The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
The awe about Koepka
The birth as a top rank player of Brooks Koepka, the new US Open champion, is now set to become golf’s equivalent of the first gig by the punk legends Sex Pistols. Not that it was particularly riotous affair at the SSE Scottish Hydro Challenge of 2013 at Aviemore. It’s just that like the Pistols’ first gig, the number of people claiming they witnessed it is now going to grow far in excess of those who were actually there.
I was there – at Spey Valley not the Pistols’ debut – and I’d like to say that I recognised his ability independently and followed him avidly throughout the whole weekend, writing prescient eulogies to a future star when he won.
However, in truth, I don’t remember much about the tournament other than it rained constantly and there was a four-hour delay on the final day.
I’m fairly sure I saw Koepka hit a shot or two, but given the weather there is certainly doubt and I’d be lying if I said it was engraved on my memory.
What I do remember, however, was chatting to Scottish players competing that weekend and the unanimous level of gobsmacked awe they had after playing with Brooks.
Greig Hutcheon, the multiple Tartan Tour winner who had played more than a few big Tour events and seen the best of this era, shot 64 on the Saturday of the tournament.
Koepka, playing with him, shot 62. “I shook his hand at the end and told him I was going to enjoy watching him win majors,” said Greig, still awestruck when I spoke to him a day later.
After he won, Brooks spoke to the actual number of journalists there that week – six Scottish newspaper men and a European Tour press officer.
If we were impressed by his play, we were even more impressed by the guy. He and his friend Peter Uihlein had found their way to play anything but mini tours in the US blocked, so they pulled out their passports and decided to chance their arm on the Challenge Tour.
Part of it was expediency – they simply needed some place to play – but there was also a sense of adventure that was somewhat unexpected, given the stereotype of the insular allAmerican boy.
Instead, said Brooks, he had learned more in less than a year bouncing about Europe and beyond on the Challenge Tour than he had in four years at Florida State University.
The day after he won at Aviemore, he qualified for his first major, the Open at Muirfield. I remember the caddies – the best source of betting advice in golf – telling everyone to put each way money on him to win the Jug, so impressed were they with his ability.
In the end he drove out of bounds at the first on the first day, and went on to miss the cut. But Brooks always carried himself like a great player, and he won before long, a big money win in Turkey the following year.
I don’t think he was a unanimous pick to win in the logjam before the start of play on Sunday – certainly Rickie Fowler and Justin Thomas were the more popular home hopes – but he was clearly the class of the field on the day. The homogenous elite golfer
I’m borrowing this description from my friend John Huggan, who has pointed out that all the players at the top of the game are pretty much the same these days.
Brooks Koepka fits the description. Rory McIlroy, Jason Day, Dustin Johnson, Hideki Matsuyama, Jon Rahm, Justin Thomas, Sergio Garcia – ballstrikers, all hitting enormous distances. Their strengths are the same, and they tend to have the same weaknesses. The exception in this group is Jordan Spieth, whose strength is the short game.
Was Erin Hills proofed against them? Not Koepka, certainly, or Matsuyama, and not Rickie Fowler, although for the second time in a major this season the US crowd favourite found no sixth gear on a Sunday.
But McIlroy, Day and Johnson, the big hitting triumvirate who most observers feel are the main contenders for world No 1, all missed the weekend.
Johnson gets a free pass – he’s done plenty this year and was presented with his second child last week – but when do we start to panic, if at all, about Rory and Jason?
Both have had injury and illness issues. Rory seems set on playing his way out of his current underperformance, adding the Scottish Open to his schedule last week means he’ll play all but one week in the build-up to the Open.
But it’s now close to three years since Rory’s double whammy at Hoylake and Valhalla. Day hasn’t won in 13 months, although he did lose a play-off in Texas recently.
Royal Birkdale is one of the great ballstrikers’ courses and all of the big three should contend there. If they don’t, somebody’s going to start to panic.
There was a sense of adventure that was unexpected given the stereotype of the insular all-American boy
Royal St George’s a treat
I’m missing the Amateur this year, but possibly my favourite tournament prior to the 2012 Ryder Cup was the 1997 championship held at Sandwich.
Glorious weather, great club and a Scot – Craig Watson – won. Hopefully one of the excellent current crop of amateur Scots can win the old trophy there again.