By Daniel Rapaport
SANDWICH, England — Collin Morikawa is a multiple-major winner, Jordan Spieth remains the best show in golf, and the Open Championship scratched a links-golf itch two years in the making. There is much to discuss. Here are 18 parting thoughts from Royal St. George’s.

1: We start, as always, with the winner. Coming into this week, the scouting report on Collin Morikawa read something like: very solid off the tee, incredible iron player, poor putter. The chief support for that description is found in the PGA Tour’s stat ecosystem, which has him leading strokes gained/tee-to-green and 172nd in strokes gained/putting for the 2020-21 season. And yet, he now has two major championships to his name and putted beautifully in both. At TPC Harding Park last August, he led the field in strokes gained/putting, the only time he’s ever done that, en route to winning this PGA Championship title. The Open did not offer putting statistics, but the man himself felt it was “as solid as it’s going to get,” and the eye test confirms. You have to think he’d have ranked somewhere inside the top 10.

“Yeah, everything about my stats say I’m not a good putter statistically,” Morikawa said on Sunday. “I feel like I can get a lot better. But in these situations, I feel like everything is thrown off the table. Forget about all your stats … who can perform well in these situations? That’s why I think over the past few majors you’ve seen a lot of the same names up there, because they believe in their game, they know what they’re doing when they practice, and they’re able to bring it out in these big moments.”

Stephen Pond/R&A

Perhaps we should take a hint from Brooks Koepka and start truly conceptualizing major championship golf and PGA Tour golf as two entirely separate entities. The “major gear” is absolutely a real thing; so while PGA Tour Collin might not be the best putter, Major Championship Collin is doing just fine.

2: This one stung Louis Oosthuizen. As my colleague John Huggan noted, the South African already looked perturbed while fielding questions about his near-misses on Saturday. No matter how even-keeled he appears on the exterior, it’s only natural to be extremely frustrated after being so tantalizingly close so many times. Unlike last month at Torrey Pines, however, Oosthuizen did not play well enough to win. He was tentative from the first hole on Sunday and, after opening with 64-65, managed only level par on the weekend. It’s much easier to accept a loss when you’ve put your best foot forward and simply gotten beat. But Oosthuizen knows his play worsened as the lights brightened, and he left without speaking to reporters Sunday evening.

3: After a gasp-inducing missed two-footer on the 18th green to end his round on Saturday, Jordan Spieth pulled an all-time relatable move by bringing his putter with him back to the crib for some late-night stroke-grooving. He said Sunday that, after resisting the urge to break something, he hit close to 500 puts the prior evening. The only question is, just how relatable was it? Does he travel with some fancy putting mat, or did he place a cut-out solo cup on the ground 10 feet away, figure out which way the rug breaks and send his ball hopping down the carpet? We prefer the latter image.

4: Another week, another Bryson controversy that has nothing to do with his actual golf. Actually, two. The first came before the event started, when he received a question about shouting fore and clapped back like a cornered cat. Next came a particularly self-inflicted wound, publicly calling out the company that pays him millions after hitting just four of 14 fairways. This was fiery fodder for headline writers and social-media commenters, and Bryson’s stock had taken yet another dip.

Andrew Redington

The reaction on the ground differed considerably. The vast majority of fans held no hard feelings at all. When he left the driving range, a solid half of the fans followed him. They welcomed him to every tee box and jostled for a better view. The crowds do not live deep inside the media ecosystem; they do not dissect every word he says with forensic fastidiousness. They see a guy who looks different and swings different. They see someone who breaks the monotony of the umpteen tour pros who all bleed together, and they love him for it. Of course, a vocal minority makes their presence known, even across the pond. But when you zoom out from the super inside-golf circles, it’s clear there is more pro-Bryson people than anti. A certain statistic comes to mind, even if it’s a few years old: in April 2019, the Pew Research Center found that less than a fourth of American adults use Twitter. There is a big, big world outside of the social-media vortex.

5: Speaking of Bryson, and at the risk of sounding blissfully naïve, this week seemed something of a turning point. Perhaps it happened Friday night, when he issued a rather remarkable statement. Consider the circumstances: Ben Schomin, a Cobra rep who caddied for DeChambeau in the Rocket Mortgage Classic, likened his employer’s biggest star to an 8-year-old and called his comments “that stupid”… and then Bryson is the one who apologizes. Schomin’s comments were not made by accident, and it’s unlikely he went rogue—reading between the lines, the Cobra folks had reached something of a breaking point. Perhaps having his biggest sponsor fire back caused something to click in his head.

“I’m 27, I’m human, I make mistakes,” DeChambeau said. “Yesterday was another one of those. I continue to keep making mistakes, unfortunately. It’s frustration. Not thinking the right way, saying the right things. I’ve messed up in my career, and every time I mess up, I learn from it. This is another learning moment … in regards to the media, I’ve struggled sometimes with the words I say, and it’s my fault.”

Bryson clearly does not enjoy being at the centre of this media merry-go-round. Maybe he used to, but he certainly doesn’t anymore. After his round on Friday, he looked mentally exhausted and expressed a wish for all the non-golf noise to quiet down. It’s possible, so long as he accepts responsibility for his past fracases and stops shooting himself in the foot.

