Category: DP World Tour

Louis Oosthuizen teeters on missing three majors next season as three LIV golfers earn spots in 2023 British Open

Oosthuizen is teetering on the brink of missing three majors in 2023.

Unless the R&A announces a change in the criteria for earning spots in the British Open, South Africa’s Louis Oosthuizen will have a chance to play next July at Royal Liverpool because he won the 2010 British Open at St. Andrews. All past winners are given a spot in the field until they reach age 60.

However, after tying for second at the 2021 PGA Championship, then being the runner-up at the U.S. Open and tying for third at the British Open that same year, Oosthuizen is teetering on the brink of missing the other three majors in 2023.

Last week, Golfweek explained to readers how pros earn spots in all four major championships, and while each uses a slightly different set of criteria to fill out their field, maintaining a high spot on the OWGR is a primary method elite golfers use. For instance, golfers ranked 50 or better on Dec. 31, 2022 can expect to get an invitation to compete in the 2023 Masters.

As of Monday morning, Oosthuizen is No. 49.

The OWGR does not award points for performances in LIV events, so like most LIV golfers, Oosthuizen’s spot on the OWGR has slowly risen since he was suspended from the PGA Tour. In his case, Oosthuizen has risen from No. 21 in early July to No. 49 on November 20. If he goes higher than 50, and he likely will in the next week or two, Oosthuizen will not meet any of the traditional criteria used by the Augusta National Golf Club to warrant an invitation. He also won’t have an exemption into next season’s PGA Championship. As for the U.S. Open, Oosthuizen will likely need to go through qualifying to get into the field at Los Angeles Country Club because the OWGR cutoff for an exemption has traditionally been No. 60 two weeks before sectional qualifying (May 23, 2023) or on the day of sectional qualifying (June 6, 2023).

Three other LIV golfers are likely feeling better than Oosthuizen on Monday because they appear to have earned spots in the field at the 2023 British Open.

Traditionally, golfers who finish in the top 30 in the DP World Tour’s Race to Duabi earn a spot in the following year’s British Open. Rory McIlroy won on Sunday, but Spain’s Adrian Otaegui finished 15th and fellow Spaniard Pablo Larrazabal finished 23rd. England’s Richard Bland finished 24th.

Those performances do not earn them a spot in any of the other three major championships and their world rankings of 98 (Otaegui), 86 (Larrazabal) and 89 (Bland) are not high enough to earn exemptions either.

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Jon Rahm wins third DP World Tour Championship; Rory McIlroy claims fourth season title

It was the Rahm and Rory show at the 2022 DP World Tour Championship.

It was the Rahm and Rory show at the 2022 DP World Tour Championship.

Jon Rahm shot a 5-under 67 on Sunday to win the tour’s season finale in Dubai at 20 under, two shots ahead of Tyrrell Hatton and Alex Noren. With the win, he becomes the first player to win the tour championship for a third time.

Rory McIlroy’s lucky number this week at Jumeirah Golf Estates was four, as in, he’s now been crowned European Number One four times. McIlroy closed with a 68 for a solo fourth-place finish and clinched the points race when Matt Fitzpatrick tied for fifth. McIlroy earns the Harry Vardon trophy as a result, something he also took home in 2012, 2014 and 2015.

“It’s been seven years I last did it. This is my fourth one but it’s been a while, I’ve won three FedEx Cups since the last time I won this and it means a lot,” he said.

Only Colin Montgomerie (eight) and Seve Ballesteros (six) have more Vardon trophies.

For Rahm, this win marks his ninth DP World Tour victory and third worldwide title in 2022.

“Hopefully, people can stop telling it has been a bad year,” he said.

Rahm began the day with a one-shot lead and started his final 18 with three straight birdies. He bogeyed the fourth but added birdies on Nos. 7, 13 and 15. He now has three wins and four top-5s at Jumeirah Golf Estates’ Earth Course.

“I like this course and this course likes me. I hope this is the third of many more,” he said.

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Jon Rahm ‘maximized the round’ on moving day to take lead at 2022 DP World Tour Championship

The DP World Tour’s rankings prize is up for grabs.

Following Friday’s second round at the 2022 DP World Tour Championship, Jon Rahm felt as if he left a couple shots on the course during his 6-under performance.

On Saturday, his thoughts couldn’t have been more different.

“I don’t think I could have shot any lower today. Maximized the round,” Rahm said. “Wasn’t my best off the tee, but I was able to actually get some birdies out of some not so good situations. I didn’t hit any of the fairways on the par 5s and still played them 3-under par.”

