LOS ANGELES – By his own admission, Rickie Fowler just didn’t have it today.
Fowler set a championship record with an opening-round 8-under 62 at the 2023 U.S. Open and held at least a share of the lead until Sunday afternoon at Los Angeles Country Club. With a long-awaited first major championship just ahead on the horizon, the California native was chasing a historic win less than 100 miles from his hometown. He found himself in the final pairing alongside eventual champion Wyndham Clark, a position he’s been in twice before, both in 2014.
Fowler finished T-2 behind Martin Kaymer at the U.S. Open that year and T-2 behind Rory McIlroy later in the summer at the Open Championship. This time, Fowler sprayed his way to a 5-over 75 and finished T-5, five shots off the pace.
MORE: 2023 U.S. Open leaderboard
“Iron play was very below average and didn’t make anything. That’s a big thing in majors, especially on a Sunday. Making putts and kind of keeping it fairly stress-free,” said Fowler, who now has nine top-five finishes in 48 major appearances. “(Sunday) was kind of the opposite. I was kind of fighting through it all day.”
“I wasn’t as tight in hitting my spots, and that was how it was, especially the first two days,” Fowler continued. “I had a lot of control and was able to place the ball where I wanted on greens, and today I was just a bit off, whether it was left, right, more so than distance control, and just wasn’t able to put the ball in the proper position where I could go be aggressive to make putts.
“We had a lot of good stuff this week. Unfortunately today we just couldn’t get it going.”
Fowler knew his ship had sailed off into the Pacific sunset when Clark hit a gem of a shot from 282 yards to just 20 feet on the par-5 14th hole.
“That was a very good shot in the situation and moment. Obviously made 4. I thought if I could make that putt on the next, which I nearly did, I thought that might kind of give me a shot to get a two-shot swing and maybe make a run in the last three,” said Fowler. “No, I knew I was on the outside looking in, but at the same time, you never know what’s going to happen. You don’t wish bad on anyone, but it’s tough to close out tournaments. Yeah, somewhere I’d say probably when I missed the fairway on 16, I knew that was going to be a tough hill to climb from there.”
It would be easy for Fowler to beat himself up after each round got a little bit worse as the week went…
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