6: There are no more majors until the Ryder Cup. Outsiders still have the Olympics and FedEx Cup playoffs to impress in, but both captains know that neither of those events will come as close to replicating Ryder Cup pressure like the majors do. So let’s take our latest, greatest guess as to who will be on each team. These are not who we’d pick, necessarily, rather who we think will be at Whistling Straits:

USA: Collin Morikawa, Dustin Johnson, Justin Thomas, Brooks Koepka, Bryson DeChambeau, Xander Schauffele, Jordan Spieth, Patrick Reed, Tony Finau, Patrick Cantlay, Phil Mickelson, Harris English

Europe: Jon Rahm, Rory McIlroy, Tyrrell Hatton, Viktor Hovland, Matt Fitzpatrick, Tommy Fleetwood, Paul Casey, Lee Westwood, Shane Lowry, Ian Poulter, Sergio Garcia, Robert MacIntyre

7: In the two years since Royal Portrush, golf fans have become accustomed to a certain standard of technological offering. The PGA Tour has since launched TourCast—every office manager’s worst nightmare—for it allows fans to real-time track every single group. The Masters has a similar tracking feature and almost instantaneously posts video of every shot hit. The U.S. Open and PGA aren’t quite on the same level, but they have developed live tracking within their apps and also now provide strokes-gained data, the lifeblood of golf stats nerds everywhere. The Open has fallen woefully behind in this department. There is no live tracking of any holes, and the only stats available on the website are the now-antiquated fairways hit, greens in regulation and putting average. For one of the world’s biggest golf tournament to, in 2021, still be stuck in the analog age defies belief—especially with the rise of golf betting, when so many have interest in analyzing advanced statistics and watching players outside the featured groups, the R&A must modernize to provide a better experience for those following from their couches.

8: We’re left to wonder, then, what Collin Morikawa’s strokes gained/approach would have been for his second-round 64. He did pour in two longer-range putts—he made it quite easy to categorize “long-range” this week, for he switched from his “saw” to a conventional grip for putts he felt needed some hit—but he also missed two shorties on 15 and 18. Most of the damage came with the irons. Every shot flew directly through its intended window; he holstered his club by his side, always an indicator of a flush, almost immediately after impact. It wasn’t a surprise, given Morikawa is currently having the best non-Tiger approach season since the PGA Tour started measuring such things. Coming into this week, his lead over No. 2 in strokes gained approach, Paul Casey, was larger than Casey’s lead over No. 55, Jason Kokrak. And yet even for him, that was an exceptional ball-striking day.

9: Given the hot-take climate of the modern media space, there’s an urge to chalk up Rory McIlroy’s major drought—now guaranteed to carry into its eighth year—to some larger narrative. On Friday, a journalist proposed the theory that he might be trying too hard to add that fifth major. McIlroy’s response was telling:

“Not at all. I’ve got four of them. Geez, look, I’ve got—I’m the luckiest guy in the world. I get to do what I love for a living. I have a beautiful family. My life is absolutely perfect at the minute. I want for nothing, so it’s not a case of trying too hard for sure.”

Charlie Crowhurst/R&A

If all you care about is Rory winning majors, those won’t be your favourite seven sentences to read. Fans expect their athletes to be unsatisfied and hungry—“I just want more,” as 24-year-old Morikawa put it after his victory. But McIlroy is not 24, and who among us cannot understand a gazillionaire athlete who’s already a Hall of Famer perhaps not feeling the same urgency he did a decade ago? Is enjoying what you’ve earned the worst thing in the world?

10: Pardon the self-centredness of this next item—there are no shortage of “American goes to The Open for the first time” articles—so I’ll keep it brief. The best way I can summarise the difference between this and the other three majors is that this brings to mind a big, jolly county fair where everyone has gathered to watch the golf. There is a noticeable lack of pretension, a sense that the tournament doesn’t take itself too seriously, and that starts with the walk to the golf course. From the Sandwich town center, one follows a two-foot wide concrete path over a bridge, under a canopy of bushes, into an open field, and under another canopy of bushes, guided only by the occasional inoffensive sign, before stumbling upon Royal St. George’s.

Quarantine over—and not your average walk to the golf course this morning.

I love this tournament already. pic.twitter.com/WmoZLzSnSv

— Daniel Rapaport (@Daniel_Rapaport) July 12, 2021

There’s not nearly as much corporate hospitality by the clubhouse (potentially a nod to the COVID protocols that the U.K. government had in place) and hardly any visible advertising on the actual golf course. The fans seem more concerned with how many birdies they’ve seen than how many beers they’ve had. They scream less.

11: The Sandwich town centre, one of the best-preserved Medieval towns in Britain, redefines quaint. Think of the most English town possible, and then add some more England, and you’re nearly there. At the heart of town is a church from 1300s. Interspersed throughout the area are cobblestone streets far too narrow for cars. Thomas Paine’s original cottage—you’ll recall him from U.S. history class—sits on the main thoroughfare. Toward the edge of town lies a perfectly manicured crop of grass … for lawn bowling. Around the exterior runs a town wall that’s straight out of “Game of Thrones.” On Saturday morning, after housing a classic British breakfast of eggs, bacon (it’s thick here) and tomatoes, I stepped outside to see a choir of middle-aged men singing old folk songs on the lawn of that church. It was, as they say, quite lovely.

