Pros, says Justin Rose, love to be prepared. And they can certainly feel that way in an Open Championship.
But here, being prepared means being ready for the unexpected.
“I think ultimately at an Open Championship, your preparation needs to be — you can’t perfect something,” Rose said. “Play with creativity and play in the moment. Just play with a lot of flair in the moment. See a shot, bump-and-run.
“You might not have practiced it, you might not have hit that shot for a long, long time, but if you see it, go with it.”
The thought came Tuesday, about seven minutes into Rose’s pre-Open press conference. It was perceptive to what’s needed this week at Royal Birkdale.
But what happens when you listen to everyone’s pre-Open press conference, 195 minutes and over 37,000 words in all?
You may just become, well, prepared for what starts Thursday in England.
And maybe, just maybe, ready to pick a winner.
Below, then, is what this writer heard. Employ it wisely. Or not at all.
‘Distance control is going to be key’
Who said that: The phrase often used this week to describe Birkdale has been ‘firm and fast,’ and Jon Rahm was asked how a player combats that. “I would say see how firm they let the greens get, right?” he said. “St. Andrews was firm and their fairways were running very fast, but the greens, they managed to keep them decently soft. That’s why you saw the scoring be low, and it was a bit more about being aggressive.
“This time around, if these greens that are way smaller than the ones at St Andrews get firmer, distance control is going to be key. Knowing how the ball is going to react and where you need to land it to give yourself a putt is going to be very, very important.
“This golf course is known as not being the easiest already. Weather conditions usually are pretty harsh, windy. It’s always windy, right? So a lot of those holes are going to present a very strong challenge.
“It also depends on the setup. With yesterday’s wind, 13 and 18 was 500-plus yards straight into the wind. They might have moved it a tee up, maybe not. If they didn’t, they would be very long holes. If they moved it a little bit up, still long holes but slightly easier. Same with 15.
“So it will be up to the tournament committee on the setup as well, but I think understanding how the ball’s going to react and the fairways and on the greens is always going to be the challenge.”
What it means for a pick: Who’s good on approach? Who has a plan off the tee? The PGA Tour’s top five in strokes gained: approach this season are Matt Fitzpatrick, Collin Morikawa, Si Woo Kim, J.J. Spaun and Tom Kim, while Jon Rahm and Laurie Canter are in the top five in greens in regulation on the LIV Golf circuit. As for the wind, here is the forecast from weather.com: 12 mph on Thursday, and 13 mph on Friday, Saturday and Sunday, and each day, it will be blowing from the north.
‘In Birkdale, you can still be aggressive, but you really don’t always have that chance’
Who said that: Rahm, who used the 1st hole as an example. “You could hit driver, but who knows where that ball is going to end up if you’re not accurate.” He also said this: “From what I’ve learned in the past, if you start pulling out drivers in an Open Championship, you can do a good job short term. You can maybe get away with it one round. Over four rounds, you’re going to start finding spots you don’t want to be in, and you’re going to pay the price.”
What it means for a pick: Accuracy off the tee won’t hurt. But approach again will be paramount — if players are hitting something less off the tee, strong iron play will become advantageous. However …
‘OK, it might be in the rough, but it’s not that penal’
Who said that: Rory McIlroy, in talking about one of the effects of the dry conditions at Birkdale. “The big thing, especially off the tee here, is the fairway bunkers and avoiding those,” he said. “You might see some guys being more aggressive off the tee, taking driver, trying to take the fairway bunkers out of play. OK, it might be in the rough, but it’s not that penal, so you get a wedge in your hand and you can figure it out from there.”
What it means for a pick: Bryson DeChambeau has heard some chirps this week. But if Mcllroy’s assessment is right, DeChambeau is in play this week — he won very similarly at the 2020 and 2024 U.S. Opens.
‘The runoff areas were still quite long’
Who said that: Joe Dean, on Monday after his win at the new Last Chance Qualifier. “I was surprised to see the runoff areas were still quite long, the grass,” he said. “Usually you can putt them fine. It’s obviously just nearly putting off the green, but not today. I’m guessing it’s to stop it from drying out too much. Just a 5-iron chip-and-runs and seems to do the trick.”
What it means for a pick: With putting potentially not an option, chipping will be a factor, and possibly even creative chipping, as Dean noted with his mention of a 5-iron chip. The PGA Tour’s top five in strokes gained: around the green this season are Fitzpatrick, Justin Thomas, Tommy Fleetwood, Jason Day and Ben Griffin. On LIV, Bryson DeChambeau, Thomas Detry and Scott Vincent are ranked in the top five in scrambling.
‘You’ve always got to make a choice’
Who said that: In some manner, several players said that, but let’s listen to Tommy Fleetwood’s thoughts.
“It’s an amazingly well-designed golf course because going back to the main goal a lot of the time in links golf is to avoid bunkers, avoid fairway bunkers, avoid pot bunkers, but I feel like there’s always something in play unless you want to be unbelievably sensible and then like you’re always on the back foot of the golf course. You’re always leaving yourself a long way.
