Two Rare Shots Highlight Opening Round of PLAYERS

Two rare shots highlighted an incredible opening round at The PLAYERS on Thursday. Ryan Moore dunked a hole-in-one on the 17th, and Harris English had an even rarer albatross at the Par 5 11th hole.

Normally, if something happens for only the 9th time in history at a golf course, it would be considered the highlight of the tournament. Rare shots are incredible, very few more so than a hole-in-one that would at least be the highlight of the round that it happened in. That is, in most cases.

Ryan Moore became only the 9th player to hit a hole-in-one at the 17th hole in tournament history. It was an incredible one at that, as Moore dunked it. Talk about rare shots, A “dunk” is when the ball goes straight into the hole, without bouncing or rolling elsewhere. Not only does a dunk take immense skill, as you are hitting the shot to the EXACT distance, but it also involves luck as well.

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The shot punctuated a great round for Moore, as he ended up shooting -5 during Thursday’s opening round, finishing the day tied for 5th. Normally, this would be the shot everyone was talking about. Alas, it wasn’t the most exciting or impressive shot of the day.

That honor, belongs to a different U.S. golfer in Harris English. Heading into the Par 5 11th hole, English was 1-over, with one birdie and two bogeys so far on his card. If you missed the hole and only saw his score change, you likely thought that there was an error that happened at some point.

Harris hit a nice tee shot, putting it around 300 yards off the tee. This left him around 235 in for his second shot. For a lot of us, a 235 yard approach shot would be something that we would need to lay-up. For English, like the other pros, he had something else in mind entirely.

Hitting a beautiful shot, English carried the bunker, landing about 10 feet short of the flag. With the perfect line, the shot bounced once, twice, and rolled on a dead line for the pin. He made an albatross, and was able to write down a score of 2 at the Par 5.

An Albatross, the rarest of golf shots…. is what you would think. Statistically, it hasn’t been over the last 3 years at The PLAYERS. This is the third straight year that someone has hit one at the tournament, as Rafa Cabrera-Bello made one in 2017, and Brooks Koepka made one last year. Both of them did it during the final round of their respective tournaments.

As for the hole-in-one on the 17th, this is the third time in four years that someone has done that. Sergio Garcia made one back in 2017, and Willy Wilcox made one in 2016. Both of these occurrences are much rarer than they have shown to be over the last few years though. From 2003-2015, there were no hole-in-ones on 17 at The PLAYERS.

The albatross is historically more of a rare shot at The PLAYERS. Although it has happened in three straight years, this one was only the fifth in the event’s history. With how often it has been happening recently, we might get lucky and see another one happen this week, as both of these ended up happening on the first day of the event.

Next. Tiger Woods finishes with a wild back nine at THE PLAYERS Championship. dark

When it comes to rare shots, anyone would be lucky to see a hole-in-one, much less one that is dunked. A albatross is the only thing that can top it. Luckily for those watching the event go down on Thursday, they got to see both of these happen. Congratulations to both Ryan Moore and Harris English.

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