Robert TheodorsonRyan Fox was the toast of the town early Saturday morning!
The New Zealander shot a 62, the third of this tournament after Lucas Herbert and Sam Burns accomplished the feat on Friday. With his final birdie on 17, Fox rocketed to the top of the leaderboard alongside Lucas Herbert.
In repeating history, the 39-year-old Fox is now a legitimate contender. Having never finishing within the Top 10 in a major his entire career, the longest of long shots now finds himself eyeing the Claret Jug.
CONTENDERS
The 62 Club: Lucas Herbert, Sam Burns, & Ryan Fox
Anyone who can set or tie the single-round scoring record has an honest chance to win. Incidentally, Xander Schauffele is the only man in history to have shot a 62 at a major (2024 PGA Championship) and gone on to win the tournament.
Despite history perhaps not being on their side, the man who has the lowest round of a normal golf tournament often goes on to win, so betting against these three is a fool’s errand. The only question is: of the trio, who is the likeliest to win?
Scottie Scheffler
If Scottie is visible on the leaderboard on Saturday night, he always has a chance to win, and often a good one. This wasn’t the Saturday that Scottie had planned: he didn’t help himself but at least he didn’t hurt himself with his par save on 18.
Does Scheffler appear out of the race? Yes. Is Scheffler capable of shooting a 62 of his own (or better)? Yes.
Sometimes the stars align and miracles are possible.
PRETENDERS
Those Who Can’t Close Out Tournaments: Tommy Fleetwood & Ludvig Aberg
Nobody is going to like this, but neither golfer did enough on Saturday make Sunday easy on themselves. Both are going to need to take some very risky shots to play catch-up, and especially for Fleetwood, that’s just not his game.
How many times have we seen Tommy and Ludvig come so close to winning it all, but unable to close when it counts the most?
Fleetwood will have the patrons behind him, cheering him on all the way, and he may come very close to lifting that Claret Jug, but this ultimately will not come to pass in 2026.
Jon Rahm
While he maintains the same score as Scottie Scheffler and the unique ability to make uncanny runs on Sundays, the magic from Rahm just seems to be completely depleted.
It’s been tournament after tournament of Rahm blowing prime chances because he can’t sink relatively easy birdie putts.
While the Spaniard will certainly be fun to watch, we’re not kidding ourselves into believing that all of a sudden, he’s going to fix his putting woes.
Bryson DeChambeau
Friday’s decision to penalize DeChambeau two strokes will be talked about all the way until the 2027 Masters, and perhaps beyond.
What could have been if Bryson was two strokes better in the standing?
Like Fleetwood, most patrons will be cheering Bryson on (though to a lesser degree) and understand that the superstar got shortchanged by the rules officials. In fact, other than Rory McIlroy and a few blowhards in the media who should have been retired years ago, everyone agrees that the ruling was outrageous and unfair to a point.
Jackson Suber
The sophomore could join the ranks of Shaun Micheel (2003 PGA Championship), Michael Campbell (2005 U.S. Open), and Danny Willett (2016 Masters) as men who have won a major championship without claiming a previous regular-season trophy.
The reason this doesn’t happen too many times is because eventually nerves get to the youngsters, especially on championship Sundays, and they let the lead slip through their fingers. We already saw a little bit of that from Suber towards the end of the 3rd round.
Suber will definitely be great television entertainment for tomorrow, but don’t expect another shocker this season as we already received that this year with Aaron Rai’s winner at Aronimink.
Moving Day Mishaps: Former Contenders Who Fell Off
A number of notable names suffered miserable moving days and pushed themselves out of contention. Of the field, there were plenty of former major championship winners and betting favorites that put themselves in spots where the only reward on championship Sunday will be OWGR points and of course, money.
Hats off to these men who made the cut and put forth a valiant effort, but they will not be lifting the Claret Jug tomorrow night.
- Tyrrell Hatton (+4)
- J.J. Spaun (+3)
- Francesco Molinari (+2)
- Chris Gotterup (+2)
- Robert MacIntyre (+1)
- Colin Morikawa (EVEN)