A sunny Saturday in Sandwich.

I absolutely adore this tournament. pic.twitter.com/TnnNroA83A

— Daniel Rapaport (@Daniel_Rapaport) July 17, 2021

12: Jordan Spieth summed up his love for links golf after shooting 65 on Friday: “instead of just a driving-range shot in Palm Springs, there’s always some shot you have to play that gives you a little bit of an advantage or certain club selections based on you hit a fade or a draw; they go 15 to 20 yards different distances than between which shot you play. I guess to sum that up, there’s a lot of external factors over here, and I think that external is where I need to be living.”

We could try to dissect the concept of “living external,” but such a profound nugget warrants a dissertation-level analysis, and we don’t have time for that. Instead, let’s focus on Palm Springs. Palm Springs! What did Palm Springs ever do to anyone? In all seriousness, it’s kind of hilarious how Palm Springs has emerged as the placeholder for Average, Toothless PGA Tour Layout. It makes sense—the old Desert Classic is held in January, when winds are typically down. The courses don’t have much bite and they’re set up with even less bite to accommodate the amateurs in the field. Since 2009, the average winning score is 25.5 under par. Last year, Jim “Bones” Mackay cited our defenseless California enclave while lavishing praise on Matt Fitzpatrick’s game: “It might not be as great in Palm Springs, but my goodness … you get to the U.S. Open, you get to these tough courses with some rough, and he can do a lot of damage.” Next time you want to criticize an unimaginative golf course, you know which to compare it to.

13: We can all learn a lesson in acceptance from Marcel Siem. The fist-pumping, man-bun-sporting 41-year-old from Germany who the cameras could not look away from this week. Siem has four European Tour titles and a brief stint inside the world top 50 on his résumé. After that fourth victory, he decided life as an occasional winner wasn’t cutting it, tried to start swinging like Dustin Johnson, and fell off the golfing planet. The Open marked the 13th straight week he played a tournament, and 10 of those came on the bare-bones Challenge Tour—so bare-bones that he didn’t have a caddie for half those events. Here was a 40-year-old man, with millions in career earnings, lugging his own bag around fan-less tournaments in the minor leagues.

Harry Trump/R&A

“Richard Bland, Gregory Havret—there’s a lot guys in my age going back to the Challenge Tour,” Siem said Friday. “If you don’t accept that you lost your card, and you still think you’re a European Tour player, and there should be a caddie around you, and you should be play for €2 million, you cannot compete on the Challenge Tour. There’s no chance. You’re grumpy, you’re upset all the time. Once you make friends on the Challenge Tour and accept that’s where I am, that’s the only way forward. I’m so happy that I understood that. … You have to show the Challenge Tour some respect.”

In related news, Siem won on the Challenge Tour the week before the Open and, with his excellent T-15 at Royal St. George’s, assured a return to the European Tour. None of it would’ve happened had he not banished his pride and welcomed his new reality. The past is exactly that. It’s what happens next that determines your future.

14: In other Challenge Tour news … any Challenge Tour player who made the cut this week had 10 percent of his prize money count toward the Challenge Tour points race. This has an outsized effect, as the purse for the Open is more than €9 million, while the average purse on the Challenge Tour is between €200,000 and €300,000. Thus, a top-10 finish at the Open holds way more weight than a top-10 finish in the Challenge de Caiz. As it should! The exposure guys like Siem and big Jonathan “Jigger” Thompson provided the second-level circuit simply by having the words “Challenge Tour” said on the broadcast alone warrants the points bump, to say nothing of the gaping divide in field strength.

Contrast this with the Korn Ferry Tour’s major policy, or lack thereof. At last month’s U.S. Open, Taylor Montgomery and Dylan Wu both made the cut at Torrey Pines and woke up Monday morning further from getting their PGA Tour cards. It may sound like a niche, inside-golf problem, but it’s a problem nonetheless, and one with a clear solution.

15: Another major came and went without much of a word from Justin Thomas (T-40) or Patrick Cantlay (missed cut), two of the top seven players in the World Ranking. Thomas looked poised for a fruitful summer after winning the Players Championship with a scintillating display in March, but he failed to even semi-contend at any of the big four: a T-21 at the Masters, a missed cut at the PGA, a T-19 at the U.S. Open, to go along with the quiet week at Royal St. George’s. He now has just two-10 finishes in his last 10 major starts; for a middle-of-the-road PGA Tour player, that’s solid. For someone like Thomas, who continues to pick off PGA Tour events at a breakneck pace, it’s highly disappointing.

Mike Hewitt

Cantlay has been even worse on the big stage, which makes hardly any sense given how well-rounded his game his. His ranks on the PGA Tour this season, where he came into the week leading the FedEx Cup: 14th in SG/off the tee, 25th in SG/approach, ninth in SG/around the green, 53rd in SG/putting, sixth in SG/overall. He’s always a trendy pick coming into the majors and has repeatedly let down his backers, with missed cuts at the Masters and the Open sandwiching a T-23 at the PGA and a T-15 at the U.S. Open.

