Brooks Koepka, the five-time major champion, showed up on Sunday without any chance of clinching his sixth major title. Despite shooting his best round of the tournament with a final-round 66, he was blunt about his performance.
“Not very good. I think it’s pretty obvious, isn’t it?” Koepka said afterward.
After a disappointing tie for 45th at the Masters, Koepka put himself through intense “penalty” workouts. This dedication paid off when he won the LIV Singapore event two weeks ago, giving him a boost as he headed to the PGA. However, despite his win, he didn’t find much reason to be positive about his performance at the PGA.
“I don’t think finishing 30th is progress,’’ he remarked. “Played good today, played good the other two days. Yesterday just didn't have anything. Was kind of disappointed with the way I finished.”
The difference between his rounds? “I don’t know, what, about eight shots?” he said. Koepka shot 74 on Saturday, with significant negative strokes-gained statistics in key areas such as off-the-tee, tee-to-green, and approach. He also lost more than two strokes putting, needing 31 putts for the round.
After starting with scores of 67 and 68, Saturday’s performance was understandably disappointing. “Yesterday I don’t think I did one thing good at all,” he admitted. “Usually when you play bad, you’ve got one thing that you do O.K., and you might putt bad or you might drive it bad. Yesterday was just a combination of everything.”
Now, Koepka has two weeks off before LIV Golf’s Houston event, which is scheduled the week before the U.S. Open at Pinehurst. He remains optimistic about his game. “I feel like I'm playing good,” he said. “It's just yesterday was just kind of unfortunate timing. But I felt like I'm playing all right. I missed a bunch of putts on Friday from inside like five feet, and then yesterday's round was unfortunate. But other than that, I think I'm pretty close to right there.”
Login