Henrik Stenson and the claret jug arrived to Royal Birkdale in a car from the future for the Open Championship

Gary Player tells the story of the back flip seen 'round the world

SOUTHPORT, England — Success can sometimes be a burden. It was for Justin Rose nearly 20 years ago. In 1998, he finished fourth at Royal Birkdale as a 17-year-old amateur, holing out a 50-yard wedge shot for birdie on the 72nd hole to finish just two back of winner Mark O’Meara. You probably know what happened next: He subsequently turned pro and missed the cut in his first 21 starts.
“The expectation for a number of years afterwards took its toll coming back, trying to live up to it,” Rose said Tuesday. “I feel now, though, at this stage of my career, I've sort of somewhat proved that that wasn’t a flash in the pan, so I can come back to the Open a little freer than I could for a number of years.”
Though he has won 18 times around the world, including a major championship (the U.S. Open at Merion in 2013) and contended in a handful of others, his fourth-place finish all those years ago still remains his best result in the tournament he most wants to win. Only once since has Rose..

Expert picks for The Open

In a letter sent to Julian Edelman, former teacher admits he was dead wrong about him

Carson Palmer is an old football player in the prime of his golf life. The 2002 Heisman Trophy winner, now 37, recently took a month to decide if his body could survive another NFL season at quarterback. The answer, to the relief of Arizona Cardinals fans, was yes, and so Palmer's dream of playing golf every day will wait a little longer.

Welcome to the Golf Digest Tournament Predictor. Each week we'll pit a machine's tournament forecast against our expert's picks. This week: the Open Championship.
Last Week Recap: Neither the professor or our expert had Bryson DeChambeau as the John Deere Classic winner. Professor Lou Riccio had two top-5 picks in Wesley Bryan (T-3) and Zach Johnson (T-5), but just one other player in the top 20 (Charles Howell III). The Golf Digest expert logged four top-12 selections in Steve Stricker (T-5), Daniel Berger (T-5), Brian Harman (T-10), and Chad Campbell (T-12), with CH3 rounding out five top-20 picks.
This Week: The claret jug returns to Royal Birkdale for the first time since 2008. Compared to other venues in the Open rota, Birkdale's fairways are of the flatter variety, subtracting the bad-break bounces often seen at links golf and providing easier second shots than one would find at Carnoustie or Muirfield. Not to say the course is a cake walk: with surrounding du..

PGA Tour player Harold Varner averages 299 yards off the tee, despite being 5-foot-8. Here are his keys to getting the ball out there.

SOUTHPORT, England — Journalists tend to like Jordan Spieth. Unlike some other members of golf’s upper echelons – they know who they are – the impressively mature 24-year old enters press conferences with the clear intent of actually answering the questions. OK, so he doesn’t always answer the question asked. But he can be forgiven that because the answers he gives to the questions he thinks he has been asked are invariably interesting and thought-provoking. Are we clear?
Anyway, Spieth was up to his usual tricks on the eve of this 146th Open Championship at Royal Birkdale, what is also the young Texan’s fifth visit to the oldest event in the game. Asked by the gentleman from The Guardian for an explanation as to why the last seven majors have been claimed by first-time winners, Spieth came up with a typically tangental — and on this occasion, flawed — response.
“I think there's a lot more guys who haven't won majors than guys who have that are playing, so the chances are ..

Here's the question: What would the World Ranking look like if we had to carry our bags? No caddies.