“I think it’s an amazingly well-designed golf course for that. I think you’ve always got to make a choice of you’re either taking something on, bringing something into play, or you’re almost playing too safe if anything.
“Yeah, it’s a course that makes you think. I think it’s a course that gives you options. You can hit driver everywhere if you want. There’s never anything stopping you doing that. It’s not how I would see the golf course, but some people will.
“Yeah, I think that’s always a great sign of a great golf course is that there’s — you could sit six people here, and they might think of six different things to do off the tee, and I think that’s always a really good sign.”
What it means for a pick: Open Championships force you to think — the horror! — and Birkdale is for the scholars. What’s the wind doing? What’s the turf look like? How much can you flirt with the bunkers? Where can you be aggressive? Is there any bail-out? Then there’s answering these questions all over again the next day. Then there’s answering these questions on Sunday, when there are just a few holes left. In a practice round at Birkdale, Rahm said he was hitting 6-irons off par-4s — 6-irons! We’ll say that if you’ve reached the Open, you can solve the riddles asked of you, along with being malleable because of ever-changing conditions and just the vagaries of golf — and especially Open Championship golf. But maybe your pick is a former Open winner, or at least a major winner. Or someone invested in analytics; someone who’s done the work ahead of time so any surprises feel a bit less shocking. Or they have a strong caddie. …
‘I think the communication is obviously really important’
Who said that: Fitzpatrick, when asked about the value of caddies this week. “I think the communication is obviously really important,” he said. “Just you’ve got to be on the same page of the shots you’re seeing, particularly in links golf. There’s obviously such a variety that you can play. Birkdale allows you to play a lot of different shots because you might be able to fly on the green, you might be able to bounce it short, you might be able to use a contour to the right or left. That’s links golf.”
What it means for a pick: This week, a caddie must be decisive, reassuring and unstifling. Being a veteran looper will help.
‘It’s a tough environment’
Who said that: McIlroy, when asked about playing an Open at home, which he did last year and in 2019 at Royal Portrush in Northern Ireland. “It’s a tough environment,” he said. “It’s a great environment, but tough in a way that you just feel the extra expectation on your shoulders, and you feel like you’re trying to play well for everyone else and not for yourself. I think there’s already enough pressure on anyone in this field to play well for themselves, so to add that extra layer on top of that is always pretty difficult. Yeah, like Tommy coming back here, for example, he grew up five minutes away, but I feel like Tommy’s more level-headed than I am and maybe won’t — he won’t fall into that trap like I did in 2019. It always seems like it takes me one go round to get it right.”
What it means for a pick: One of the stories of the year would be Fleetwood winning on a course close to where he grew up. But how sturdy are his blinders?
‘The more difficult the venue, it requires me to really dial in mentally’
Who said that: Jordan Spieth, when asked about his game. “The more difficult the venue, it requires me to really dial in mentally a little bit more, which I think is going to be a good thing,” he said. “Then being able to handle whatever comes your way on a difficult major venue and kind of react a bit less.”
What it means for a pick: An interesting thought. Might a struggling player succeed? Or one undergoing some swing changes? Previous major championship winners would likely also say they dialed in mentally a little bit more when they won.
‘It’s important to get over here’
Who said that: Spieth, who didn’t play last week’s Scottish Open, but did play practice rounds at Birkdale last weekend. “It’s almost impossible to overestimate the wind,” he said. “I feel like I underestimate it every single time the first three or four days that I’m playing golf here. Whether it’s a cross-wind or it’s into or down, the effect on the golf ball is magnified almost double what it is in the States. … It’s important to get over here and really get your distance control, the total distance control dialed in. It’s firmer around the greens, making it more difficult. We can’t — some of us who like to use, like myself, a 60 degree and fly balls and spin it a lot, those shots are a lot harder when it’s firmer around the greens. It can bounce into it a lot easier. You have to be super precise. So figuring out different ways to play shots around the greens, too. I’ve been doing a lot of around-the-greens work trying to figure out what the best options are. A lot more putting, stuff like that, and speed control around the greens. Your typical stuff at Opens.”
What it means for a pick: Simple here. Go with players who either played the Scottish Open, or, like Spieth, spent time at Birkdale.
‘Obviously we’re going to be watching’
Who said that: Rose, when asked if he planned to watch England’s World Cup semifinal match on Wednesday that started at 8 p.m. “Obviously we’re going to be watching,” Rose said. “But at the same time, I’m going to watch it with an eye on what’s important for me as well and not get too high and low and keep my own emotions in check. We’ve got big things as well to do this week, but at the same time, it’s a match where if you think that you’re not going to watch it, you’re probably kidding yourself.”
What it means for a pick: You might want to check which English players tee off early on Thursday.
And the pick?
Considering approach play, short game, major championship pedigree and preparedness, it really does seem like Matt Fitzpatrick’s week, doesn’t it? There’s this, too: Did Fitzpatrick feel he was playing better golf than he did in 2022, when he won the U.S. Open?
“Yeah, definitely playing better,” he said.
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