The Open Championship roundtable: Preview from Carnoustie

CARNOUSTIE, Scotland – Although our PGATOUR.COM staff of experts is split across two continents, it doesn’t prevent us from making a few observations going into The Open Championship this week at Carnoustie. 1. Let’s get straight down to brass tax. Who’s your winner? BEN EVERILL (Staff Writer): Marc Leishman. Was 5th in 2014 on the clear wrong side of the draw. Lost in a playoff in 2015 after finding an unlucky fairway divot. Was T6 last year. Leishman is as relaxed as they come which will serve him well on this tough examination. Plays the wind expertly. This is his time.  SEAN MARTIN (Senior Editor): Brooks Koepka. I’ve been really impressed with his comments about playing on tough golf courses. He is disciplined in the gym and disciplined on the course. That will serve him well on a course where you have to execute a strong strategy. Also, Koepka has finished no worse than T21 in his past 11 majors. He plays his best when conditions are toughest. And they don’t get much tougher than Carnoustie. MIKE McALLISTER (Managing Editor): Rickie Fowler. He has experience winning in Scotland, and it just seems like his time. Admittedly, that last part is an absurd way to make a prediction, but there’s been so many first-time major winners in recent years, Fowler is simply next in line. CAMERON MORFIT (Staff Writer): Francesco Molinari. The guy is 40 under in his last two starts, with a win and a T2. And at 35, he’s got the seasoning I like to see when the stakes are high and the conditions are difficult. Plus, his putting has come around under the tutelage of Phil Kenyon. JONATHAN WALL (Equipment Insider): Rickie Fowler. At some point, Fowler is going to add a major championship to his resume. This feels like a pretty good spot to make it happen. He was just one back going into the final round at last week’s Scottish Open — a tournament he won in 2015 — and seems to thrive on firm, fast courses. Carnoustie should be right in his wheelhouse. Whether Fowler decides to take a more aggressive approach off the tee or lay back with long irons, he has the iron game to handle quite possibly the toughest track in the Open rota. It’ll all come down to a putter that’s been lukewarm of late. This is the week the flat stick gets going and he hits paydirt.  2. And who’s your outside-the-box selection? Everill: Adam Scott. He’s been in terrible form for some time now and should rightfully be overlooked by most, but Scott has spent nearly a month in the UK preparing for this tournament, he has experience on his bag with Fanny Sunesson and he quite legitimately should have or could have won four straight Opens from 2012-15. With Peter Thompson’s recent passing, it would be a nice story for Scott to regain his links love this week.  Martin: Russell Knox. He’s on a good run after finishing second in the French Open, winning in Ireland and contending in Scotland. He came to Carnoustie, the closest venue in The Open rota to his Scottish birthplace, as a kid. And few players hit it as straight as he does, which will come in very handy. The firm conditions will help stretch out the length on his tee shots, as well. McAllister: Danny Willett (yes, I went there). Don’t look now, but Willett has two top-10s and a top-20 in his last five starts. Yes, it’s a small sample size in a two-year stretch in which he seemed to recede after his 2016 Masters win, but you wanted an outside-the-box pick. Hey, he’s moved from 462nd in the world to 320th in the last two months. Morfit: Michael Kim. OK, he’s never played The Open before, and he’s played in only one major, the 2013 U.S. Open at Merion (T17). I don’t care about any of that. Kim was nerveless at the John Deere, where he made 30 birdies and had the second-best performance on the par 4s of any player on TOUR since 1983. I could go on, but the point is the guy has found something.   Wall: Tyrrell Hatton. Has the links chops as a two-time winner of the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship, and finished T5 two years ago at The Open. Did I mention he also qualified for golf’s oldest major in 2010 when he was still an amateur? This isn’t a complete dart throw, but I think Hatton still qualifies as an outside-the-box selection who has a legitimate chance to hoist the Claret Jug.  3. Carnoustie is the longest course in The Open rota. Will this be a week for the bombers or will a straight hitter who can avoid Carnoustie’s penal pot bunkers prevail? Everill: Surely the bomb and gouge crowd can’t survive this place. Long will help in some places but it’s about plotting your way around, making a solid plan, and being cool, calm and collected when that plan inevitably comes awry at times. Watch out for the veteran strikers, such as