16: Royal St. George’s won’t find its way onto many people’s bucket list, and it took its share of subtle daggers from players all week. (And one not-so subtle dagger from Brooks Koepka, never one to beat around the bush). It does, however, feature one of the great holes in championship golf. The par-4 fifth, dubbed “Sea Hole,” is a masterclass in design. The hole turns left. Bold tee shots that challenge a venomous bunker left of the fairway are rewarded by a flat lie on a plateau, and a view of the green through two massive dunes. Bail out right and your ball will find its way to a hollowed-out valley, leaving a completely blind and much longer second shot. Once you trudge between those dunes, you’re treated with your first proper view of the sea. Adding to its mystique is the role it played in an all-time quirky Open memory: in 1948, Harry Bradshaw’s drive rolled onto parts of broken glass. He didn’t know the rule and there wasn’t an official around, so he took a whack. It didn’t work, he made double, and wound up losing in a playoff.

17: Matthias Schmid impressed in winning the Silver Medal, beating out Yuxin Lin for the low-amateur honours. And he did so while following rule No. 1 of being a Low Amateur: you must wear a hat you picked up in the tournament merchandise tent.

GLYN KIRK

18: Let’s hope it never happens again, for if it does, something terrible has likely happened. But we’ve been treated to seven major championships in 11 months and precisely zero of them produced an off-the-wall winner. There was no Ben Curtis here. We had: Collin, Bryson, Dustin, Hideki, Phil—still can’t quite believe Phil—Rahm and Collin. It’s been a breakneck, adrenaline-addled stretch, and the comedown’s about to be real. We’re now faced with 263 long days until Augusta … oh wait, we still have two more women’s majors, the Olympics and two bi-annual exhibitions where the golfers scream more than usual. That comedown can wait at least a few months more.

The post Collin Morikawa finds his ‘major gear’ and 17 other parting thoughts from Royal St. George’s appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Joel Beall
There are a number of players missing from this Open Championship, but—with all respect to those not making the trip to Sandwich—most of the game’s marquee names remain in the field at Royal St. George’s, and a pack of them will be paired together during the Open’s first and second rounds.

Before you ask, no, Brooks Koepka and Bryson DeChambeau are not in the same group. As discussed at Torrey Pines; this is for the best; better to let that rivalry manifest over the weekend when it matters most rather than during the fleeting nature of a Thursday or Friday. So as we wait and pray for that heavyweight battle to come to fruition, here are 11 pairings to keep us entertained during the first two rounds of the Open Championship.

7:41 am local Thursday/2:41 am EDT — Viktor Hovland, Ryan Palmer, Thomas Detry

Hovland is making his Open debut, and historically this is a tournament that favors—and arguably requires—experience. Conversely, what has made Hovland so good so early in his career is a blissful disregard to his surroundings, beholden to an inner command known only to him. Better yet, compared to the other majors, lights-out putting is not a prerequisite for contention, pacifying one of Hovland’s few weak spots. Throw in Palmer’s continued late-career revival and a red-hot Detry (two T-2s in past four starts) don’t be surprised if these names are on the early board.

8:03 am/3:03 am — Brooks Koepka, Jason Kokrak, Garrick Higgo

There’s a “weapons of mass destruction” joke in here, but these three are more than muscle. Kokrak is fighting like hell for a U.S. Ryder Cup captain’s pick and a top-five finish would move him from the “charming story that, realistically, doesn’t have a shot” category to “about to burst some star’s bubble” list of contenders. … Higgo is in a bit of a slump with three missed cuts in his last four starts; he’s also won three times since late April so maybe we should keep an eye on him, yes? … As for the third player, let’s save our words for later in the week. Because this is a major and this is Brooks Koepka, so you better believe we’ll be talking about him in greater capacity come Saturday.

9:25 am/4:25 am — Jordan Spieth, Bryson DeChambeau, Branden Grace

Aspiring gamblers could find a worse dark horse than Grace, who is back from the wilderness with a win earlier this year along with a fourth-place finish at the Memorial and T-7 at the U.S. Open. … Augusta National is his playground but the Open has been just as kind to Spieth, and Royal St. George’s profile and past point to that providence continuing this week. The only thing keeping him from contending come Saturday will be finding himself in the wrong weather wave. … As for Bryson, this week ends with DeChambeau winning by three, forcing the R&A to convene an emergency session to declare persimmon and balata will be mandated at next year’s Open at St. Andrews OR Bryson becomes so flummoxed by the wind and ground game that he walks off the course and into the sea. There is no in-between.

9:58 am/4:58 am — Shane Lowry, Jon Rahm, Louis Oosthuizen

No matter what happens on the score card, this will be a long-overdue victory lap for Lowry. … Rahm will be treated with just as much love coming off his U.S. Open conquest. And amidst that parade Louis will very quietly put together two solid rounds to find himself near the lead because apparently that’s a bylaw for majors now.