Rahm fired a 7-under 65 on moving day to nab the lead at 15 under for the tournament heading into the final round. He trailed 36-hole leaders Matt Fitzpatrick and Tyrrell Hatton by four shots before the third round, but now those two are chasing the Spaniard.

Ranked fifth in the world, Rahm had seven birdies and no bogeys at Jumeirah Golf Estates on Saturday. He leads Fitzpatrick, who shot 2 under, by one and Alex Noren by two. Hatton and Rory McIlroy are T-4 at 12 under, three back. McIlroy matched Rahm with a 7-under performance.

As it stands, McIlroy is projected to win the DP World Tour points standings. There remains plenty of fluidity in the points race with 18 holes to go, but it’s clear what McIlroy’s goal is.

“It’s really cool, I’ve got to this stage in the game over 15 years as a pro, and I’m still trying to do things for the first time,” McIlroy said. “I’ve never won the FedEx Cup and this tour’s rankings in the same year, so it would be really nice.

“It’s been a wonderful year. I’ve played some really, really great golf and really consistent golf. If I’m able to go out there tomorrow and shoot a good score and get the job done, it would be a really nice way to end what’s been a great year.”

Fitzpatrick, projected second in the standings, could nab the title with a victory as long as McIlroy doesn’t finish solo second.

However, those two are both chasing Rahm heading to Sunday in Dubai.

“I’m hoping come tomorrow I can be a little better off the tee, and still keep the good iron play and good putting going,” Rahm said.

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Lynch: Rankings complaints are less about fuzzy math than outdated European entitlement

Justin Harding earned more ranking points for second at the 2019 Magical Kenya Open than he did for a T-12 at the Masters.

“The world is unfair, Calvin,” the precocious child in Bill Watterson’s celebrated comic strip Calvin and Hobbes was once told by his father.

“I know,” Calvin replied. “But why isn’t it ever unfair in my favor?”

That Tao of Calvin has been embraced as a governing sentiment by European tour loyalists, who appear more alert than ever to any perceived dilution of their circuit’s long-established grace and favor status. And in August’s radical overhaul of the Official World Golf Ranking, the perpetually aggrieved found fresh wood with which to fashion a cross that they might nail themselves to.

“Laughable” is how Jon Rahm described the OWGR at this week’s DP World Tour Championship in Dubai. “The fact that the (PGA Tour’s) RSM Classic, which doesn’t have any of the top 20 in the world, has more points than this event, where we have seven of the top 20, is laughable.”

Rahm is a thoughtful guy and, to be fair, his comments erred only in their timeliness. The rankings were laughable. Now they are like most rating systems: merely imperfect.

Golf’s world ranking was compromised at birth and corrupted regularly thereafter, hostage to politicking and used as a statistical strut to prop up weak tournaments and tours. Member tours designated ‘flagship’ events, often ensuring more ranking points were awarded than would otherwise be justified by the strength of field. Every tour was also assigned a minimum number of points that would be given to winners of tournaments with weak lineups. The PGA and European tours both had a 24-point minimum. The PGA Tour relied upon that in roughly 12% of its events and the Europeans in about 50%, while other tours used it every time.

Any time an event was artificially inflated in value with the use of minimum points, the ranking was degraded, which served also to diminish the worth of accomplishments against elite fields. The 2019 Magical Kenya Open was elevated that year from the Challenge Tour to the main European circuit, but the field quality remained challenged. Justin Harding was the only player ranked higher than 117th in the world. He finished second and earned more ranking points (10.4) for that result against mediocre competition than he did for a T-12 at the Masters (10.3) a month later.

The system introduced this summer ended institutional bias and endemic false accounting. Every player contributes points to a total that is disbursed by percentage. The winner of the RSM Classic is projected to receive 37 points, or 17.2% of the 215 total points available. The winner in Dubai should get 21.8, or 18.2% of the 121 points on offer.

“The current method recognizes that every player contributes to the strength of a field,” said Mark Broadie, the Columbia Business School professor who devised the algorithm. “The winner of the DP World Tour Championship has to beat 49 players, with 34 of those players ranked in the top 200. The winner of the RSM classic has to beat 155 players, with 68 of those players ranked in the top 200, a considerably tougher challenge.”

People minded to look for eye-opening wrinkles in the ranking system won’t be disappointed. For example, the man who finishes dead last in the no-cut tournament in Dubai is projected to receive more points than the bottom four finishers in Georgia, who will have beaten 90 guys to play the weekend. The line between imperfect and unfair is often a matter of perspective, and legislating against every such scenario is impossible.

