A common fallacy golf fans (and media!) can fall into is demanding a leaderboard of recognizable names early in a tournament. That’s just not realistic given how deep the fields are, and how long these days can be. There are just too many holes to play. As of noon local time, the leading group is … Herbert, Suber, Cauley, Wallace. Not exactly the biggest names in the game.
But for those who want a bunch of headliners in contention, you may have to be patient. There is a group of heavy hitters waiting in the wings, and one (or many) of them will charge at this group of less-proven leaders. I’m talking about Scottie Scheffler (-2), Cameron Young (-4) and a bunch of others who are just off the first page of the board: Chris Gotterup, Collin Morikawa, Patrick Reed, Jon Rahm, Tommy Fleetwood, Tyrrell Hatton.
If you’re non-plussed by the names they’re chasing, keep the faith. Dive into some work for the next couple hours and come back to the Open for the late-morning rounds. It’ll improve. It always does.
That said … Cut Watch is officially ON
Wyndham Clark’s reign as the most recent major champ was always likely to come to an end this week, but it’s likely ending even earlier than he thought. The U.S. Open winner shot 73 in the opening round and began his second round with a string of lost shots. The cutline, as of noon local time, is looking like one over or better, but could slide down to two over. Clark sits at eight over with just nine holes left.
Other notables to keep an eye on: Jordan Spieth (+3, 18 to play), Hideki Matsuyama (+2, 18 to play), Joaquin Niemann (+4 thru 36), Rory McIlroy (+2, 12 to play), Matt Fitzpatrick (+3, 12 to play)
Lucas Herbert has gone nuclear
The Australian, who plays most of his golf on LIV, shot a genuinely startling 28 on his front nine Friday, racing up the leaderboard. He then added another pair of birdies early on the back nine to reach eight under for the tournament and a three-shot lead.
One thing to know: it’s not like he’s just hooping putts from everywhere on the course. Yes, he’s making plenty, but he’s also just not finding the kind of trouble that can halt a round in its place — which exists basically everywhere at Royal Birkdale. He’s peppering greens and plodding his way around in an unstressful manner.
England’s (surprising) great hope
Between Justin Rose, Tyrrell Hatton, Tommy Fleetwood, Aaron Rai and the Fitzpatrick brothers, England held plenty of hope that one of its own could win the Open Championship for the first time since Nick Faldo in 1992.
We just didn’t really consider that England’s best hope might come from someone way off that big board: Matt Wallace.
Wallace has been playing his typically solid golf this season, bouncing between Europe and the United States and trying to maintain status on each tour. He’s finished second in one event on each tour as well, just hanging around.
And thanks to a solid opening 69 Thursday, and an early start Friday in barely any wind, Wallace quickly became England’s top golfer on the board. He felt it, too.
“That was seriously special,” he said after his round. “And I know you won’t believe it in terms of early in the day, but from the 5th hole, the short one over there, man, the amount of people saying, ‘go on, Matt,’ and egging me on and pushing me because you’ve got an Englishman at the top of the lead. When was the last Englishman to win an Open in England?”
It was 1969, when Tony Jacklin won up the coast at Royal Lytham & St. Annes.
Does experience … matter?
I’ve been waffling on that question all morning, as links rookies Jackson Suber and Pierceson Coody sit near the top of the leaderboard. Shane Lowry put it plainly in his Thursday comments:
“I pity the guys that have never played links golf coming here. You’re hitting 4-irons off tees, and they’re going over 300 yards. Sometimes it’s hard to mentally and visually see that.”
For a while there, it seemed like what Lowry said didn’t matter, as Suber spent part of his Friday morning with a two-shot lead. Then, he rode the bogey train for three holes and it felt like the equalizer of links golf was finally having its way with him. But Suber (and Coody as well) settled in and will enter the weekend at six under and with as good of a shot as anyone on this baked-out course.
Suber will continue learning about links golf (and this course) with each passing hole, it seems. It was only last week that he was first introduced to Royal Birkdale … by watching drone videos of it on YouTube. If he said anything worth noting on Thursday, it was describing his approach:
“Just keep being patient and keep being disciplined and knowing that you can get in spots where bogey is a great score and taking that and just moving on.”
