TULSA, Okla. — The last time the PGA Championship was contested at Southern Hills Country Club, back in 2007, Rickie Fowler hadn’t signed any endorsement deals or been featured in any television commercials. He had not won a Players Championship nor any other PGA Tour events, been an Olympian, a Ryder Cup player or someone who has contended in major championships.
Nope. Back then Fowler was a hot-shot freshman from California who was helping a stacked Oklahoma State men’s golf team win a Big 12 Championship over Texas and Texas Tech. He would go on to win the Ben Hogan Award and the Phil Mickelson Award that season as both the collegiate player of the year and the best freshman golfer of the year, respectively.
In other words, Rickie Fowler was potential.
Today, Rickie Fowler is in a slump. He failed to qualify for the FedEx Cup playoffs last season and coming into this week, he ranked No. 125 on the Fed Ex Cup point list. His best finish and lone top 20 this year is a T-3 at the CJ Cup last October. With Stillwater, Oklahoma, being just over an hour’s drive from Southern Hills, so many people thought that returning to a familiar area might help Fowler jumpstart his game.
Thursday’s opening round of the PGA Championship, a 1-over 71, proved that Fowler still has patience. He grinded and worked and sweated in 90-degree temperatures. Nothing seemed to come easy. In fact, before holing a 14-foot birdie putt on 17, Fowler had only made 33 feet of putts Friday.
The score was good enough to put Fowler in a tie for 41st in a clogged field. He will start the second round six shots behind the leader, Rory McIlroy. The low 70 players and ties make the cut at the PGA Championship, so Fowler is in good shape, but he can’t afford to play a loose round Friday either.
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Fowler’s tumble from a career-high Official World Golf Ranking of No. 4 to his current ranking, No. 146, comes down to two things—poor putting and poor driving—a lethal combination for professional golfers.
Five years ago, Fowler was the best putter on the PGA Tour. He won the Honda Classic that year, was a runner-up at the Memorial and the BMW Championship, played on the Ryder Cup team and earned over $6 million in prize money.
As you can see in the chart below, coming into this week’s PGA Championship, he’s among the worst putters on Tour, ranking 162nd in strokes gained putting. He has also fallen from being ranked 18th in strokes gained off the tee to 141st coming into this week.
Fowler came to Southern Hills tied for the lead on a list that no golfer wants to be on. He and Matt Kuchar have both finished in the top 10 in major championships 12 times without winning one. That’s one more than Lee Westwood, two more than Tony Finau and three more than Xander Schauffele. It means that Fowler has played at a high level on the biggest stages.
You could argue that Fowler has not lived up to his potential, but he’s said this week that he’s still grinding, and enjoying the grind.
“Going through it, it’s never fun. I’ve actually enjoyed it as much as it sucked,” Fowler said. “I’ve definitely found myself, not that I ever fell out of love with the game or anything like that, but I’ve embraced the grind and the aspect of just taking every day and going out and enjoying it, even though we have been in tough spots.”
Those are not the words of someone who is giving up on himself or his potential. And Fowler is not giving up on contending this week at Southern Hills either.
“Tomorrow morning it’s supposed to blow even harder, and yeah, that just makes it tough,” Fowler said Thursday evening. “You know it’s hard going in, so the biggest thing is you just focus on trying to execute each shot. You’re not going to do it perfect, so hit it, find it and keep going.”