The OWGR has flaws but it isn’t laughable. Removing bias from any system will always be perceived as unfair by those who benefitted from that bias. Griping from those quarters ought to be greeted with skepticism, if not quite the contempt warranted for the conspiratorial guff being peddled by LIV golfers who are eager to portray the OWGR as lacking credibility or being part of a cabal intent on ruining Greg Norman’s folly. (It’s a diversionary tactic to skate around the pesky non-compliance issue.)

Dismissive verdicts like that of Rahm are proving commonplace among Europeans accustomed to their tour offering ranking points incommensurate with the talent pool competing for them. The only credible way to rank the world’s best golfers is to measure how they perform and against whom they do so, without consideration for legacy entitlements or politics. The new ranking system is finally weighted toward accuracy rather than influence. Some people are just unhappy that their thumbs have been dislodged from the scale.

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Co-leader Tyrrell Hatton gets tough crowd on 18th hole after big par save at 2022 DP World Tour Championship

The two names at the top remained the same after the second round.

Tyrrell Hatton was thrilled with his par save on the 18th hole.

The crowd at Jumeirah Golf Estates? Not so much.

Hatton’s tee shot on the par 5 went into the creek meandering the fairway, so he dropped his ball about 250 yards from the green. He smoked a 3 wood  and two-putted for par. This comes a day after making bogey on the closing hole.

Yet the fans encompassing the green didn’t give much of a response to his shot.

“That’s probably one of the best 3-woods I’ve hit in my life, to be fair, and I didn’t realize it was as close as it was,” Hatton said. “It was a tough crowd on 18. Nice way to finish the day.”

Hatton fired a second-round 5-under 67 and remains tied with Matt Fitzpatrick at 12 under with 36 holes left in the DP World Tour Championship in Dubai. The duo played together Friday after matching 65s on Thursday, and they again copied each other in the second round.

Hatton’s round consisted of eight birdies, three bogeys and the clutch par save on the 18th. Meanwhile, Fitzpatrick’s first bogey of the week came on the 12th hole, but he countered with three birdies on the front and back nine to maintain a share of the lead.

Fitzpatrick has won twice before at the DP World Tour Championship. A third win would help him clinch the season-long points race.

“I feel really comfortable with where my game is at, particularly after three weeks off and looking forward to the weekend,” Fitzpatrick said.

The duo has a three-shot lead on Alex Noren and Adri Arnaus, who sit at 9 under. Jon Rahm, who shot 6-under 66 on Friday, is at 8 under and tied for fifth.

Rory McIlroy, the top-ranked player in the world and leader in the DP World Tour points race coming into the week, shot 4-under 68 on Friday and is T-11.

If Fitzpatrick—who came into the week third in the points race but now projects as the points leader—were to win, McIlroy would need to finish solo second or in a two-way tie for second to win the DP World Tour season-long championship.

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Matt Fitzpatrick, Tyrrell Hatton tied for lead after first round at 2022 DP World Tour Championship

Ever started a round with five straight birdies? Matt Fitzpatrick did on Thursday.

Matt Fitzpatrick couldn’t have started any better than he did Thursday at the 2022 DP World Tour Championship.

How about five straight birdies to begin the day? That’s what Fitzpatrick, the 2022 U.S. Open champion, did at Jumeirah Golf Estates in Dubai during the first round. He added another on the eighth hole, going out in 6-under 30. on the back nine, he added another birdie and didn’t have any bogeys.

Fitzpatrick carded a 7-under 65 in the first round and is tied with Tyrrell Hatton following the opening 18 holes. Hatton himself had a birdie barrage, his coming on the back nine with four straight from holes No. 13-16. He was at 8 under until a bogey on the closing par 5.

“I was laughing (at the start), to be honest,” Fitzpatrick said. “It was a nice start to the day.”

Fitzpatrick, who said he’s battling a sore throat and dry cough, hit all but one green during the opening round. He has won twice previously at Jumeirah in the DP World Tour Championship. In 2016, he beat Hatton by one shot for the title.

Hatton said his mind is still raging about a bogey on the final hole.

“It is what it is,” Hatton said.

The duo on top has a one-shot lead over Alex Noren, who shot 6-under 66 after a strong event in Houston last week on the PGA Tour.

Tommy Fleetwood, who broke a three-year winless drought last week in South Africa, sits T-5 at 4 under. Rory McIlroy, who leads the DP World Tour points standings, shot 1 under and is tied for 22nd.

If Fitzpatrick, who is third in the points race, were to win, McIlroy would need to finish solo second or in a two-way tie for second to win the DP World Tour season-long championship. If Fleetwood wins, McIlroy needs a two-way tie for third or better to win.

