Let’s get one thing straight: Whether Tyrrell Hatton likes it or not, making 16 pars during the wet and windy conditions at Royal Troon Thursday in the first round of the Open Championship is pretty good.
Sure, he probably would have rather made two birdies instead of the two bogies he did make, which, at the time of this writing, was the difference between a tie for second and a tie for 57th, halfway through Thursday’s afternoon wave. Regardless, he was still only five shots off Justin Thomas’ lead when he finished, with few signs of anyone making a run to take it much deeper.
But what Tyrrell Hatton does and does not like, well that can be something of controversy, especially of late.
After his opening round of two-over 73 at Royal Troon, Hatton met with the press and bemoaned that he played one of his worst ball-striking rounds of the season.
“My ball striking day was pretty awful,” Hatton said. “It’s one of the worst rounds I think I’ve had this year, in terms of how I think I’ve hit the golf ball. It wasn’t a fun experience.”
It’s easy to take Hatton’s comments with a grain of salt as he similarly complained in January *after shooting 62* at the Sentry in his second-to-last PGA Tour start before joining LIV Golf. That round even included a couple of club slams.
“Long game didn’t feel that great, I’d say it’s pretty rusty,” he told Golf Channel then. “My body doesn’t feel that great.”
Again, he had just shot 62.
Back to Scotland where Hatton’s stats don’t exactly support his statement Thursday. Yes, he didn’t drive the ball very well, losing nearly a shot to the field off the tee, but he more than made up for it on approach. While he only hit 10 greens, he still gained more than 1.3 strokes on approach, which is more than triple what he averaged on the PGA Tour in 2023.
Hatton said during the leadup to this week’s final major of the season that he was struggling with his ball-striking and resorting to having a swing thought on the course, something he doesn’t like to do. He said a video of his swing showed him that his swing was “miles out from where I would expect to see it.”
“I’ve always played pretty freely or tried to, but it was so far out that I had to try really hard to get it back to where it was,” he said. “Obviously today it didn’t really work.”
He was also very middling on the greens, losing just under two-tenths of a stroke with the flatstick. And it was Royal Troon’s putting surfaces, which were running at just faster than 10.5′ on the stimpmeter Thursday, that drew his ire.
“I holed a couple of par putts, but I think the greens are pretty hard to hole putts on,” Hatton said. “They seem pretty inconsistent speeds as well. And they don’t roll great. So it’s not a good combination.”
His complaints about Royal Troon, which has been lengthened nearly 200 yards since the last Open here in 2016, didn’t stop with the greens.
“There’s a few holes that are just obviously playing really long,” Hatton said. “Unfortunately, that’s where it’s going at the moment, where they just seem to try to make it longer to make it harder, which I think doesn’t make it the most enjoyable test.”
Hatton took issue with the course setup on Thursday as 20 mph winds hammered the course for much of the early wave, only a handful of tees were moved forward. He also picked apart Troon’s par-5 16th and par-3 17th. The 16th played as the easiest hole at Troon in Round 1 while No. 17 was the sixth-most difficult.
“They didn’t put any tees forward,” Hatton said. “You can’t reach any of the par-5s on the front nine. Was it 15 or 16? The par-5, you’re hitting a 4-iron off it. [The 16th] Tell me a good par-5 where you’re hitting 4-iron off the tee. There isn’t one.
“Even though they’ve moved the tee back on 17, which I think is a shame, it’s still with the wind today, you’re hitting 5-iron and hoping it can stay on the green. Rory obviously hits it a lot higher and further, and he was hitting 7-iron there. It doesn’t change the fact that it’s a tough hole, and it’s still hard to hit that green.”
Hatton offering controversial thoughts on major championship courses and setups has been getting up there with the likes of death and taxes, in terms of life’s certainies.
At the Masters this year after a T9 finish, Hatton claimed he hates Augusta National’s famous par-5 15th hole and that it “lives rent-free in my head.” That wasn’t the first time he’s taken aim at Augusta National as he said the course “doesn’t really suit my eye” in 2022.
During the 2023 PGA Championship, hot microphones caught Hatton shouting expletives at Oak Hill’s par-3 3rd.
With Hatton, who is better known for theatrics on the course as well as his hot takes on setups, on the cusp of contention after Round 1, one can only wonder what might be in store for the rest of the week.
