There's a Youth Movement in Golf, and Jordan Spieth Is Leading It - The New ... - New York Times
ST. ANDREWS, Scotland â€" The bespectacled, white-haired journalist from The Surrey Advertiser, on hand to chronicle his 37th consecutive British Open, cocked his head and asked Jordan Spieth a question that cut through the crosswinds during the tournament as deftly as did one of Spieth’s crisp iron shots on the Old Course:
When did golf become so youthful?
Down the stretch of Monday’s finale, the usual cast of leading men was nowhere to be seen. Tiger Woods, a 14-time major winner, failed to make the cut. Phil Mickelson, who has not won since the 2013 British Open, teed off early and put together a quiet three-under-par 69 to finish tied for 20th, eight strokes back. Rory McIlroy, the world No. 1 and the event’s defending champion, never made it to the first tee. Sidelined with a badly sprained ankle, McIlroy was out of sight, out of mind.
In five news conferences with the print media over six days, the second-ranked Spieth was asked 64 questions, and the only time McIlroy’s name came up was when Spieth casually mentioned him in a list of players whose power off the tee he could never hope to match.
Last summer, McIlroy was golf’s transcendent figure, with victories in the British Open and the P.G.A. Championship leaving him one Masters title from a career Grand Slam. Having taken the mantle from Woods, though, McIlroy, now 26, found Spieth, an avid basketball fan, battling him for it as if it were a jump ball. Spieth could have supplanted McIlroy at No. 1 with a victory Monday. His tie for fourth only delayed what appears inevitable.
Once hailed as golf’s young gun, McIlroy must feel, suddenly, as if 26 is the new 36. Spieth, who turns 22 next week, is blazing a trail for the millennials. On Monday he battled rain, wind, a few golf ghosts, his putter and the Road Hole and came within a holed chip or a made 6-footer of joining Zach Johnson, Marc Leishman and Louis Oosthuizen in a playoff. Spieth’s play in the first three majors disinterred sepia-toned memories of Bobby Jones, who opened his successful Grand Slam bid in 1930 with a victory in the British Amateur at the Old Course.
Jones was 28 in 1930, which would have rendered him an old-timer on Monday’s bottlenecked leaderboard. One of three players sharing the 54-hole lead was a 22-year-old, Paul Dunne, who was trying to become the first amateur to win this tournament since Jones. Dunne, an Irishman, is 243 days older than Spieth, for whom he was often mistaken, he said.
Playing in the final twosome, Dunne struggled to a 78 and finished tied for 30th in a group that included Rickie Fowler and Jim Furyk.
“I don’t think there’s much positives to put on a 78 in a final round,†Dunne said. “But I’m sure there’s still stuff I can learn from it that’ll be positive going forward and help me in the future.â€
Spieth could relate. He briefly contended in his British Open debut in 2013 before ending up in a tie for 44th.
“I got into contention there on Saturday and started to make a little move, and I remember almost thinking like that was too big for me at the time, in a way,†Spieth said. “I felt like I wanted to compete, I loved the pressure, and I felt like I could do it, but it was a position I’d never been in, and it was an odd feeling, being in contention in a major on a weekend.â€
He added: “I didn’t finish well that round. But it was enough to where I’m now in the position I’m in sitting here today.â€
Dunne’s collapse kept him from winning the silver medal, awarded to the low amateur. That distinction instead belonged to Jordan Niebrugge, a Wisconsin resident who is eight days younger than Spieth. He started the day tied for ninth and spent all afternoon on the first page of the leaderboard. Niebrugge, who has one year left at Oklahoma State, recorded a 70 to hold a share of sixth place at 11 under.
“Just to see all the amateurs competing on a high level just says a lot about the amateurs coming up and how good they are,†Niebrugge said.
Oliver Schniederjans, who turned 22 last month, finished with a 67 and an overall score of nine under in his final amateur start. Schniederjans, who played at Georgia Tech, will make his pro debut this week at the Canadian Open. He posted the same cumulative score as another amateur, Ashley Chesters, a 25-year-old from England who plans to turn pro by the end of the year.
This new generation, drawn to the game by the spell cast by Woods, has benefited from junior and collegiate circuits that give players access to quality courses and keen competition. By the time they are in their late teens, they are as tough as calluses.
“There’s just no fear,†said Spieth, who believes an amateur will win a major “in the next decade or so.â€
Niebrugge agreed. “I grew up playing with a lot of the guys that are playing well right now on the PGA Tour and out here, and it just gives me the most confidence, seeing that we can actually compete with those guys and we’re not far behind,†he said.
Was it only two years ago that a 43-year-old, Mickelson, won this championship? Sometime between Woods’s back operation last year and McIlroy’s ankle injury this year, golf entered a transitional period.
So many spray-painted lines in the sport are becoming more and more blurred: between professionals and amateurs, public courses and private ones, men’s clubs and women’s clubs. Spieth won his first major at the exclusive Augusta National Golf Club. He captured his second at Chambers Bay, a public course. The crowds on hand to watch him try to win his third included a few of the first female members of the Royal and Ancient Golf Club, from which the organizing committee of this tournament is culled.
The tournament’s Monday finish was courtesy of torrential rains on Friday and gale-force winds on Saturday. After the storms came a rainbow of multigenerational spectators. The well-heeled fans of the sport were joined by those who took advantage of the price of admission (10 pounds, or about $16), a pittance compared with the £80 price tag for tickets for the first three rounds.
What everybody saw were players not made from the same mold as Woods, who elevated the game with his athleticism. Woods in his heyday cut doglegs with his prodigious drives. The strengths of Johnson and Spieth are playing angles and plotting their way around the course like mathematicians. They subdue courses not with brute force but with the brunt of their golf intellects.
The younger players took note.
“Amazing final day as an amateur,†Schniederjans said. “Couldn’t ask for anything more special, watching myself or feeling like I belonged out here and watching my name go up the leaderboard.â€
He added: “That’s incredible. Extremely special day, and I’m ready to turn pro.â€
An earlier version of a picture caption with this article misstated the given name of the golfer shown on the fourth hole during the final round of the British Open. He is Oliver Schniederjans, not Chris.
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