David Cannon/R&A

10:20 am/5:20 am — Dustin Johnson, Will Zalatoris, Justin Rose

With two months to go before Ryder Cup rosters are finalized, Rose is shockingly on the outside looking in. He also has top-10s at the Masters and PGA, and a third this week can justify a captain’s pick against a blah record the rest of the year. … Speaking of Zalatoris, despite his strong season he’s trending to be snubbed for Whistling Straits. Yet if he contends at Royal St George’s, that would be four top-10s—highlighted by the Masters runner-up—in his past five major starts. And that is a hard, hard line to bypass. … Sticking with the theme, Johnson has his Ryder Cup spot locked up. He also hasn’t finished better than T-10 since February, which by DJ standards is a drought. Royal St. George’s is the site of one of Johnson’s major misses; can his putter wake up from its slumber (71st in putting this season) to give the 37-year-old his long-awaited payback?

1:04 pm/8:04 am — Patrick Cantlay, Matthew Fitzpatrick, Ryan Fox

Cantlay has finished no better than T-15 in his last eight major starts. Fitzpatrick hasn’t logged a major top-10 finish in his last 21 outings. Both are too talented for these streaks to continue.

1:26 pm/8:26 am — Collin Morikawa, Corey Conners, Sebastian Munoz

Morikawa leads the tour in SG/approach by a mile. Conners ranks top 10 in the category (eighth). Munoz is a fine player coming off a strong performance (T-4 at the John Deere Classic) but legitimately worried the poor guy is going to quit after watching Morikawa and Conners pepper flagsticks for two days.

2:48 pm/9:48 am — Phil Mickelson, Tyrrell Hatton, Kevin Kisner

In one sense it’s unfair to Mickelson to view what happened at Kiawah as proof the man can still get it done, rather than recognize what he did defied all we thought we knew about age and sport. In other words, to treat that moment for just that, a moment, instead of extrapolating what is next for Phil. HOWEVER, experience matters at the Open. Creativity matters. Understanding bad breaks are inevitable and possessing the fortitude it takes to bounce back from them really, really matters. In short there’s a decent chance the magic from Kiawah comes alive again in Kent, where Mickelson finished T-2 the last time the claret jug visited Royal St. George’s … As for Hatton and Kisner, our only wish is that Kisner pays tribute to Hatton with his own disgusted club toss at some point. Game recognise game, after all.

GLYN KIRK

2:59 pm/9:59 am — Xander Schauffele, Robert MacIntyre, Rickie Fowler

With Rahm capturing the U.S. Open Schauffele is now the best under-40 player to not have a major. That he’s ditching his ill-fated arm-lock experiment should help the cause … Fowler has shown signs of life over the past six weeks, and did contend at the 2011 Open (T-5). Fowler’s success in the wind is a bit overstated but it’s also not wrong, which is why this week could be the turning point so many hope comes … The Euro cognoscenti desperately wants MacIntyre to be the next big thing. He’s not far away from such status, proving his mettle at the 2019 Open (T-6) and playing well at a number of venues this year. His game is not necessary pretty, yet it’s at its best when things get ugly, the type of game that so often decides who grabs the claret jug.

3:10 pm/10:10 am — Justin Thomas, Tommy Fleetwood, Adam Scott

I know the golf gods are not just but it seems criminal these three men have a combined two majors.

3:21 pm/10:21 am — Rory McIlroy, Patrick Reed, Cameron Smith

Rory McIlroy is an Open champ. He is the fulcrum of the European Ryder Cup team. He is everything a fan could want in a player avatar. So we have no idea what McIlroy did or who he betrayed to get thrown into the crossfire of Reed and Smith, two players who have an interesting past. (Smith called out Reed for his penalty for moving sand at the Hero World Challenge in 2019, then the two exchanged words shortly after at the Presidents Cup.) But if McIlroy traverses this minefield without incident, no one is stopping him from snapping his seven-year major slump.

The post DeChambeau-Spieth, a trio of bombers and a bad-blood pairing highlight our 11 favourite groups at Royal St. George’s appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Christopher Powers
For much of the early portion of his career, Dustin Johnson suffered nothing but heartbreak in major championships. After awhile, there was a feeling that the golf gods were simply conspiring against this all-time great talent on the four biggest weeks of the year.

First came the 2010 U.S. Open at Pebble Beach, where Johnson entered the final round leading by three shots and promptly shot a Sunday 82 that featured a pair of duffed chips, a missed two footer and a lost ball… on the first three holes. Two months later, BunkerGate at the PGA at Whistling Straits.

The following summer, at Royal St George’s, site of this week’s Open Championship, Johnson played alongside Darren Clarke in the final group. After a rough start, he climbed back into contention early on the back nine, then hit one out of bounds from the middle of the 14th fairway and made double bogey. His next truly close call came at the 2015 U.S. Open at Chambers Bay, where he three-putted on the crispy 72nd green to miss out on an 18-hole playoff with Jordan Spieth.

Bad bounces, unlucky breaks and overall terrible energy was all Johnson knew in the majors for a long time. Finally, at the 2016 U.S. Open at Oakmont, that changed, though it also sort of didn’t. Early in the final round, a video of Johnson seemingly causing his ball to move became the latest sign that this whole major thing just wasn’t going to work out for DJ. He was ultimately penalized after having the potential penalty hang over his head the entire day, but, luckily, he still won by three.

There was, however, one good break for Johnson on that Sunday, and you better believe he remembers it very well.

