Now Delaet must work on winning
He has power, accuracy and pureness of strike, but he needs more victories, writes CAM COLE.
At the peak of his game — when he was newly crowned Masters champion on his way to being ranked No. 3 in the world — Mike Weir never had what Graham DeLaet has.
Not the power, not the accuracy, not the pureness of strike.
On the other hand, Weir’s prime years included eight PGA Tour victories, including a major, which indicates that other important detail: the ability to get the ball in the hole.
So at age 31, the late-blooming, self-taught DeLaet, product of a nine-hole golf course in Weyburn, Sask., needs to get to work on the win column.
Statistically, DeLaet, who is playing his first major championship this week at Muirfield, has already made his mark on the tour.
The numbers? He ranks first in greens in regulation (72.38%), second in total driving (combined distance and accuracy), first in actual scoring average (69.99), second in par-5 performance, fifth in total birdies, and — most tellingly — first in ball striking (combined total driving and greens in regulation.)
That’s a basic requirement to play Muirfield, where DeLaet will tee off Thursday morning for the 142nd Open Championship in the 8 a.m. group with Sweden’s Jonas Blixt and Englishman Brian Davis.
“It’s a great course. It’s going to be a test,” said DeLaet. “Obviously, you’re going to have to use your imagination. You’ve got to be hitting the ball solid. Fairways are going to be key, obviously, staying out of that fescue, but it should be fun.”
DeLaet has played a British Amateur at Royal St. George’s, and the Dunhill Links tournament twice — it’s contested on Carnoustie, Kingsbarns and the Old Course — so he’s not a total stranger to links golf.
“Not that I’m familiar with it, but it’s not like it’s my first time,” he said. “It’s a different style of golf. I don’t know if it’s something I would want to play every single day because it beats you up, but it’s a lot of fun.
“The main thing is to stay patient. Everybody is going to get some bad breaks and you’re going to hit some poor shots. The wind can just accentuate a bad shot. Everyone is going to make bogeys and doubles and get bad breaks in bunkers. It’s just kind of licking your wounds and taking what it gives you and move on.”
DeLaet says the constant wind is not a huge problem.
“I grew up in Saskatchewan, so this is a pretty average wind for us,” he said.
He said it’s not that they don’t get wind coming in sideways on the prairies, as it did on the Saturday of the 2002 Open at Muirfield, “but we just go inside.”
‘The main thing is to stay patient. Everybody is going to get some bad breaks and you’re going to hit some poor shots.’
GRAHAM DELAET Talking about playing links golf
The lone Canadian in this year’s Open field, DeLaet looked as though he would have company when Brantford’s David Hearn had three distinct chances to win his way here in the John Deere Classic on Sunday, but he failed to capitalize on any of them and 19-year-old Jordan Spieth won in a playoff.
“I wanted to stay up (and watch on TV), but I was just falling asleep,” said DeLaet, who only found out last Monday that he had qualified for the Open by virtue of his world ranking (No. 65), and had to scramble to get here and find a place to stay.
“It was unfortunate. There’s not one person I root for more than (Hearn),” said DeLaet. “It was good to see him in the mix.”
Like Hearn, DeLaet hasn’t won on Tour. The sense is that it’s only a matter of time until one of them does, but nothing is guaranteed.
“I think it’s fair to say that’s how we’re both feeling. It’s not a race. We all want to win,” DeLaet said. “Out of all the guys on Tour — I’ve got some good friends out here — but he would probably the guy I would want to see win first.”