Pebble Beach Pro-Am: Power ranking the top 10 pros

It’s the 10-year anniversary of Graeme McDowell’s triumph at Pebble Beach. The former US Open champ is playing like it’s 2010 again, too.

McDowell just won the Saudi International on the European Tour where he beat the likes of Brooks Koepka, Dustin Johnson, Sergio Garcia, etc.

It was the Northern Irishman’s first European Tour win since 2014.

The 40-year-old’s game went dormant for the latter half of the last decade. He found something, though, in 2019.

He won the PGA Tour’s Puntacana event as part of seven worldwide top-10s.

McDowell finished T-4 at the Sony Open this year, which proved to be a sign of things to come overseas.

“I started working with Kevin Kirk back in August of last year and he’s injected a lot of focus and motivation into my practice and my way of thinking,” McDowell said on Sunday. “He helped me get my ball flight back a little bit, and it’s amazing to be getting these leaps forward this soon, really. It’s nice to test yourself.”

McDowell won in difficult conditions at the 2010 US Open where he fired 71-68-71-74 to win by one over Gregory Havret. For some reason, he didn’t return to the site of his lone major championship until 2018.

He MC’d in 2018 but took T-18 in 2019 (68-70-70-71) and T-16 at the 2019 US Open (69-70-70-72).

McDowell ranked fourth on Tour last year in strokes gained putting (.731). That’s a stroke that holds up in the clutch, too. He was also 16th in proximity from 150-175 yards (25’1”).

He’s now inside the top 50 in the world and looks to be in the field at the majors and WGCs. With that weight off his shoulders, I like McDowell to rack up more high finishes.