Adam Scott made his major championship debut in the Open Championship at St Andrews, the world was just about realising that millennium bug fears had been greatly oversold.
It was a memorable week in many ways for the Australian who was just four weeks into his professional career and had come through Regional and Final Qualifying to earn his place at the Home of Golf. He celebrated his 20th birthday four days before tournament play began, played a practice round with Tiger Woods on the eve, but ‘fatted’ a wedge into the Swilcan Burn on the first hole of the actual championship and made a double bogey, then went on to miss the cut.
Woods, a fellow Butch Harman pupil at the time, went on to win by eight.
12 months later, Scott pitched up at Royal Lytham & St Annes as not just a fully fledged European Tour member – he earned his card in eight starts – but as a European Tour winner having won the Alfred Dunhill Championship in South Africa in January 2021.
That Open Championship on England’s northwest coast started one of the most remarkable runs in modern major championship history, and this week at Shinnecock Hills, Scott will become just the second player to play in 100 consecutive majors, though he still has another 46 to play in to equal Jack Nicklaus’ astonishing record.
At the start of that run, mobile phones were still in monocolour, homes that actually had internet relied on a dial-up connection, Apple were on the verge of revolutionising music by releasing the very first iPod, and Christina Aguilera, Lil’ Kim, Mya and Pink were top of the charts with their Lady Marmalade cover.
There had also only been one movie in The Fast and the Furious franchise – I’ve lost count, but we’re probably approaching triple digits now – and the first of Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings trilogy had yet to hit the big screen.
So, yeah, it was a long time ago.
But as much as playing in 100 consecutive major championships in the ultra-competitive modern environment is astonishing, the fact that Scott has only managed to get his hands on the trophy on one occasion is arguably even more so.
11 years after the Open Championship that began the streak, he held a four-stroke 54-hole lead over Graeme McDowell and Brandt Snedeker at the same venue. Ernie Els was six back, but he shot a closing 68 to Scott’s 75 and got his hands on the Claret Jug for the second time.
The previous year, he’d birdied the 16th hole to take a two-stroke lead in the final round at Augusta National after Rory McIlroy had imploded, but Charl Schwartzel proceeded to birdie the final four holes – something no Masters winner had done before or since – and made off with the green jacket.
But in 2013, it was finally Scott’s turn. With Steve Williams, Tiger’s former caddie, on the bag, he birdied the 72nd hole of the Masters to slip one sleeve into the green jacket, only for Angel Cabrera to follow suit 10 minutes later. This time, however, the Aussie wasn’t to be denied and he held his nerve over a 15-footer on the second playoff hole to finally join the major-winners club at the 48th time of asking.
Despite a three-month stint as the world number one in 2014, a second major title has continued to elude him, but he’s finished inside the top 10 in each of them at least once since.
Perhaps what Scott’s century streak tells us more than anything else is how hard it is to win major championships.
Sure, less-accomplished players have done so – and will continue to do so – but that’s the beauty of the game. Four times a year, the best golfers on the planet assemble and all 156 of them – less at the Masters, of course – are only four rounds away from potentially life and career-defining glory, and they’re all physically capable of doing so, if they can overcome the extreme mental hurdles they’ll encounter.
But few of the 156 will ever come close to a half-century of consecutive appearances, and it’s long odds against that any will join Scott and Nicklaus in the centurion club.
That’s testament to Scott’s professionalism, how he’s cared for his body, his work ethic, and the lasting nature of both his swing and temperament. And his talent, of course.
So, if Scott happens to be the one crowned U.S. Open champion on Sunday evening – Nicklaus won his final major in his 97th consecutive start – it will be one of the most remarkable major championship victories of all time. It’s not outside the realms of possibility either. He’s quietly going about his business in impressive fashion, only missing one cut this year – the PGA at Aronimink – and generally saving his best play for the toughest tests he’s presented with.
But if it’s somebody else that hoists the trophy, Scott will be a winner regardless.
And that’s not a bad way to be on a major championship week.
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