2021 Memorial Tournament: Top 10 power rankings at Muirfield Village
It’s fitting that smack dab in between two majors the PGA Tour finds itself at a place founded by golf’s greatest major champion.
The Memorial Tournament is set to get underway at Muirfield Village in Dublin, Ohio.
The course opened in 1974. Jack Nicklaus has annually hosted consistently strong fields since 1976.
It also hosted the 2020 Workday Charity Open, a makeshift one-time event held the week prior to the Memorial Tournament. It was created due to the PGA Tour needing to fill out its schedule after the pandemic wiped out several tournaments in the spring.
Muirfield Village is a par 72 measuring 7,462 yards. It tends to draw praise for its immaculate conditioning and lush, green grass. The fairways and greens are bentgrass/poa annua.
We all remember during the 2020 Memorial as play was still going on on the holes ahead, the greenskeeping staff was ripping up turf left and right.
It was part one of a two-phase renovation project that began in 2019. According to Golf Digest, the first phase included new tee boxes on holes 8, 11 and 15 as well as a new rough area on the par-5 fifth.
The second phase shut down the course to rebuild all greens and bunkers, add sub-surface heating and cooling systems below the greens and alter fairway widths. The par-5 fifth is also redesigned to play more difficult.
Course history will still be a good indicator for future success with the same type of skill set still needed to win like in years past. With that said, the renovations could provide somewhat of a clean slate.
Muirfield Village is a prototypical parkland style layout. The strategy to play well here is “right in front of you” as they’d say, so it’s all about execution. Forced carries and aerial style assaults tend to get it done best, though the right conditions can firm things up.
A left to right ball flight like Jack used to hit is favorable to have at Muirfield Village.
Seven of the world’s top 10 are teeing it up in Dublin, as well as 29 of the top 50. This event is an invitational comprised of 120 players with no Monday qualifiers.
This is the last week to try to sneak inside the top 60 in the Official World Golf Rankings to qualify for the U.S. Open. Those who aren’t qualified after this cut-off will head to sectional qualifying on Monday (unless they played last week’s Dallas qualifier), so there’s extra to play for this week in Ohio besides the tournament’s elevated status.
Elevated status in PGA Tour jargon means a bigger purse ($9.3 million), more FedEx Cup points (550 to the winner instead of the standard 500) and three years of PGA Tour status for the winner instead of two.
There may be some storms early in the tournament. Temperatures will be in the 60s and 70s with light wind. Could this mean low scores? The winner was between 12- and 15- under between 2013-18 until Patrick Cantlay took it 19 deep in 2019 and Jon Rahm got it done in firm and fast conditions at 9-under.
Who will be shaking the Golden Bear’s hand on Sunday? Here are 10 picks to contend at Muirfield Village.