Well, that Open Championship had a little bit of everything, huh?
Rules snafus, drama, disparaging commentary, and most importantly – great golf.
Overall, it was quite an enjoyable watch for the 154th edition of The Open.
First, let’s start with Ryan Fox.
His performance over the weekend was stellar. In fact, his final two rounds (62-68) matched the lowest 36-hole score in Open Championship history.
The 62 that got him into contention on Saturday was a lot of fun to watch, but the round he played on Sunday was nothing short of gutsy and championship-worthy.
Yes, his putter was awesome. Yes, his iron play was crisp. But it was the way he accepted the bad breaks and kept grinding that stood out most.
He made bogeys on the 9th and 11th holes, then caught a brutal bunker lie on the 15th, where he had to chip backward just to get out. He still managed to get up-and-down from there to save bogey.
He immediately answered with a birdie on 16, then narrowly missed another on 17 that would’ve given him the outright lead.
Standing on the 18th tee – a hole that had yielded just five birdies all day – he told his caddie he was going to play for keeps.
He mashed a drive down the right-center of the fairway, leaving himself 176 yards. He stuffed the approach to 11 feet.
He had found himself in the dream scenario every kid who’s ever picked up a club, bat, or ball has imagined.
“A putt to win The Open.”
“A catch to win the Super Bowl.”
“Bottom of the ninth. Bases loaded. Two strikes. Two outs.”
We’ve all played those moments out in our heads. Ryan Fox got to live one.
“To cap it off with a putt – everyone practices on the green, I guess, you’ve got a putt to win a major championship, to win The Open. It’s not like that in real life. It’s not a very comfortable feeling. It’s certainly very enjoyable when you see it go in.”
And it’s those moments – watching someone realize the dream they’ve had since childhood – that make sports so special.
What About Everybody Else?
A lot of names flashed across the leaderboard before eventually hitting a snag: Scottie Scheffler, Sam Burns, Si Woo Kim, and Tommy Fleetwood among them.
They all played great golf and helped create the drama that made this such a memorable championship.
Of the chasing pack, Cameron Young impressed the most.
Young started the day tied for 20th and charged all the way to 10-under before a tough bogey on the final hole dropped him back to 9-under. He became the clubhouse leader and then had to wait more than two hours before Ryan Fox finally closed the door.
It’s been a terrific season for Cam Young. He has all the talent needed to win major championships, but that doesn’t make this one sting any less.
What’s Next?
The PGA TOUR heads to TPC Twin Cities in Blaine, Minnesota, for the 3M Open.
3M Open Odds
- Scottie Scheffler (+270)
- Kurt Kitayama (+1900)
- Maverick McNealy (+2100)
- Hideki Matsuyama (+2500)
- Keith Mitchell (+2500)
- Jake Knapp (+2700)
- Jackson Koivun (+2800)
- Tom Kim (+3000)
- Pierceson Coody (+3600)
- Jackson Suber (+3800)
- Gary Woodland (+4100)
The final men’s major of the year starts this week.
It is July.
That feels insane, because it is insane.
Rory McIlroy said this week that he’d like to see golf’s major championship season stretched out beyond its current four-month sprint. The calendar got squeezed when the PGA Championship moved from August to May, and now the sport basically crams its four biggest events into one giant blur from April through July.
From a player perspective, you can see the benefit. If you find something, you can ride it. Get hot at the Masters, carry it into the PGA, survive the U.S. Open, and show up at The Open still feeling like you’re in rhythm.
For the rest of us, it’s a little different.
Golf spends all winter trying to convince casual fans that the season has started. Then the Masters shows up, everyone remembers golf exists, and we get the best stretch of the entire year. Augusta. PGA. U.S. Open. The Open.
Four months of actual juice.
And then the Claret Jug gets handed out before August, and the sport basically asks everyone to stay emotionally invested through FedExCup math, Ryder Cup speculation, and whatever LIV headline is making everyone tired that week.
This is where Rory is right.
Golf’s biggest problem is not that it lacks good events. It’s that the events people care about most are packed too tightly together. The majors should feel like tentpoles. Right now, they feel like a bender.
The Guardian reported that Rory is not alone here, either. Scottie Scheffler has also acknowledged the season feels condensed, and Jon Rahm has pushed the idea even further, suggesting golf should think bigger globally with a major in places like Australia, Asia, or another part of Europe.
That is probably a much harder conversation, because the majors are run by different organizations, with different histories, different priorities, and different television deals. Nobody is just moving the Masters because we all think September needs a little more golf.
But the broader point is still obvious.
The current setup does not serve the fan as well as it could.
Give us the Masters in April. Give us the U.S. Open in June. Give us The Open later in July, and move the PGA back to August. Let the season breathe a little bit. Let every major have its own runway.
Because right now, the best part of the golf calendar is over before most of America has even gone on summer vacation.
That’s bad business. It’s bad momentum. And most importantly, it gives all of us way too much time to start pretending we understand the FedExCup standings or even care about them.
