After the British Open, some of men's golf's biggest stars go for Olympic gold
The Paris tournament could feel a bit like a major
The final men's golf major of the year tees off Thursday at Scotland's Royal Troon, site of the 152nd Open Championship.
The last-chance vibes of this British Open, as we call it on this side of the pond, are especially strong as some of the sport's biggest stars look to make up for missed opportunities in the previous majors.
We're mostly talking about Rory McIlroy, who blew a pair of short putts over the final few holes of last month's U.S. Open to cost himself his first major title in a decade. If the second-ranked Northern Irishman is truly recovered from that meltdown (his fourth-place finish on Sunday at the Scottish Open after a long break suggests that he is), he should contend again this week.
Sixth-ranked Collin Morikawa tied for third at the Masters and fourth at the PGA Championship, but the American is still seeking his first major since winning the British Open in 2021. Tenth-ranked Jon Rahm has gone off the rails since he took the money and ran to LIV Golf late last year, surrendering his Masters title with his worst-ever finish at Augusta in April before missing the cut at the PGA Championship and withdrawing from the U.S. Open with a toe injury.
Even top-ranked Scottie Scheffler has something to prove. Yes, he's a virtual lock for PGA Tour player of the year with six tournament wins already, including his second green jacket, to establish himself as the most dominant player since Tiger Woods' heyday. But the American tied for eighth at the PGA Championship (getting arrested by an overzealous traffic cop probably didn't help) and was outside the top 40 at the U.S. Open — easily his worst finish of the year.
WATCH | Explaining how golf works in the Olympics:
Since LIV Golf splintered the sport with its absurd paydays, the majors are the only events where all of the world's best players compete against each other. So, if Scheffler finishes the year with "only" one major title, it would bolster the take that Scheffler's dominance is partly due to not having to face the LIV defectors on a regular basis.
The good news for all those stars mentioned above is that, if things don't work out at the British Open, they'll still have another shot at winning a high-profile tournament next month at the Paris Olympics.
The 60-player men's event begins Aug. 1 at Le Golf National, which hosted the 2018 Ryder Cup. Along with Scheffler, McIlroy, Rahm and Morikawa, the four-round stroke-play tournament features 2021 gold medallist Xander Schauffele of the United States, who recently won his first major at the PGA Championship. Wyndham Clark, the 2023 U.S. Open champion, is also competing for the Americans.
Other big names in the field include 2022 U.S. Open champion Matt Fitzpatrick (representing Great Britain), 2021 Masters winner Hideki Matsuyama (Japan), 2019 British Open champion Shane Lowry (Ireland), reigning FedEx Cup champ Viktor Hovland (Norway) and Swedish rising star Ludvig Aberg. Plus, there's perennial contender Tommy Fleetwood (Great Britain), former world No. 1 Jason Day (Australia) and Canadians Corey Conners and Nick Taylor. They're all playing the British Open this week too.
Those are some nice headliners, and the fact that the Olympic field includes several LIV players (Rahm and Chile's Joaquin Niemann are the best two) also gives it a bit of a major feel. But it falls short in the depth department.
First off, 60 players is a tiny field. Almost 100 more golfers than that will compete in the British Open, and even the famously exclusive Masters had 89 players this year.
Another issue is that Olympic organizers don't simply invite the world's top 60 players. Due to "universality" guidelines (Olympic-speak for making sure as many different countries as possible are represented in each event), a maximum of four players per country are allowed in men's golf. And only the United States, because of its abundance of top-15 players, was able to reach the limit. Every other country was capped at two.
The universality restrictions prevented several great players from qualifying for the Olympics — including U.S. Open champion Bryson DeChambeau. The beefy long-ball artist is ranked ninth in the world, but his decision to bolt for LIV cost him precious rankings points in the cutthroat chase for the four American spots (the rebel tour's events don't count). Eighth-ranked Patrick Cantlay, No. 11 Sahith Theegala and No. 13 Brian Harman, the reigning British Open champ, also missed the cut for the United States. Tyrrell Hatton, a LIVer ranked 23rd in the world, didn't make it for Britain. And neither did Robert MacIntyre, winner of both the Canadian Open and his home Scottish Open this year.
Given all that, it would probably be incorrect to call the Olympics the fifth major of 2024. That unofficial title still belongs to the extremely lucrative Players Championship, though its lack of LIV players has diminished its prestige. But, with all those stars set to tee it up in the Paris suburbs two weeks from now, it should be a damn good golf tournament.
