Quail Hollow's Johnny Harris on PGA, handling critics and what's next (a Ryder Cup?)

Scott Fowler, The Charlotte Observer on May 15, 2025

Published in Golf

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CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Quail Hollow Club president Johnny Harris was busy hosting the largest party in Charlotte on Thursday — the first day of the 2025 PGA Championship.

Wearing a coat and tie in 80-degree weather, Harris bustled about supervising all the small problems that crop up when you get 40,000-plus people together in the Queen City. The TVs in the men’s locker room had gotten fried due to a recent lightning strike and needed replacing. Hands needed to be shaken. Fencing needed to be moved.

At lunchtime, though, Harris came inside for a few moments, grabbed a lemonade and did an interview with The Charlotte Observer as Day 1 of golf’s second major of the season rolled on. Here’s an edited version of what Harris said:

— His ideal Sunday scenario this week. “I’d love to see the top five players in the world, yeah, including one guy from LIV (Bryson DeChambeau), and let’s go identify who the best player in the world is right now. And the way you do that is you put them on the golf course (together, in the final groups). That would be wonderful. That would also probably create the largest television audience other than Augusta that we’ve had in golf.”

— Criticism from 6-time PGA Tour winner Hunter Mahan. (Mahan told The Athletic earlier this week that the Quail Hollow course is “like a Kardashian. It’s very modern, beautiful and well-kept. But it lacks a soul or character.”)

“I’m actually going to write him a note and invite him to come here and play,” Harris said of Mahan. “I’m not sure he’s been here recently. So that’s unfortunate.”

Harris later added: “I do think that it’s interesting that Phil Mickelson tells me on Saturday that he’s never played a golf course in as good a condition as this one and he really loves it. ... Golf courses are like beautiful ladies — the beauty is in the eye of the beholder. And also, if you didn’t play well here? In the case of Hunter, he just never did play real well here.”

Mahan last played the PGA Tour event at Quail Hollow in 2021, finishing tied for 54th.

— The weather. “Everybody seems to think we have a real shot now of getting it (done) all the way through. It’s gonna be hot, and there might be an afternoon or evening shower, but that sounds more like Saturday and Sunday. ... You want everyone to come out and enjoy this and see the spectacle, because it’s pretty special. The rain early in the week — it’s just annoying more than anything else. So many people have worked so hard to get the place ready and have it in such pristine condition. ... We’ll have a cleanup that will be a little more challenging, but it’ll all come back.”

— What the winning score might be after 72 holes. “I think the rain is going to make the first day a little easier than than many people expected. ... I think you’re going to see people bang around somewhere in the (minus) 12 range. Maybe it will go down to 8 or 9 (under par), or up to 14.”

— Future tournaments. After this year, the Truist Championship will return to Charlotte at Quail Hollow every year as a regular PGA Tour stop from 2026-2031. Then what happens next is somewhat in flux. Harris would like to get the PGA Championship to return for a third time to Charlotte, sometime in the 2030s. And Harris also has another dream he would love for the 350-member club to fulfill.

“We’ve always, always wanted to try to attract a Ryder Cup,” Harris said of the high-profile biennial team competition between the top golfers from Europe and the United States. “It’s never been to this part of the world — or at least not (recently) — and it would be great to get it to come to a venue in the south. There are only two or three (clubs) that can really handle the kind of size that’s necessary.”