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Jon Rahm unloads on ‘laughable’ Official World Golf Ranking, but it has nothing to do with LIV Golf

“I understand what they were trying to do when they changed some things, but I think like I said, they missed the mark.”

Jon Rahm’s press conference ahead of the DP World Tour Championship in Dubai started with the Spaniard receiving honorary life membership on the tour and ended with him unloading on the “laughable” Official World Golf Ranking.

The 28-year-old has become one of the best quotes in golf over the last few years and is known to speak his mind. Wednesday was no different.

“I’m going to be as blunt as I can. I think the OWGR right now is laughable. Laughable. Laughable,” said Rahm. “The fact that the (PGA Tour’s RSM Classic) doesn’t have any of the top 20 in the world has more points than this event where we have seven of the top 20 is laughable. The fact that Wentworth had less points than Napa, having players in the top 10 in the world is laughable.”

The OWGR website projects this week’s winner of the RSM Classic in Sea Island, Georgia, will receive 38.38 points. The DP World Tour Championship winner is projected to receive 21.82.

“I understand what they are trying to do with the depth of field but having the best players in the world automatically makes the tournament better. I don’t care what their system says,” he continued. “I think they have made a mistake. I think some aspects of it might be beneficial but I think they have devalued the value of the better players.

“Depth of field doesn’t mean better tournament. I could go on and on. I think they have missed the mark on that stance quite a bit.”

During his press conference on Tuesday, Rory McIlroy bluntly explained the points discrepancy between this week’s PGA and DP World tour events.

“Yeah, so when you look at two different fields, you’ve got a 50-man field (in Dubai) versus a 144-man field (in Georgia). So just in terms of how the strengths of field is calculated, they have 90 more players to contribute to their strength of field,” said McIlroy. “So the reason that this has got 21 points and the RSM has got 39 is the person that wins the RSM has to beat 139 other guys. You only have to beat 49 other guys here. It’s a much fairer system.”

McIlroy’s Ryder Cup teammate begs to differ.

“But would you rather win a tournament when you have the No. 1 player in the world there or because you have the 30th or 6th there?” asked Rahm. “I think it’s more valuable if you’re beating the best players in the world. I think a lot of people would agree and I think it should reflect that.”

Rahm, who boasts seven wins on the PGA Tour and eight on the DP World Tour, freely admitted the math for point calculations is above his pay grade and he doesn’t know the precise way to fix the ranking.

“I understand what they were trying to do when they changed some things,” said Rahm, “but I think like I said, they missed the mark.”

Rahm is far from the first player to be critical of the OWGR this year, but the majority of the criticism has come from across the professional golf aisle. LIV Golf, the upstart series led by Greg Norman and backed by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, has been fighting for points since its inception earlier this summer. None of LIV’s first eight events earned OWGR points after the circuit applied for accreditation in July. The circuit formed a strategic alliance with the developmental MENA Tour to try and force its way to receiving points, but was unsuccessful. LIV players like Patrick Reed, Graeme McDowell, and Bryson DeChambeau have all called out the ranking system.

“I think a lot of people are against (LIV) having world ranking points. I’m not necessarily against it but there should be adjustments,” Rahm explained. “If your requirement is to have world ranking points as 72 holes and a cut, maybe you don’t award them 100 percent of the points since they are not fulfilling all of the requirements.”

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New complaints in Florida court sue Official World Golf Ranking for allegedly colluding with PGA Tour, DP World Tour, Golf Channel

The complaint further alleges monopolization, attempted monopolization and other unfair trade practices.

Attorney Larry Klayman announced the filing of a Second Amended Class Action Complaint in Palm Beach County’s 15th Judicial Circuit on Monday which alleges antitrust conspiracy to restrain trade and harm golf fans in the state of Florida, as well as “eliminate LIV Golf in its infancy.”

Named in the court filing are the PGA Tour, the DP World Tour Golf Channel and the Official World Golf Ranking (OWGR).

The OWGR is alleged to be part of a conspiracy to restrain trade in violation of Florida’s antitrust laws because its board contains “the conflicted leadership of the PGA Tour and DP World Tour.” PGA Tour commissioner Jay Monahan and DP World Tour chief executive Keith Pelley are both on the OWGR board.

The court filing alleges that consumers “have seen the quality of the product that they are paying for at PGA Tour events be diluted and destroyed by a deterioration of the talent level at PGA Tour events due to the exclusion of many of the top players in the world who have signed to LIV Golf.”

The court filing also claims tickets for the Players Championship in 2023 are 34 percent higher than in 2022, “and some packages for the Arnold Palmer Invitational in Orlando, Florida are at least ten percent higher in 2023 than in 2022” and later refers to the increases as “supracompetitive prices.”