“The one that sticks out, probably getting a drop on No. 10 at Oakmont,” Johnson said on Wednesday at The Open. “I think that was on Sunday, too. Because of the sign or the TV tower being in my way. Obviously it gave me a chance to hit it on the green, where I probably wouldn’t have been able to hit it on the green from where I was.”

The moment Johnson is referring to did occur on Sunday at the par-4 10th, where Johnson missed the fairway so badly with his drive that he nearly ended up in the ninth fairway down the left side. His ball came to rest in an impossibly thick lie in the rough that would have forced him to just chop it back out into the fairway, but Johnson called for a rules official, as there was a TV tower directly between his ball and his line to the green. He was granted line of sight relief, which allowed him to drop the ball in the first cut of the ninth fairway:

At the time, this seemed like a bit of a gaming-the-system type move, especially when Johnson wound up hitting it directly over the TV tower anyway and wound up making par. But, as David Fay perfectly explained in the clip, he was entitled to the relief he got and is not required to play the shot a certain way. Also, wasn’t DJ owed one? No wonder he remembers this good break so well. It’s one of the only ones the golf gods have ever given him.

The post Dustin Johnson recalled his best break in a major (yes, he had a good break in a major once) appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Daniel Rapaport
SANDWICH, England — Hideki Matsuyama, the reigning Masters champion, became the latest player to withdraw from the 149th Open Championship at Royal St. George’s, the R&A announced on Sunday. He will be replaced in the field by Harold Varner III.

Matsuyama was forced to withdraw prior to the second round of last week’s Rocket Mortgage Classic when he tested positive for COVID-19. He went into quarantine in an effort to be able to play in the Open, and says he is symptom-free. However, he had continued to test positive for the virus in subsequent PCR tests.

“I’m feeling fine but haven’t been able to practice in preparation for the Open,” the 29-year-old said. “Combining that with the difficult travel to the U.K., my team and I have decided it’s best to withdraw to ensure everyone’s safety. I feel badly missing the Open and look forward to playing again at St. Andrews next year. I’d like to thank the many golf fans for their continued concern and support as I strive to return to the game I love as soon as possible.”

The news comes a day after three other players withdrew: Matthew Wolff, who did not cite a reason; K.H. Lee, who will miss the action due to the birth of his child; and Danny Lee, who pulled out with an injury.

There are now five players ranked inside the world’s top 50 that will not tee it up at Royal St. George’s. In addition to Matsuyama and Wolff, Sungjae Im and Si-Woo Kim opted to skip the year’s final major to focus on the Olympics, where a medal would exempt them from mandatory South Korean military service. Kevin Na will not make the trip due to “travel restrictions.”

The first alternate for the Open is now Brendan Steele, with fellow Americans John Catlin and Adam Long behind him in the pecking order should there be more withdrawals.

The post Hideki Matsuyama withdraws after continued positive COVID-19 tests appeared first on Golf Digest Middle East.

By Derek Duncan
Golf is an enduring, addictive game precisely because success requires both ability and some rub-of-the-green good fortune. This is never truer than on links courses, where the bounce and scurry of the ball is the heart and soul of the game. With their firm, crinkled fairways and punishing hazards that seem random only until experienced in every conceivable wind, the links are the ultimate scales balancing luck against ability.

OUR DRONE VIDEO TOUR OF THE 2021 OPEN VENUE

Of all the great tournament links of Great Britain, Royal St. George’s—Sandwich to friends, named for the nearest town in southeast England—is the most opaque, rumpled and confounding. The routing spins players like a blindfolded child en route to a piñata, ensuring the blustery winds gusting off the English Channel pummel all sides equally. There are high holes and low, shots fired across the bows of high dunes and caterpillar fairways likely to buck otherwise straight drives into fits of misfortune.

Royal St. George’s—ranked 28th in Golf Digest’s World 100 rankings—offers no blueprint for scoring well other than to strike the ball solidly, hole some putts and pray that on your day the gaze of providence is a caring one. It’s no wonder that during Open Championships the pros do little more than grit their teeth and bare it, sensing that much of what they do is beyond their control. Anything can happen at Royal St. George’s, and does. It’s how champions like Harry Vardon, Walter Hagen, Bobby Locke and Greg Norman are crowned. It also explains Jack White, Reg Whitcombe, Ben Curtis and a 42-year-old Darren Clarke in 2011.

This is the promise of Royal St. George’s: that across some of the most attractive and alluring linksland in golf, something fantastic and mystifying is likely to occur. No matter how skilled we are, what we really want from golf is a chance. And at Royal St. George’s, there’s always a chance.

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By Joel Beall
Cameron Davis can take solace that his marriage is not the first to put the kibosh on a golf trip.

Davis, who captured his first PGA Tour win days ago at the Rocket Mortgage Classic, was listed as an alternate for next week’s Open Championship. On Thursday morning that standing granted Davis a spot in the Open field, as Kevin Na dropped out due to the myriad travel restrictions facing players making their way to Royal St. George’s.

However, the R&A announced Na’s position would be filled not by Davis but by two-time major winner Martin Kaymer because Davis was “unable to travel.” Following his first round at the John Deere Classic Thursday—where Davis posted a 4-under 67—Davis clarified why he had to pass.

Chiefly, because he can’t leave the country … thanks to tying the knot.

