AUGUSTA, Ga. — A U.S. Open broke out this weekend at Augusta National, so it’s unsurprising that the finest Open player of the past decade embraced the type of grind known to test head and heart as much as technique. Brooks Koepka has won the Open twice, finished in the top four three other times, and won a couple of PGA Championships at USGA venues. Few athletes are better suited to tough examinations, and no other potential winner at the 87th Masters would better exemplify the contradictions and conundrums in elite golf these days.
He isn’t Jay Monahan’s dream champion — and probably not Fred Ridley’s either — but nor is he an ideal winner for Greg Norman, who prefers more malleable and docile types as his promotional playthings for LIV Golf.
He has long maintained friendly relations with the commissioner of the Tour he left, but not of the one he joined.
He has won four major championships, but in each instance refused to join a show-and-tell trot around television talk shows to promote the victory, and by extension the organizations and tour that would benefit from such. Barring a contractual obligation to be pimped — which is feasible given the straitjacket terms of LIV paperwork — Koepka’s preference for retreating to celebrate with his inner circle bodes ill for any effort by Norman to enlist him as a spoil of war.
He’s a man who said on Friday that he’s happy with his decision to sign with LIV, but admitted in the same breath that the decision would have been tougher had he been healthy, a subtle but damning indictment that the circuit’s top player viewed it as a cash-out.
He’s a guy who loves nothing more than trash-talking in the heat of competition, who fancies himself an NBA-style stud but finds himself in little-watched exhibition games with the Riyadh Globetrotters when he now knows he can still beat the world’s best.
He would be an asset on either tour, yet thirsts for a competitive high that is found only in majors, a sentiment he has voiced often. The PGA Tour couldn’t slake it, and LIV won’t either. Tour golf — any tour — is what Koepka uses for reps, not motivation.
He could pick up a check Sunday for $3.24 million, less than the $4 million he earned last weekend in a LIV event but also less than the top prize in a dozen PGA Tour events this season. Majors once led the way in purses and stature, but the cash arms race has far outpaced what the uppermost tier of golf excellence can cobble…
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