The Open Championship storylines: Can Spieth recapture Birkdale magic?

Restock your beans, put together your mugs and you should definitely set your alarm — it’s time for espresso golf.

The remaining males’s golf main of the season, The Open Championship, begins Thursday at Royal Birkdale Golf Club in Southport, England.

Tee occasions start as early as 1:35 a.m. ET, however motion needs to be going till practically 5 p.m. ET, making for some enjoyable, caffeine-fuelled golf-viewing home windows.

Here are the storylines you need to know:

The dying embers of the Spieth mystique

Jordan Spieth was all set to turn into golf’s subsequent famous person, the inheritor obvious to Tiger Woods, after profitable the 2015 Masters at simply 21 years previous. Then, he gained the U.S. Open, the very subsequent main, and rounded out that nascent season with two extra main top-fours. Two years later, the wunderkind captured his first Open Championship at Royal Birkdale in traditional Spiethian vogue, utilizing a hard-earned Sunday bogey on 13 to gasoline a 5-under run over his subsequent 4 holes.

Spieth hasn’t gained a significant since. Now, for the primary time since his final, The Open is again at Birkdale. This time, although, the American’s early-career pedigree has pale into nostalgia. He’s perennially “close,” however he additionally hasn’t had a top-10 end this season. Some weeks, he flashes type along with his driver. In others, that trusty Scotty Cameron putter enjoys a throwback 4 rounds. It simply hasn’t come collectively unexpectedly.

“I’m quite frustrated with the results considering I know where my game is at,” Spieth informed reporters Monday. “It’s higher than it was 4 or 5 years in the past, after I acquired again to high 10 on this planet. It’s indisputably higher than it was then. It’s simply not fairly displaying up in outcomes.”

And therein lies the Spieth rub. He does simply sufficient to make his followers consider, however the outcomes paint a distinct image. Links golf — quick, agency and shorter than common PGA Tour fare — ought to play to his strengths, and the vibes shall be excessive at Birkdale. But if he can’t make a very good run this week, it could lastly be time to confess that Spieth simply isn’t that man anymore.

Tommy Fleetwood returns dwelling

The amiable Englishman involves Birkdale in a broadly comparable spot as Spieth, attempting to earn a long-awaited win at a spot that holds particular that means. Unlike Spieth, Fleetwood, who hails from Southport, has by no means gained a significant — and earned his first PGA Tour victory solely final August, within the season finale.

Still, that he hasn’t gotten it achieved at a significant doesn’t imply that he can’t. Fleetwood has eight profession wins on the European tour and he’s persistently proven up as one in every of Europe’s high Ryder Cup gamers. He’s additionally among the many most constant gamers within the recreation, one in every of simply 4 who ended final 12 months within the high 10 of the world golf rankings that continues to be there at the moment (although he’s down from third to ninth).

Fleetwood sits sixth on the PGA Tour in complete strokes gained for the season, and he’s completed between eleventh and 14th in every of his final 4 begins, together with the U.S. Open. His greatest weak spot has been placing, however he needs to be fairly aware of the Birkdale greens having grown up across the nook, and he’ll have the backing of his dwelling crowd. Fleetwood and Spieth are grouped collectively (alongside Jon Rahm) for Thursday and Friday.

One thing more: Sunday’s remaining spherical simply so occurs to coincide with the World Cup remaining. It could be fairly the spectacle if each Fleetwood and England emerged victorious.

At this time one 12 months in the past, world No. 1 Scottie Scheffler dove right into a viral soliloquy in regards to the that means of profitable main championships — how the glory wears off and the realities of day-to-day life and household come additional into focus as a substitute. Then, he went on to win that week at Royal Portrush, claiming his fourth main in three years. The Tiger comparisons hit full gear.

Scheffler returns to The Open in a a lot totally different place. He has only one win since, in January towards a mediocre area in California. He hasn’t added to his main tally, which appeared unfathomable only a few months in the past. He’s additionally nonetheless been the perfect participant on this planet, together with second-place finishes at each The Masters and U.S. Open. Then once more, he additionally missed his first lower in 4 years on the Scottish Open on Friday.

The American stays the favorite to elevate the Claret Jug come Sunday. If he does, his season could possibly be thought of a hit — it’s arduous to win majors, however it’s vital, legacy-wise, to choose them off in your prime. Anything lower than that, nonetheless, and Scheffler’s 2026 will go down as a missed alternative.

The final two main seasons have included a pair of two-time winners, with Xander Schauffele and Scheffler each finishing the PGA Championship-Open Championship double. If you assume the sample holds, then you ought to be going all-in on England’s Aaron Rai to choose up the victory this week. Rai was a shock main winner at Aronimink, and he’s now ranked seventeenth on this planet, however he’s not precisely the all-world expertise of Schauffele and Scheffler.

Wyndham Clark, the winner on the U.S. Open final month, carries barely extra pedigree as a two-time main champion who enters this match nonetheless in type, having shared thirteenth on the Scottish Open. Clark has gained a fame as an influence participant, somebody who can bomb his strategy to a U.S. Open however could have bother with the creativity required on a hyperlinks course. That could also be true; then once more, he completed tied for fourth eventually 12 months’s Open.

Rewind even additional, and Rory McIlroy wore the inexperienced jacket because the Masters champion for the second straight 12 months. After years of looking for the tip of his main drought, it’s wild that the Northern Irishman’s first point out is all the best way on the backside right here. The second favorite behind Scheffler, McIlroy positioned seventh in Scotland, although he additionally hit an enormous pull and yelled at himself that he “sucks” at golf. It could be fairly the bookend if McIlroy gained his seventh main this week and have become the primary to tug off the Masters-Open double since Tiger in 2005.

As the breakaway league’s future stays in flux, LIV’s stars have struggled. Bryson DeChambeau has missed the lower in any respect three majors and hasn’t contended for one since final 12 months’s Masters collapse, carrying a number of the shine off his 2024 U.S. Open within the course of. DeChambeau, who’s on the lookout for his third profession main, has traditionally struggled at The Open — however maybe he may use some momentum from final season, the place he completed tied for tenth regardless of a gap 78.

It hasn’t been as dire for Rahm, who tied for second on the PGA Championship and had a pair of top-10s final season. Still, the Spaniard is a part of the game’s elite that may measure success solely by main championships, and he hasn’t picked one off because the 2023 Masters. A win this week would go away him a PGA in need of the profession Grand Slam.