Running Blog For The Open Championship Round 2
135AM Two Euros you never heard of are in the leadoff spot this morning. And it will be an hour and a half before anyone in the top 11 get started. Three hours before anyone in the top 10 are on the course. So let’s look at yesterday’s late question as to whether a lower ranked player has ever led the Open after day 1 than Daniel Brown at 272nd.
The Official World Golf Ranking was established in 1986 but took on the form we know today in 1987 so we’ll measure from there. First round British Open leaders since then with their ranking at the time:
1987 Rodger Davis 11th
1988 Seve Ballesteros 4th
1989 Wayne Stephens Not Ranked (Archives only list the top 200 players)
1990 Michael Allen, Greg Norman 109th, 1st
1991 Seve Ballesteros 6th
1992 Raymond Floyd, Steve Pate 14th, 34th
1993 Mark Calcavecchia, Greg Norman, Peter Senior, Fuzzy Zoeller 78th, 4th, 30th, 85th
1994 Greg Turner 107th
1995 John Daly, Ben Crenshaw, Tom Watson, Mark McNulty 109th, 24th, 29th, 21st
1996 Paul Broadhurst 186th
1997 Darren Clarke, Jim Furyk 46th, 28th
1998 John Huston, Tiger Woods 54th, 1st
1999 Rod Pampling 142nd
2000 Ernie Els 3rd
2001 Colin Montgomerie 12th
2002 Carl Pettersson, David Toms, Duffy Waldorf 76th, 6th, 95th
2003 Hennie Otto 200th
2004 Paul Casey, Thomas Levet 30th, 64th
2005 Tiger Woods 1st
2006 Graeme McDowell 103rd
2007 Sergio Garcia 13th
2008 Robert Allenby, Graeme McDowell, Rocco Mediate 30th, 29th, 50th
2009 Miguel Angel Jimenez 42nd
2010 Rory McIlroy 9th
2011 Thomas Bjorn, Tom Lewis 80th, Amateur—Not Ranked
2012 Adam Scott 13th
2013 Zach Johnson 29th
2014 Rory McIlroy 8th
2015 Dustin Johnson 4th
2016 Phil Mickelson 19th
2017 Brooks Koepka, Matt Kuchar, Jordan Spieth 11th, 18th, 3rd
2018 Kevin Kisner 33rd
2019 J.B. Holmes 55th
2020 None
2021 Louis Oosthuizen 13th
2022 Cameron Young 32nd
2023 Tommy Fleetwood, Emiliano Grillo, Christo Lamprecht 21st, 41st, Amateur—Unranked
2024 Daniel Brown 272nd
So as you can see Brown’s lead isn’t unprecedented but very uncommon. Wayne Stephens in 1989 was at best 201. He has no Wiki page so I would bet in the 300’s or worse. Then you had the two Amateurs and that is it. If Brown were to go on to win it would be in the top 4 or 5 Major upsets in history. BTW—of these last 37 years only Ballesteros in ‘88, Norman in ‘93, Daly in ‘95, Woods in ‘05, McIlroy in ‘14, and Spieth in ‘17 held at least a share of the first round lead and went on to win. That’s 6 out of 36 Opens.
530AM Lotta name players on the course now so good time as any to pick up round 2 coverage. Shane Lowry already birdied his first to tie for the lead. Dean Burmester and Corey Connors have made mini moves into the top 5. Early projected cut is +3 but probably lands on +5.
553PM Lowry hits his approach on 4 to a foot and he will get to 7 under. There was some smoke and mirror to his round yesterday with his putter bailing him out for par multiple times. That is not the case today thus far albeit not even a third of the way through.
609AM Scottie Scheffler finally makes a putt of length and he’s -2 , very much looming. Lowry makes his first bogey of the Tournament at 5 to fall back into a tie with Brown.
641PM If you had a putt for your life and had to pick a player to make it, you might go through 800 players before you get to Jordan Spieth. Good grief I think I could do as well blindfolded. He’s never going to even approach the highs he used to know until that is fixed. Tall order.
659PM Scheffler would be pick 800,000.
702AM My man Gary Woodland cards a 68 and he will play the weekend sitting at 2 over. This could be his last Major that isn’t the US Open for awhile as his five year exemption for winning in 2019 is expiring.
726 AM John Daly, per custom, has WD. He joins fellow 50+ year old Ernie Els shooting 82 and saying F it that never should have got on the plane.
825AM Everytime they show Tiger Woods he’s either hitting into the mess or scrambling out of it. 13 over with 4 to play and 3rd from DFL it’s mercifully about over. That will conclude our Tiger Tracker for 2024.
838AM Tied for 152nd place with Eldrick is 20 year old Denwit Boriboonsub of Thailand. Give that name a try out loud if you will. When I was a kid Dimwit was a pretty hefty insult. Warrants mentioning.
