ROCHESTER, N.Y. -- What surprised you about the first round of the 2023 PGA Championship? Was it that Masters champion Jon Rahm shot 76 and fell behind several PGA pros? Was it that Rory McIlroy hit just two fairways but still somehow gained over two strokes on the field? Or was it that Bryson DeChambeau -- captain of the Crushers -- shot 66 to hold the clubhouse lead for a significant portion of Round 1 in the second major of the season?
DeChambeau came into this week at a slimmed down 210-215 pounds after experimenting for years with bulking up and hitting bombs. It was a path that led him to a 2020 U.S. Open victory but not much in the way of contention at subsequent major championships. Since that victory at Winged Foot, DeChambeau said he experienced inflammation that led to vertigo-like symptoms as well as a wrist surgery that kept him out of last year's PGA Championship. He has also missed more cuts (two) than he placed among the top 25 (once) at majors in that span.
Not much was made about his chances entering the week. Even recently, DeChambeau has struggled. Since a T8 at last year's Open Championship, he has just two top 10s in 13 starts across LIV Golf and the Asian Tour.
Even DeChambeau, who said after his round that at times during practice he wondered how anyone was going to shoot under par at Oak Hill, seemed a bit taken aback by his performance in Round 1.
"Hitting the driver straight, finally," he said while explaining what was most surprising about his opening 18 holes. DeChambeau hit nine of 14 fairways on Thursday.
"I'm so used to hitting it everywhere. Look, it could happen [Friday]. I don't think it will, but I feel really confident. Golf is a weird animal. You can never fully have it, like Arnie [Palmer] said. You always think you have it one day and then it just leaves the next. Just got to be careful."
Even after losing 18 pounds in 24 days like DeChambeau claims, he appears to be a transformed driver from five or six years ago. He's kept the speed that made him great, estimating that he can still reach 200 mph while sending the ball. It's just been an issue of keeping it on this planet. He believes a lack of ulnar stability has led to both low left and high right misses.
"As I've told you guys before, I've struggled with my driving," DeChambeau said. "You see me out there on the range. That's something I don't want to do. I don't want to be out there all night, but I've had to to figure out what I did so well in 2018 and what made me so successful then."
The Thursday 66 mached DeChambeau's low round at a major championship.
It's good to have him back, too. His press conference was an amalgamation of scientific tangents, body breakdowns and psychological riffing. In other words, a Bryson-like press conference. He clearly remains the high king of golf content.
Whether he remain the high king of this tournament is yet to be determined. We've seen him do it at a major before, but that was a different time with a different body and a different confidence. This is a bit of a reinvention, and his early success this week is surprising.
DeChambeau was as high as 100-1 to win the tournament entering the week, according to Caesars Sportsbook. Though his name is familiar, recent success is not.
If there was a tell from Thursday about how the rest of the week is going to transpire, it's neither the tournament-leading 3 strokes gained off the tee, the easy 200 mph speed nor the six-birdie 66 over the first 18 holes. All of that could hold up, of course.
The biggest tell was DeChambeau being just as surprised as anyone when asked a round that seemingly caught the golf world off guard.
Rory McIlroy battles
The four-time major champion shot 38 going out, and it would have been incredibly easy for him to lay down coming home. He grinded out a 71, though, and gained over two strokes on the field even though he had one of the worst driving days of anybody at Oak Hill. Only Denny McCarthy hit the same number of fairways (two) as McIlroy, and McCarthy shot 75.
Clawing his way to the top of the leaderboard after a tough start at a big tournament is not exactly McIlroy's path to success, but perhaps -- amid a sea of "here's what he should try" theories -- it's the formula for getting to major championship No. 5. If so, he's probably going to have to fix a broken driver. As underrated as his overall game may be these days, it's not good enough to overcome an average week off the tee at Oak Hill.
Rory McIlroy hit only 2 fairways today, his fewest ever in a major championship round.
— Justin Ray (@JustinRayGolf) May 18, 2023
It's just the 4th time in the last 20 years at the @PGAChampionship that a player hit 2 or fewer fairways and still shot 71 or better.
Dominance diverging
How about this statistic: In the nine tournament both Jon Rahm and Scottie Scheffler have played together this season, one of them has gone on to win six times. Six! Two of the others included fourth-place finishes, and one of them was a T11. Their best-ball finishes this year have been extraordinary, and that portends well for Scheffler, who is just one back of DeChambeau going into Friday's second round.
Rahm isn't out of it yet, either. Despite shooting 76, he talked after the round about believing a rebound to around even par could give him a shot to win entering Sunday. That sounds crazy given he sits 10 shots back of the leader, but it's not. Six of the last 14 PGA Championship winners have been outside the top 30 after Round 1. It's among the most volatile majors over the last three days, and Rahm can -- as we've seen over and over again -- make up all that ground in a hurry.
Plus plus
Speaking of high scores! Is an over-par score in play this week at Oak Hill? It's only happened four times in PGA Championship history, and all four were scores of 1 over: Dave Stockton (1976), Gary Player (1972), Julius Boros (1969), Jay Herbert (1960). Scheffler believes Thursday is going to end up as the easiest day at Oak Hill, and with just 19 players under par after Day 1, it does seem like an over-par winner is at least in play.
"I felt like today there wasn't as much wind, and tomorrow it looked like the wind is going to be blowing 10 to 20," said Scheffler. "I thought I saw a lot of that over the next three days as well. So, going into today, it looked like it was going to be really calm. That was just my thought. Could be wrong."
Viktor stays hot
Viktor Hovland is T7 after his first round, which is about where he's been after the last two majors. He was T5 after the first round of the 2022 Open Championship and T1 after the first round of the 2023 Masters. In both instances, he faded; however, Hovland claims he's gleaned from those failures. This time, he is trying to stay patient and disciplined (not necessarily his strengths at majors over the years!).
"I'm still learning, but I feel like I've learned a lot from past experiences," said Hovland. "In these tough tests, I've been trying to force birdies too much, and now I just need to kind of try to play my game, hit the middle of the greens, pick up a couple birdies here and there and just play boring golf. And hopefully on Sunday, that's good enough to win it instead of trying to push for flags that I'm not supposed to push for."
Best with one major?
Who's the best golfer ever with just one major win to his name? Tom Weiskopf, Fred Couples, Davis Love III, David Duval, Justin Leonard and Ken Venturi are all in the mix. Adam Scott has to be on the list as well. He has 14 PGA Tour victories and 31wins worldwide. He's also one of just 25 players who have been No. 1 in the world. Scott has played in 87 major championships with 40 top-25 finishes. He's maybe not an all-time great, but at the least, he's one of the handful of best ever from his continent.
Scott can remove himself from the conversation completely with a second major win this week at Oak Hill to go with his 2013 green jacket. At age 42, it's likely to be one of his last great chances ever. Scott sits T2, one shot back of the 5-under lead after the first day of action.
Late-early wave
You know what would frustrate me if I had to play in the afternoon wave late into the evening on Thursday and get up early to play 20 or 22 holes early on Friday morning? Scheffler dropping a bogey-free 67 and getting to sleep in during Round 2. It's true that the afternoon wave has been mildly easier thus far, but I would venture to say it the late-early will end up being the worse of the two waves when it's all said and done and the cut is made on Friday night or Saturday morning.
