The 4 majors are fairly set in stone. The fifth main, self-proclaimed, is the Gamers Championship.
T2G is at all times in number-nerd territory and has made prolific use of the OffIcial Golf World Rankings’ Energy of Area (SoF) ranking up to now.
The sixth main? If we have been up for having that many – which I’m undoubtedly not – the Genesis Scottish Open this week at The Renaissance would at the moment be it.
Newly co-sanctioned between the DP World and PGA Tour as a part of their preliminary “strategic partnership”, the Scottish Open has taken an almighty leap in SoF. Final 12 months it was 424. This 12 months, it’s going to be within the 640s.
That elevates our expensive previous nationwide championship to sixth place to this point in 2022 – behind (in SoF order) the PGA Championship, US Open, The Gamers, the Masters and the WGC Matchplay.
14 of the world’s prime 15 are enjoying within the Scottish – Rory McIlroy is the only real absentee. All 4 main champions are current. Even the lack of the LIVers (and extra on that beneath) hasn’t actually affected the power of area rank.
The Scottish outguns Genesis’ different PGA Tour occasion, the previous LA Open in February. And the ‘legacy’ championships, Jack Nicklaus’ Memorial and the Arnold Palmer Invitational. It will likely be the DP World (previously European) Tour’s highest ranked occasion of all time.
Our fears that the PGA Tour’s half-share was actually a takeover, and that native Scots could be frozen out, seem to have been largely assuaged.
David Regulation – contemporary from securing an one hundred and fiftieth Open spot in Eire – and Drumoig’s Connor Syme got invites to play on Monday morning.
That takes the Scottish contingent to eight. Ewen Ferguson, Grant Forrest, Stevie Gallacher, Robert MacIntyre, Richie Ramsay and the a lot welcome return of Russell Knox are the others.
Time was once we’d have as much as 20 within the Scottish Open, after all. Stalwarts of our present skilled contingent like Marc Warren, Scott Jamieson and David Drysdale have regrettably been frozen out.
However I believe all of us accepted that some sacrifices must be made on this course of. And the advantages of getting this enhanced Scottish far outweigh any detriments.
The Scottish Open has grow to be a massively necessary store window for our sport worldwide.