“Yeah, I got married last year in September and decided to start the green card process to make travelling in and out of the country so much easier,” Davis explained. “But, unfortunately, six months I’m not going to be able to leave the States while that’s getting processed. That means I’m not able to go next week.”

That, my friends, is a tough swallow. We suppose this is more of a bureaucratic red tape issue than one relating to matrimony, although the latter led to the former so we’ll let you be the judge of that.

The 28-year-old Aussie has played in the Open just once in his career, turning in a respectable T-39 in his debut at Carnoustie in 2018, and clearly his game is trending in the right direction. If there’s any comfort, Davis will at least spend next week getting a chance to take in last week’s breakthrough.

“’I’m looking forward to seeing my family and celebrating back in Seattle next week and recharging a little bit because this week is already a bit of a grind to get through,” Davis said. “I’m pretty tired. It’ll be nice to relax.”

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The governing body has introduced new categories to help round out the field. All players not already exempt that meet these criteria will be added:

• Top 50 on the Official World Golf Ranking as of May 23

• Top five players (and ties) among the top 20 in the FedEx Cup standings after the 2021 Travelers Championship

• A minimum of eight sports via regional and final qualifying, which will take place in June (more info on these events will come at a later date).

“In light of these exceptional circumstances, we have carefully reviewed our exemption categories and made adjustments so that players can earn places in the Championship from results achieved in both the 2020 and 2021 seasons as well as retaining opportunities through our qualifying events,” said Johnnie Cole-Hamilton, the R&A’s executive director of championships.

In addition, the R&A noted that its use of tournaments on various tour around the world that it has dubbed Open Qualifying Series events, will not be in place for additional exemptions into the 2021 Open. These would include a handful of summer PGA Tour events where the top two or three finishers in the tournament not already into the Open would qualify.

Here is a complete list of the exemption categories and all players who have already qualified (players can qualify in multiple categories, names are bold in the one in which they first qualify).

Open Champions aged 60 or under on 19 July 2020
Mark Calcavecchia, Ian Baker-Finch, John Daly, Justin Leonard, Paul Lawrie, Tiger Woods, David Duval, Ernie Els, Ben Curtis, Todd Hamilton, Padraig Harrington, Stewart Cink, Louis Oosthuizen, Darren Clarke, Phil Mickelson, Rory McIlroy, Zach Johnson, Henrik Stenson, Jordan Spieth, Francesco Molinari, Shane Lowry

•••

Open Champions for 2010-2019
2010 – Louis Oosthuizen, 2011 – Darren Clarke, 2012 – Ernie Els, 2013 – Phil Mickelson, 2014 – Rory McIlroy, 2015 – Zach Johnson, 2016 – Henrik Stenson, 2017 – Jordan Spieth, 2018 – Francesco Molinari, 2019 – Shane Lowry

•••

First 10 and anyone tying for 10th place in The 148th Open at Royal Portrush in 2019
Shane Lowry, Tommy Fleetwood, Tony Finau, Brooks Koepka, Lee Westwood, Rickie Fowler, Robert MacIntyre, Tyrrell Hatton, Danny Willett, Patrick Reed

•••

The first 50 players on the OWGR for Week 21, 2021
To be taken from the Official World Golf Rankings on May 23 2021

•••

The first 30 in the final Race to Dubai rankings for 2019
Jon Rahm, Tommy Fleetwood, Bernd Wiesberger, Shane Lowry, Matt Fitzpatrick, Rory McIlroy, Matt Wallace, Louis Oosthuizen, Tyrrell Hatton, Erik van Rooyen, Robert MacIntyre, Marcus Kinhult, Victor Perez, Kurt Kitayama, Danny Willett, Benjamin Hebert, Matthias Schwab, Christiaan Bezuidenhout, Mike Lorenzo-Vera, Jorge Campillo, Sergio Garcia, Paul Waring, Rafa Cabrera-Bello, Romain Langasque, Joost Luiten, Justin Harding, Ian Poulter, Paul Casey, Haotong Li, Francesco Molinari

•••

The first 10 in the final Race to Dubai rankings for 2020
Lee Westwood, Matt Fitzpatrick, Patrick Reed, Tommy Fleetwood, Collin Morikawa, Victor Perez, Christiaan Bezuidenhout, Aaron Rai, Tyrrell Hatton, Louis Oosthuizen

•••

BMW PGA Championship winners for 2017-2020
2017 – Alex Noren, 2018 – Francesco Molinari, 2019 – Danny Willett, 2020 – Tyrrell Hatton

•••

The first 5 European Tour members and any European Tour members tying for fifth place, not otherwise exempt, in the top 20 of the Race to Dubai rankings on completion of the 2021 BMW International Open.

