Thomas, a former world No. 1, praised the rising accomplishments of this youthful set regardless that the competitors has helped push his present world rating to seventh.
“I’ve performed some fairly rattling good golf, however if you happen to’re not profitable tournaments now, you’re getting lapped,” Thomas mentioned. “That’s simply the way in which it’s, which simply goes to point out the extent of golf being performed.
“However the jealous facet of me desires that to be me.”
It’s a cheap expectation that youth will proceed to have an effect heading into the 4 golf majors contested from April by way of July. Whereas the truism is that have issues tremendously on the Masters, additionally it is value remembering that Will Zalatoris, 25, completed second eventually 12 months’s Masters. Xander Schauffele, 28 and ranked ninth (one behind McIlroy), performed within the last group on the final day of that Masters with eventual winner Hideki Matsuyama.
At this 12 months’s U.S. Open, Rahm, 27, is the defending champion. Scheffler, Schauffele and Morikawa had been all within the prime 10 final 12 months, as had been Daniel Berger, 28, and Guido Migliozzi of Italy, who’s, in fact, simply 25. Ultimately 12 months’s P.G.A. Championship, Scheffler, Zalatoris and Morikawa had been among the many prime 10 finishers; Morikawa is the reigning British Open champion. Oh, sure, at that occasion a 12 months in the past, Spieth was second and Rahm was third.
There are a handful of theories to clarify this youthful surge, and most middle on the heightened professionalism that has grow to be commonplace even in competitions for prime golfers of their late teenagers or early 20s. That has in flip raised the caliber of golf on the American collegiate degree, the place rosters are additionally now often dotted with elite gamers from around the globe.
And since each dialog about trendy golf should have a tie to Woods, there’s additionally a perception that extra agile and finely honed athletes have been flocking to golf for greater than 20 years — a tribute to Woods’s impact on sports activities worldwide.
Put all of it collectively and people graduating from professional golf’s chief minor league, the Korn Ferry Tour, appear much less intimidated by the massive leagues and extra able to win, or at the very least contend, straight away.
