2019 Qualifiers for majors, THE PLAYERS, WGCs
As the swells slows in how the field for The Open Championship nears capacity, there’s no less intensity in who’s gaining entry. And who isn’t.
The Dubai Duty Free Irish Open was the only tournament last week that’s part of The Open Qualifying Series. The top three, not otherwise exempt, inside the top 10 earned exemptions at Royal Portrush.
Bernd Wiesberger (T2), Robert Rock (T4) and Paul Waring (T7) swiped the berths. The trio is a combined 8-for-15 in The Open with one top-15 finish (Rock, T7, 2010). None qualified last year.
Two-time major champion Martin Kaymer finished T9 at Lahinch Golf Club on Sunday. He was the first on the outside looking in as he’s not yet exempt into The Open.
The 34-year-old German has qualified for every major since the 2008 Masters, so his last chance to extend the streak rests on his performance at this week’s Aberdeen Standard Investments Scottish Open. (Incidentally, Kaymer played in all but one of the majors for which he qualified. He skipped the 2017 PGA Championship due to a sore left shoulder.)
With the focus of The Open limited to the goings-on in Ireland, the inaugural 3M Open was not included in the OQS, so first-time champion Matthew Wolff will have to win or finish better than everyone else inside the top five who isn’t already exempt at this week’s John Deere Classic to reserve a seat on the charter flight to Royal Portrush.
Wolff, Kevin Tway (Safeway Open), Adam Long (Desert Classic) and Max Homa (Wells Fargo Championship) are the only winners of PGA TOUR events this season who aren’t exempt into The Open but who are eligible for the World Golf Championships-FedEx St. Jude Invitational.
The special update to this page on July 4 added the 12 local qualifiers determined on four sites early last week, but it didn’t include a pair of European Tour members who joined the 156-man field prior to that. Those unannounced exemptions went to Mikko Korhonen and Andrea Pavan, both of whom will be making their Open debuts this year.
Korhonen, 38, was 86th in the Official World Golf Ranking when it was used to exempt the top 50 as of May 26. That edition was invoked again on June 26 to exempt another 14 in order outside the top 50. At the time, Corey Conners (82nd) was the worst-ranked listed in the press release. Then and now, Korhonen easily is Finland’s highest-rated talent, so he gives the country a lone representative in the major.
Pavan, a 30-year-old from France, was 124th in the OWGR on May 26. It wasn’t until after he won the BMW International Open and rose to 83rd on June 23 that the R&A extended an invitation.