If Bryson takes an iron off the 5th tee and pokes one down the middle, everything is different. Sir Nick was right, he has no strategy.
There’s an air of anticipation around Royal Birkdale on Open Championship Saturday. A tournament that has been a slow burner could be set for a box office weekend. The big names are lying in wait to squeeze out the duds as the cream begins to slowly rise to the top.
Then we come to Bryson DeChambeau. Insert the clumsy DeShambles and DeTrample jokes. When he walked off the 18th green on Friday evening he had bulldozed his way to a 66 and to within one of Lucas Herbert. Today he will tee off three shots off the pace after he was penalised two shots post round for inadvertently improving his lie on the 5th.
Imagine he wins the Open Championship, collects the Claret Jug on the 72nd green, snubs the R&A handshakes and walks off with jug in one hand, Husqvarna automower in the other. Or, better still, loses the Open by one and all of the LIV bot conspiracy theorists set Twitter ablaze with notions.
Friday was one of the great major championship rounds of his career, a 66 on a links course. Bryson who is universally hated rivalled Rory McIlroy and Tommy Fleetwood in the popularity stakes yesterday and probably won. Rarely has he received such love on a golf course.
Naturally enough, he reverts back to the self obsessed immature type and it all blows up in his face.
His apparent refusal and frustration at being handed a two shot penalty for the incident on the 5th caused chaos last night. It was a two hour farce that not only put a bad light on what was a brilliant day of scoring but was also unfair to his fellow competitors.
What we saw was everything bad about DeChambeau, his inability to control his emotions, his victim mentality and his immaturity. By essentially delaying the draw for round three – to the point where Marco Penge and Justin Thomas were tagging the R&A on twitter – AND threatening to withdraw he brought this great championship into disrepute. He tried to hold the Open Championship, a behemoth of 154 years of history to ransom, hostage.
A rules breach does not put a black mark on your reputation. The rules of golf are finicky and border on the line of ridiculous anyway. But his reaction was one of self sabotage, it was classless and it was childish. Did he cheat? No. Has he disgraced himself? Yes.
Cast your mind back to Royal Portrush last year. Shane Lowry was assessed a two-stroke penalty for accidentally causing his ball to move and failing to replace it to its original position on the 12th hole of his second round. It ruined his tournament.
But unlike DeChambeau, Lowry didn’t cause a scene. He also disagreed with the ruling that was thrown at him but he accepted it, owned it and also addressed the media to clear the air. In an incredibly difficult situation it was a classy act by the Offaly man. He didn’t get a very generous statement which basically cleared Bryson of cheating read out by the R&A either. Although it must be said the R&A handled the situation very well and stuck to the rulebook.
DeChambeau has shunned the media at major championships this season but he was delighted to see a collection of the press scurrying after him to the driving range where he hit balls for approximately an hour and revelled in the media attention he was receiving. It was all completely manufactured and contrived. He believes he can live in some reality where this sort of behaviour is OK.
He has got his wish. Today will be all about Bryson for better or worse.
In the midst of all of this he made us forget some of the other storylines. Did you know that Jon Rahm received a code of conduct warning for a club throw? Justin Rose has surely played his last Open Championship at Royal Birkdale, the site of where his golfing journey began. Jordan Spieth looks a shadow of his former self and must be questioned whether he will ever get back to the top of the game. Oh, and there were two 62s, equaling the lowest round in a men’s major.
But anyway, back to Bryson. He is compelling to the point where the PGA Tour need him back, but he is also compelling to the point where there are people in the PGA Tour who feel he is too much hassle. Bryson is golf’s greatest love/hate player.
He’s given radio silence all week. But imagine how helpful a constructive relationship with the media would be given the events of last night?
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