After coming so close to winning The Masters in April, and then bouncing straight back to lift the PGA Championship, Brooks Koepka will tee it up at the 2023 US Open as one of the hot favorites. He’s also one of five LIV players to have won the US Open before.
A number of LIV Golf players have faced criticisms for joining the Saudi-backed circuit, which got off the ground last year. One of them, besides been accused of greed, is that they are past their best.
Koepka, however, has done his best to prove that no one can label him as washed up, and no doubt the other LIV players to have qualified for the 2023 US Open will be keen to do so in California in two weeks’ time.
Although the list of US Open entries has yet to be finalised, 12 LIV names have been confirmed on the USGA’s website. Of the dozen, four players have previously won the US Open – Bryson DeChambeau, in 2020, Koepka in 2017 and ’18, Dustin Johnson in 2016 and Martin Kaymer in 2014. Graeme McDowell has also won the US Open, in 2010, but he came up a shot short of making a playoff in qualifying for this year’s edition.
That makes it five LIV players who have previously won the US Open, although only four will tee it up at The Los Angeles Country Club. Here, we take a quick look back at those victories.
GRAEME MCDOWELL – 2010
Graeme McDowell held his nerve as Pebble Beach showed its teeth
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G-Mac was the last man standing at a devilish Pebble Beach, closing with a final-round 74, a score good enough to just hold off Grégory Havret of France. The Ulsterman showed nerves of steel to claim his first Major title, fending off the likes of Ernie Els, Phil Mickelson and Tiger Woods, and in so doing became the first British golfer to win the US Open since Tony Jacklin in 1970.
MARTIN KAYMER – 2014
No one could get near the German at Pinehurst
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The German was in a league of his own at Pinehurst, where he cruised to victory by an incredible eight shots. Kaymer, then 29, led from start to finish, displaying the same level of quality that had earned the man from Düsseldorf another huge victory at the Players Championship the previous month. History was also made that week, with Kaymer becoming the first man from continental Europe to win a US Open.
DUSTIN JOHNSON – 2016
Dustin Johnson survived a Rules scare at Oakmont
(Image credit: Getty Images)
For so long, Johnson carried the tag of ‘best player never to have won a Major Championship’…
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