A year after Phoenix Open glory, Nick Taylor feels no pressure in title defense

Defending champion Nick Taylor feels as cool, calm, and collected as ever in Phoenix.

SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — There is nothing Nick Taylor wanted to do more than represent his home country at the Presidents Cup last fall. He had never played for the International Team before, so playing for Mike Weir at Royal Montreal would have been a dream come true.

And given what transpired last year at TPC Scottsdale, where Taylor knocked off Charley Hoffman in a playoff, his spot on the team seemed all but guaranteed. He flexed his clutch genes down the stretch, making five birdies over his last two six holes — two being in the playoff — which helped him leap up to 28th in the Official World Golf Rankings and among the top 10 in the FedEx Cup. His path to the Presidents Cup was clear.

He had all of Canada cheering him on too. Eight months before his win at The People’s Open in Scottsdale, Taylor became a Canadian hero. He defeated Tommy Fleetwood by making a 72-footer for eagle to win the 2023 RBC Canadian Open on the fourth extra hole, becoming the first Canadian to win this event in 69 years. It was cause for a national celebration, so much so that tournament officials permanently changed the logo to represent Taylor’s silhouette of his celebration.

All this is to say that Taylor felt an insurmountable amount of pressure after his win in Phoenix in 2024. He kept looking ahead to both the Presidents Cup and the Olympics, worrying about what it would look like if he did not make either team.

“In golf, that’s not a great thing,” Taylor said Tuesday.

With his future weighing on him throughout the spring and summer, Taylor struggled, barely looking like the player who willed his way to victory in Toronto and Scottsdale. He missed the cut at Augusta National, then proceeded to miss the cut at both the PGA Championship and RBC Canadian Open. More missed cuts followed at the U.S. Open and The Open Championship at Royal Troon, and suddenly, Taylor found himself outside of the top 50 in the FedEx Cup standings.

“I think the months leading up to [the Presidents Cup], there was just probably too much pressure putting on myself to try to prove myself to be on that team, even though I was obviously in the standings high enough where I had the potential to have a pick,” Taylor said.

His form was terrible, and Weir decided to pass Taylor by.

“Memphis was disappointing because I did not make the top 50, and then right after that, I did not get a pick [for the International Team]; that was a couple of gut punches, so then I reassessed. I didn’t think I needed to reinvent the wheel with my golf game; I just felt like there was some outside stuff — I felt like the whole thing last year was trying to qualify for things,” Taylor explained Tuesday.

“I just worked a little harder on the mental side, tried to tweak up a few things mechanically in my golf swing, and it’s never a guarantee for success when you come out, but to have a hot start has obviously been nice.”

Those improvements have since helped Taylor immensely. Just last month, he began his 2025 season with a vengeance, winning the Sony Open in Hawaii in — yep, you guessed it — another playoff. He miraculously chipped in on the 18th hole to finish at 16-under, tying Nico Echavarria to force extra holes. Then, on the second playoff hole, Taylor made a terrific up-and-down from 46 yards short of the green while Echavarria three-putted for par, thus giving the Canadian his fifth career PGA Tour victory.

“We’re excited to have a year where I was just playing a normal PGA Tour schedule,” Taylor explained.

“I’m not trying to qualify for the Olympics. I’m not trying to qualify for the Presidents Cup team and have that be in the back of my mind. It’s just let’s go play as good as I can and stick to what I know is best for my game and my results.”

That mentality has paid dividends so far. His win at Waialae secured his schedule for the rest of the year, as Taylor will now play in every Signature Event.

“For me, when I play golf, if I’m trying to protect against bad things or protect a lead, it’s not great for me,” Taylor added.

“I’m better when I’m actually trying to chase things down. I think that’s what I settled into last year, the last few months, of trying to protect the spot I was in on the team or trying not to play bad, which is never a good thing. I’ve tried to learn as much as I can from it and hopefully not kind of settle back into that ever again.”

Whenever defending champions at a tournament speak during their press conference, they often feel tense or pressured to play well in their defense. Regardless of the tournament, the limelight shines brighter on them, adding stress to their week. They’re often placed in featured groups, too, which applies to Taylor this week. He will play alongside Hideki Matsuyama and Jordan Spieth over the first two days.

But Taylor looked as cool, calm, and collected as ever during his press conference in the media center below the TPC Scottsdale clubhouse. The 36-year-old has been doing some soul-searching since being overlooked for the Presidents Cup, and that time spent reflecting has translated into immediate success in 2025. It was easy to recognize too.

“In the past, when I’ve struggled, if I have a poor start, I try to script ‘I’ve got to birdie this hole,’ or ‘I gotta par this or do that,’ and I try to leave that open and let things come. I think it’s helped with the acceptance part of golf, which you definitely need to be high level,” Taylor said.

“A lot of stuff I feel like on the golf course I try to work on is with the mental side, having an open look of the future of essentially in that round, anything is possible.”

Anything is possible — look no further than Taylor’s victories in Toronto, Scottsdale, and Honolulu over the past three years. But this is golf, a sport where everything can come crashing down all at once, which Taylor experienced firsthand as the 2024 season progressed.

Now that he has experienced all of this, learned from it, and applied his strategies to his overall approach, Taylor feels zero pressure this week in the desert. That makes him a dangerous threat, almost as dangerous as his putter in a playoff.

Jack Milko is a golf staff writer for SB Nation’s Playing Through. Follow him on X @jack_milko.