The complaint further alleges monopolization, attempted monopolization, group boycotts and other unfair trade practices. The first amended class action complaint to name the OWGR was filed on Nov. 4. The second amended complaint was e-filed Nov. 11. Golfweek confirmed with the 15th Judicial Circuit the second complaint is still pending at the time of this post’s publication. Offices were closed on Nov. 9th and 10th due to Hurricane Nicole and also on Nov. 11th for Veterans Day.

The second amended action “seeks actual and compensatory damages, in an amount to be determined” by a jury.

“Consumers, that is Florida golf fans including me, have as much right as anyone to benefit from a free market, which would allow all golf leagues and independent contractor players to fairly compete,” said Klayman via a release. “But the Defendants have illegally worked hard to prevent this, as the PGA Tour and its co-conspirator Defendants will not tolerate honest and fair competition, as it will challenge their trillion dollar plus monopoly to totally dominate the golf world.”

While representing LIV Golf’s Patrick Reed, Klayman refiled a $750 million defamation lawsuit in late September to add Golf Channel’s Damon Hack, Shane Bacon, as well as Golfweek columnist Eamon Lynch and its parent company, Gannett. Earlier this month, Klayman filed a new $250 million suit against a number of other prominent golf media members and organizations, including author Shane Ryan, Hachette, the New York Post and Fox Sports, as well as Associated Press golf writer Doug Ferguson and the organization for whom he works.

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Rory McIlroy: ‘Greg (Norman) needs to go’ and there will be no reconciliation between the PGA Tour, LIV Golf ‘unless there’s an adult in the room’

“No one’s going to talk unless there’s an adult in the room that can actually try to mend fences.”

After winning the PGA Tour’s FedEx Cup in August for the third time in his career, Rory McIlroy is in Dubai for the DP World Tour Championship for a chance to sweep the season-long titles on both pro tours.

Despite being winless on the European circuit, McIlroy leads the DP World Tour Rankings thanks to three straight top fives after his win in Atlanta. Over 10 starts, McIlroy has seven top-five finishes with his worst performance coming in January at the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship (T-12).

Just a ridiculous year.

On top of his success on the course in 2022, McIlroy has been the loudest voice when it’s come to the PGA Tour vs. LIV Golf battle. However, his tone has changed over the last few months as he’s waiting for the two leagues to sit down, settle the dispute and come to an arrangement for the betterment of the game.

On Tuesday, he laid out a plan for that to happen.

“Greg (Norman) needs to go. He needs to exit stage left,” McIlroy said. “He’s made his mark but I think now is the right time to say you’ve got this thing off the ground but no one’s going to talk unless there’s an adult in the room that can actually try to mend fences.”

On Nov. 10, The Telegraph reported LIV was looking to replace Norman with former TaylorMade CEO Mark King. LIV quickly denied the report.

Later in the interview, McIlroy disputed comments Norman made claiming Tiger Woods and PGA Tour players should be “thankful” for what LIV has done for the game.

“I’ve said this a million times: Tiger is the reason that we are playing for as much as we are playing for,” he said. “Tiger is the reason that the stature of our game is where it is. The generation of Tiger and the generation coming after Tiger have all benefited from him and his achievements and what he’s done for the game of golf.

“I don’t think Tiger should be thankful to anyone for anything. I think everyone else in the game should be thankful.”

After a hectic year for the game off the course, McIlroy is looking forward to turning the calendar next month.

“I think next year, if we can get the storylines to being about the golf and what’s happening on the course, that’s a good thing.”

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Photos: Tommy Fleetwood’s emotional, unique DP World Tour title defense three years in the making

Fleetwood won the Nedbank Golf Challenge in 2019 before the event was cancelled the last two years due to COVID.

Tommy Fleetwood shot just one round in the 60s this week in South Africa, and it came at the perfect time to seal the deal for a title defense three years in the making.

The 31-year-old Englishman shot a final-round 5-under 67 on Sunday at Gary Player Country Club in Sun City, South Africa, to win the 2022 Nedbank Golf Challenge and defend his 2019 title. The DP World Tour event was canceled the last two years due to the lingering effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The 2019 win in South Africa was Fleetwood’s last victory, and came via a playoff with Marcus Kinhult. Fleetwood won this year by just one shot at 11 under, holding off Ryan Fox, who finished runner-up at 10 under. Shubhankar Sharma finished third at 9 under, with Richie Ramsay fourth at 8 under. Sebastian Soderberg and Christiaan Bezuidenhout finished T-5 at 7 under.

The win was emotional for Fleetwood, who now has six DP World Tour victories to his name. Check out the best photos of his big win in South Africa.