With 2023 PGA Champion Brooks Koepka
Pain is the scourge and complaint for many athletes, primarily when the suffering exists in the knees, feet, and joints that restrict their movements and range of motion.
Injuries compounded and more problematic for Professional Golfers who must forcefully swing a golf club and walk when they ply their trade on the PGA Tours.
When the Professional Golfer is a Multiple Major Champion winner and former No. 1 player in the world with a shattered kneecap, sagging confidence, contemplating retirement from the sport he once ruled, and wondering if he will play competitive golf again, you know his concern and anguish are severe.
When that player regains his inner strength, health, resolve, and competitive fire and then claims the 2023 PGA Golf Championship at the demanding Oak Hill Country Club, you
you might say his comeback and recovery from his injury and self-doubts was successful.
The passage to rehabilitation appears considerably more laborious and noteworthy when the player in question, Brooks Koepka, is also the standard bearer for LIV Golf, the upstart alternative Professional Golf Tour, funded and promoted by Saudi Arabia, in direct competition with the more established PGA Tour.
Whose members’ participation in PGA Tournament events has been curtailed, restricted and is the subject of aggressive and multiple legal actions by both parties of the dispute in question.
Koepka’s injuries prevented him from competing in the 2022 Masters and the Presidents Cup two years ago in Australia, precipitating his move to the LIV Golf Tour in June of last year.
Feeling his way back into competition, he challenged at this year’s Master’s only to fall back and finish second to the eventual winner, Jon Rahm.
His comeback was not to be denied in this year’s second Major Championship.
He made consecutive birdies early on the final day, never losing the lead, shot 67, and cruised to victory over Victor Hovland and Scottie Scheffler, who tied for second place.
With this performance, Brooks Koepka, clawed his way back to the top, playing high-caliber golf on the world stage against the best players on the planet, without pain, and for the fifth time in his career and third time at the PGA, Brooks Koepka won a major Championship.
This Major
Tournament is Koepka’s first since claiming the 2019 PGA Championship in New York, and he is the twentieth player in the modern era to win at least five majors.
Koepka is also joining Jack Nicklaus, Walter Hagan, Tiger Woods, Gene Sarazen, and Sam Snead to have won at least three or more PGA’s.
Only Tiger Woods and Phil Michelson have won more Majors among active players.
Koepka is the first LIV Golf member to win a major Championship giving additional credibility to the fledgling organization, along with three other members of LIV Golf finishing in the top ten for the second straight major tournament.
The victory also moved Koepka to No. 13 in the world and No. 2 in the American Ryder Cup standings, with the top six automatically qualifying for the team event in September.
California Club Professional, Michael Block, made the loudest noise of the tournament by making the 36-hole cut, and a hole-in-one to finish fifteenth, pocketing almost $300,000 and qualifying to return to next year’s PGA Championship at Valhalla.
The highest finish by a Club Professional since Lonnie Nielsen’s tie for eleventh in 1986.
Giving credence and hope to Club Pros everywhere whose only dream, as working PGA Golf Professionals, is a chance to compete on the world’s biggest and grandest stage and achieve success if only for a fluttering moment in time.
With five major championships, Brooks Koepka has now returned from injury, his self-doubt, and salvaged his ownership as one of Professional Golf’s all-time outstanding players.
The list of Professional Golfers to have won five majors since 1970 is short and explementary and includes Tiger Woods, Tom Watson, Nick Faldo, Phil Mickelson, Seve Ballesteros, and now Brooks Koepka.
I had a chance to sit in and listen to Brooks Koepka’s Sunday night Championship interview at the Oak Hill Country Club.
Please Listen Here.
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