Rickie Fowler had reason to pout, but didn’t

LOS ANGELES — More than any championship in golf, the U.S. Open makes competitors acutely aware of how little separates yesterday’s pigeon from today’s statue. Witness Brooks Koepka. He won the PGA Championship last month, but was bruised in the early going Thursday at Los Angeles Country Club. He didn’t lack for company on skid row; expected contenders Patrick Cantlay and Justin Thomas were also among those struggling.

Perhaps more than any player in the 156-man field, Rickie Fowler understands how capricious golf’s cycles can be, and not just at the U.S. Open.

On Thursday, Fowler posted an near-flawless 62, the lowest round in the Open’s 123-year history and tying the lowest ever in any major. By the time he pulled out of the parking lot, he was tied with Xander Schauffele atop the leaderboard, the record-setting duo a handful clear of the competition.

Rewind 364 days. Fowler pulled out of The Country Club on opening day of the U.S. Open in an altogether less glamorous position. He was the first alternate but a call to the tee never came — an undignified exit for one with his undeniable star power. But the attitude he displayed that day in Boston goes some way to explaining the position in which he now finds himself in L.A.

“I enjoyed being around and playing with the guys and getting in some good work on the range,” he said 12 months ago. “So there is a lot of good stuff to take away from not being able to play.”

Commercialism has made Fowler an easy target for criticism. He has far outpaced peers in being the face of blue-chip brands while trailing them in victories, the kind of jarring imbalance that is catnip for the Socratic analysis prevalent on social media. On the other hand, attitude – not so much on good days like today, but on lousy days like in Boston – make him an easy guy to root for.

There have been plenty of disappointing days in recent years. The last of his five PGA Tour wins was more than four years ago, around the time he began working with John Tillery on swing changes that never quite took. He went 29 consecutive events without recording a single top-10 finish, a run of poor form that saw his world ranking – once as high as No. 4 – plummet to 185th, rendering him ineligible for most major championships. Prior to his record-setting showing at L.A. Country Club, he last played a U.S. Open in 2020 in New York.

The struggles were granular too. Where once he led the PGA Tour in putting, he dropped…