TBC following the BMW International Open on June 27 2021

•••

U.S. Open winners for 2016-2021
2016 – Dustin Johnson, 2017 & 2018 – Brooks Koepka, 2019 – Gary Woodland, 2020 – Bryson DeChambeau, 2021 – TBC on 20 June 2021

•••

Masters winners for 2016-2021
2016 – Danny Willett, 2017 – Sergio Garcia, 2018 – Patrick Reed, 2019 – Tiger Woods, 2020 – Dustin Johnson, 2021 – TBC on 11 Apr 2021

•••

PGA Championship winners for 2015-2021
2015 – Jason Day, 2016 – Jimmy Walker, 2017 – Justin Thomas, 2018 & 2019 – Brooks Koepka, 2020 – Collin Morikawa, 2021 – TBC on 23 May 2021

•••

Players Championship winners for 2018-2021
2018 – Webb Simpson, 2019 – Rory McIlroy, 2020 – Cancelled, 2021 – TBC on 14 Mar 2021

•••

Top 30 players from the final 2019 FedExCup Points List
Rory McIlroy, Xander Schauffele, Brooks Koepka, Justin Thomas, Paul Casey, Adam Scott, Tony Finau, Chez Reavie, Kevin Kisner, Hideki Matsuyama, Patrick Reed, Jon Rahm, Bryson DeChambeau, Jason Kokrak, Gary Woodland, Matt Kuchar, Webb Simpson, Tommy Fleetwood, Rickie Fowler, Sung-Jae Im, Patrick Cantlay, Louis Oosthuizen, Abraham Ancer, Marc Leishman, Brandt Snedeker, Justin Rose, Corey Conners, Charles Howell III, Dustin Johnson, Lucas Glover

•••

Top 10 players from the final 2020 FedExCup Points List
Dustin Johnson, Justin Thomas, Xander Schauffele, Jon Rahm, Scottie Scheffler, Collin Morikawa, Tyrrell Hatton, Sebastian Munoz, Patrick Reed, Rory McIlroy

•••

First 5 PGA Tour members and any PGA Tour members tying for 5th place, not exempt in the top 20 of the PGA TOUR FedExCup Points List for 2021 on completion of the 2021 Travelers Championship
TBC following the Travelers Championship on 27 June 2021

•••

Open de Argentina 2019 winner
2019 – Ricardo Celia, 2020 – Cancelled

•••

Playing members of the 2019 Presidents Cup teams
Marc Leishman, Hideki Matsuyama, Louis Oosthuizen, Adam Scott, Abraham Ancer, Haotong Li, CT Pan, Cameron Smith, Sung-Jae Im, Byeong Hun An, Adam Hadwin, Joaquin Niemann, Justin Thomas, Dustin Johnson, Patrick Cantlay, Xander Schauffele, Webb Simpson, Matt Kuchar, Bryson DeChambeau, Tony Finau, Gary Woodland, Rickie Fowler, Patrick Reed, Tiger Woods

•••

First and anyone tying for 1st place on the Order of Merit of the Asian Tour for 2019 & 2020
2019 – Jazz Janewattananond, 2020 – Cancelled

•••

First and anyone tying for 1st place on the Order of Merit of the Tour of Australasia for 2019 & 2020
2019 – Ryan Fox, 2020 – TBC in March 2021

•••

First and anyone tying for 1st place on the Order of Merit of the Sunshine Tour for 2019 & 2020
2019 – JC Ritchie, 2020 – TBC on 28 March 2021

•••

Japan Open winner for 2019 & 2020
2019 – Chan Kim, 2020 – Yuki Inamori

•••

Asia-Pacific Diamond Cup winner for 2020 & 2021
2020 – Cancelled, 2021 – TBC on 16 May 2021

•••

First 2 and anyone tying for 2nd place, on the Official Money List of the Japan Golf Tour for 2019 & 2020
2019 – Shugo Imahira, Shaun Norris, 2020 – Cancelled

•••

The first two, not already exempt, in the 2021 Mizuno Open
TBC following the 2021 Mizuno Open

•••

Senior British Open winner for 2019 & 2020
2019 – Bernhard Langer, 2020 – Cancelled

•••

British Amateur winner for 2020 & 2021
2020 – Joe Long (a), 2021 – TBC on 19 June 2021

•••

U.S. Amateur winner for 2019 & 2020
2019 – Andy Ogletree (a) – now turned pro so no longer exempt via this route, 2020 – Tyler Strafaci (a)

•••

European Amateur winner for 2020 & 2021
2020 – Matthias Schmid (a), 2021 – TBC

•••

The Mark H McCormack Medal (Men’s World Amateur Golf Ranking) winner for 2019 & 2020.
2019 – Cole Hammer (a), 2020 – Takumi Kanaya (a) – now turned pro so no longer exempt via this route

•••

Asia-Pacific Amateur winner for 2019 & 2020
2019 – Yuxin Lin (a), 2020 – Cancelled

•••

Latin America Amateur winner for 2020 & 2021
2020 – Abel Gallegos (a), 2021 – Cancelled

•••

OQS Australia – The 2019 Emirates Australian Open
Matt Jones, Aaron Pike, Takumi Kanaya

•••

OQS South Africa – The 2020 South African Open
Branden Grace, Marcus Armitage, Jaco Ahlers

•••

OQS Singapore – The 2020 SMBC Singapore Open
Joohyung Kim, Richard T Lee, Poom Saksansin, Ryosuke Kinoshita

•••

OQS USA – The 2020 Arnold Palmer Invitational
Danny Lee, Joel Dahmen, Keith Mitchell

•••

A mininum of eight spots will be available at Open Final Qualifying on 29 June 2021.

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