At the Unexpected Open Championship, all bets are off

HOYLAKE, England – Romain Langasque, a Frenchman who plays the DP World Tour, looked like he’d just disembarked from a crabbing boat in the Bering Sea. His hood pulled up over his head and under his golf cap, he would’ve fit right in on “Deadliest Catch” but was in fact standing on the first tee at Royal Liverpool.

Emiliano Grillo, winner of the recent Charles Schwab Challenge, wore a ski hat.

And then Friday’s second round of the 151st Open Championship turned sunny, breezy and dry, with everyone shedding clothing and wondering what happened – and what other surprises awaited.

This has been the Unexpected Open, and that goes for more than the forecast.

Start with the leader – a crafty, albeit often overlooked lefthander. We should have known Scotsman Robert MacIntyre would do well this week, coming off his absurdly good final-round 64 in whipping winds last week at the Genesis Scottish Open.

Only it’s not MacIntyre distancing himself from the field. It’s Brian Harman, on whom you could’ve gotten 125-to-1 odds to win. Harman is a model of consistency, having made the FedExCup Playoffs for a dozen straight years. But he also has the most top-10 finishes (29) without a win on the PGA TOUR since the start of the 2017-18 season.

At the Unexpected Open, though, the normal rules don’t apply. MacIntyre made the Sky TV broadcast for beaning a spectator and proffering a signed glove at the par-5 fifth, while Harman shot a second-round 65 in tough and breezy conditions, stands at 10 under par, and leads by five.

“Unbelievably impressive,” said pre-tournament favorite Rory McIlroy, who shot 70 on Friday and stands at 1 under. “He's been doing some good work with Justin Parsons, and yeah, he's been up there on leaderboards over the last few weeks.” (Harman tied for 12th at the Genesis Scottish Open last week.)

And there it was: Justin Parsons, the guy whom reporters would surely ask Harman about.

Or not.

At the Unexpected Open, the leader wound up talking about 1971 and ’72 Champion Golfer of the Year Lee Trevino, since someone asked why the two were talking at last year’s Open at St. Andrews.

“That was a technical golf swing question,” Harman said. “Lee has always been incredibly nice to me. I wouldn't expect him to know me from – couldn't pick me out of a lineup of two, I would imagine, but he's always made it a point to say hello, so I've always appreciated him and made it a point whenever I'm around him to talk to him.”

Also unexpected: Justin Thomas, a 15-time PGA TOUR winner and two-time major champion, said after his even-par 71 Friday that he was using the round to prepare for the 3M Open at TPC Twin Cities next week. That’s because he shot 82 in Round 1 – his worst score in a major, tied for the worst in his career – and had little hope of making the 36-hole cut.

“There's nobody that shot 82 that hit some of the quality shots that I did yesterday,” Thomas said, processing in real time a predicament that has him outside the top 70 in the FedExCup and thus in line to miss the Playoffs. “It doesn't make sense. I'll hit shots like a No. 1 player in the world, and then I'll make a nine on my last hole.”

Gary Woodland, who carded a 71 Friday and stands at 2 over, accidentally hit a metal barricade from point-blank range, his ball somehow not shattering on impact. That, too, was unexpected.

So was FedExCup No. 1 Jon Rahm (70 on Friday, also at 2 over) missing four times from inside 4 feet.

“Four shots that you can't give up in major championships,” Rahm said.

Tony Finau (75 Friday, 6 over for tournament) used his putter to nudge his ball backward away from the face of a pot bunker. Of all the putting questions he’s gotten, he surely never anticipated this scenario.

Then again, it wasn’t just Finau. The pot bunkers created chaos in the first round, the R&A having flattened out the sandy bottoms so balls could roll right up to the steep, striated sod edges. It had happened to Rahm and McIlroy, too, in Round 1, and there was the potential for something like that to decide the championship.

Oops, never mind. The R&A changed course overnight and into Friday morning, building up the edges of the sandy areas to help stray balls roll away from the sod faces in Round 2. Unexpected.

The same goes for first-round co-leader Christo Lamprecht, the 6-foot-8 amateur going into his senior year at Georgia Tech, ballooning to a second-round 79 and most likely making the cut on the number.

And Shubhankar Sharma (71 Friday, 3-under total), the likeable player from India who hasn’t made much noise since leading the 2018 WGC-Mexico Championship through three rounds, beating McIlroy, Rahm and Scottie Scheffler.

And John Deere Classic champion Sepp Straka went 5 under over his last seven holes to go from barely above the cut line into contention at 4-under par.

Unexpected. Unexpected. Unexpected.

This weekend’s forecast on the Wirral Peninsula is for overcast conditions and, potentially, “outbreaks of light or moderate rain, with some heavier bursts possible.”

Pass the sunscreen.