player and caddie safety in a time of pandemic. Next, there was surely something about doing damage to efforts at keeping golf or all other sports viable. Shoot, maybe something about not hurting the image of the game. Well, the PGA Tour.

Anyway, I’m fairly certain another top three reason would have been wishing the virus on a fellow player. Actually, no one in their right mind would think a player might…oh, wait, you said Sergio’s playing this week?

Sigh.

Following a third round 65 that has him two strokes off the RBC Heritage, Sergio Garcia accomplished at least one thing: he got Rory McIlroy out of the lead for the week’s Most Regrettable Comment.

From GolfDigest.com’s Daniel Rapaport on Garcia telling how he felt for Nick Watney testing positive for COVID-19, including how he gave him a ride on his jet and had a scary 4 1/2 wait for a test result.

“I felt terrible for Nick because he's probably one of the nicest guys on Tour,” Garcia said after shooting 65 on Saturday. “Unfortunately, it had to happen to him. So there's a lot of other people that probably deserved it a lot more than him, and he's the one that got it.”

Garcia did not, unfortunately, elaborate further as to which PGA Tour player deserves COVID-19 more than Watney.