843AM Phil Mickelson is done with round 2 and is +5 which should be enough to make the cut. Unfortunately. Credit where credit is due though. Compare to the other 50+ year olds.
1004AM Scheffler bogies 18 which gives him a 70 that matches his round 1. 2 under, 5 strokes back and tied for 4th. The analysts are hyping his weekend chances. I am not. He’s in good position but he’ll never make enough putts.
1016AM Justin Thomas, who spent much of yesterday in the lead, is 6 over through 6 holes and will be fighting the cutline before it’s over. Round 1 was a mirage. His game is in shambles, far worse than Spieth for example.
1032AM Is Wyndham Clark going to go down as one of the all time fluke Major winners? Below are his Major results prior to this week. He shot 78-80 here and is next to last for another missed cut. That’s 7 MC’s in 12 starts
1037AM They just showed a dude parasurfing out on the Firth of Clyde. Whattya say the degrees are of that water? 2?
1043AM Yeah, this is going well.
1054AM Yesterday the morning groups got the worst of the wind. Today they are going to get the worst of it playing in the afternoon. Draw luck at the British is as important as anything else.
1120AM Cut now being projected to fall to +6. Essentially you need 10 players at +5 or better to drop to +7 which seems like a lock. You’d need 21 of them to drop to 8 over for a +7 cut. That is a stretch but it certainly isn’t impossible.
1125AM Rory McIlroy has tripled the 4th and is 11 over. My prognostications haven’t been great but I nailed that one. I marvel at the media idiots who forecasted he would win. Was 0% chance.
1141AM Blood Oil Money Savant Joaquin Niemann just made a quintuple bogey 8 on The Postage Stamp to plummet from T7. You hate to see that.
1155AM Is this bad?
1201PM Nick Taylor is well on his way to becoming the only player to start in all four 2024 Majors yet miss the cut in every single one of them. Sungae Im may match him which I am monitoring. Check out Taylor’s Wiki page which has surely been written and edited by his Mother. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nick_Taylor_(golfer)#Professional_wins_(5)
1225PM Justin Rose birdies 16 and goes to 4 under. Playing magnificent golf in this wind, really the only player currently on the course that is. Has one bogey in 34 holes.
1248PM Rose makes another on 18 and he’ll go into the weekend tied for 2nd with Daniel Brown. Not sure there will be anything else to watch the rest of the day except those fighting for the cut. Everybody else likely too far back to even breach the top 10. Brown and Rose both in the Field via Final Qualifying.
141PM I had admittedly and gleefully buried Joaquin Niemann too soon after his 8 on The Postage Stamp. He’s birdied four holes on the back to reclaim almost all those lost strokes. Had he made par there he would be tied for 2nd with Rose.
157PM Jon Rahm, one of my picks, playing steady golf this afternoon as the wind has lessened a bit. He’s +1 and probably too far back but a solid effort here was sorely needed.
244PM My picks somewhat in order of preference with scores: Cam Smith +12 (MC), Colin Morikawa +1 (T14), Tony Finau +10 (MC), Jon Rahm +1 (T13), Cameron Young +4 (T38) and Tommy Fleetwood +9 MC. With Smith’s meltdown it feels worse but I’ve definitely had more abysmal results.
307PM Two stats from Justin Ray the last two days: 87% of Champs since 1960 have been within 4 of the lead after day 1. And 89% of the last 44 Champs have been top 10 through 36 holes. If we cross reference that leaves us with Shane Lowry, Daniel Brown, Justin Rose, or Xander Schauffele at nearly 90% chance of being the winner.
345PM Cut isn’t official but it’s going to be +6. That means we now know the players who played all four Majors and missed all four cuts.
That’s it. That’s the list. He’s missed 9 straight Major cuts since 2020.
420PM LIV had a good day on the whole. Only one player in contention and four on the periphery but better than it looked yesterday
Dean Burmester -2 T4
71 69
Joaquin Niemann E T11
71 71
Brooks Koepka +1 T13
70 73
Dustin Johnson +1 T13
74 69
Jon Rahm +1 T13
73 70
Laurie Canter +3 T27
71 74
Adrian Meronk +3 T27
73 72
John Catlin +4 T37
76 70
Andy Ogletree +5 T54
75 72
Phil Mickelson +5 T54
73 74
Abraham Ancer +6 T69
73 75
Tyrrell Hatton +8 MC
73 77
Sam Horsfield +8 MC
75 75
Henrik Stenson +8 MC
77 73
Louis Oosthuizen +8 MC
78 72
Bryson DeChambeau +9 MC
76 75
Cameron Smith +12 MC
80 74
David Puig +13 MC
80 75
416PM That will conclude today. Tomorrow’s coverage begins at 5AM (mercifully). Possibly heavy rain forecasted tomorrow so some spice could be ahead.
You can find me on Twitter at JWSkelton7