Scott, Stenson, Zach, Molinari, Rose and Tiger. Martin: At the end of the day, you can’t play Carnoustie with reckless abandon. Carnoustie is so well-bunkered – and there’s that pesky Barry Burn – that you have to be cautious. It will require sound strategy to get around the course. Almost all of the bunkers require nothing more than a pitch out, so the driver will, for the most part, stay in the bag. McAllister: Accuracy will be the key this week. Got to stay out of those bunkers. The dry conditions will allow for ridiculous run-out for those able to hit low liners, so not sure the big boys will have a huge advantage anyway. Morfit: I think with how dry the course is, and the forecast calling for only a light bit of rain, Carnoustie is going to play into the hands of the medium-length hitters who specialize in precision and game management. That’s guys like Molinari, Kim, Zach Johnson, Kevin Kisner, and, uh, Tiger Woods. Wall: Carnoustie won’t be brought to its knees this week by modern golf equipment. Even with some hinting, they’ll take a bomb and gouge mentality with a healthy dose of drivers, the course has to be respected. There’s nothing wrong with picking your spots and trying to cut the corner, but firm conditions open the door for some of the shorter hitters in the field to plod their way around. Heck, Brandt Snedeker recorded a 425-yard drive during a practice round. I don’t think distance will separate the field. It’ll come down to putting.  4. Carnoustie is playing firm and fast. The forecast is favorable. Will we see unprecedented scoring or will Carnoustie win once again? Everill: If Car-nasty ever loses, maybe the game has evolved too far. I’m cheering for the course.  Martin: Dustin Johnson said that even though Carnouste is playing short, it’s hardly easy. The soft greens and favorable forecast will help, but no one has ever finished double-digits under par here, and I think that trend will continue. This course is just too tough. “When the wind is blowing, it is the toughest golf course in Britain,â€� said World Golf Hall of Fame member Sir Michael Bonallack. “And when it’s not blowing, it’s probably still the toughest.â€� McAllister: Trying to determine a target score with so many variables is difficult. The winds aren’t expected to be ridiculous, and the rough isn’t penal, so I’m thinking single digits under par, probably bettering Harrington’s 7 under. But not double digits. That’s too much to ask on this tough of a course. Morfit: No, Carnoustie will win. It always does. Maybe not to the extent that it did with Van de Velde, but it will win. Wall: I don’t think so. Carnoustie has ample defenses to keep the best players in the world honest. I’m not saying we won’t see a low round or two, but to assume we’ll see a double-digit under-par winner is a bit of a stretch. I believe the firm conditions will make things interesting for the entire field.  5. Tiger. Discuss. Everill: With a little bit of luck we could see something really special from Tiger this week. Driver potentially out of the bag for a lot of the week and slow greens for all mean his striking could push him right into the mix. I would not be in the least bit surprised if he’s in the top 10 heading into Sunday … Martin: I think he has a good chance, but we had high hopes for the Masters (T32) and U.S. Open (MC), as well. He didn’t contend in either. I think he will have his best major finish of the year. He lit up when recalling playing Carnoustie as an amateur. The fact that he can hit iron off so many tees, and the slower, flatter putting surfaces, should help him this week. McAllister: I’m expecting a good week from him, possibly a top-10. As he said this week, The Open will ultimately be his best opportunity in a major for the rest of this career, although I think he might have a better chance three years from now than he does this week – provided, of course, he stays healthy. Morfit: I like Tiger here because of the conditions. He was so good in winning The Open at Hoylake, when the venue was similarly sun-scorched. He is probably the best iron player who ever lived, one of the best at managing his way around and scoring, and when you take the big liability of the driver out of his bag, look out.   Wall: The firm conditions take driver out of his hands, so he’s already in a great position. Woods has thrived from the short grass this season and seems to putt well on slower greens. I’d imagine we’ll see a repeat of The Open in 2006, where he won employing a driver-less strategy. He’s only logged one tournament with the mallet putter, but I saw enough over four days to believe it’s something he can win with. I think Tiger gets close this week and logs a respectable top-5 finish. 

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