Rahm Moves to World No. 1 With Win at Memorial

Jon Rahm looked like he was on his way to about the easiest win you can have on the PGA Tour Sunday at the Memorial, but where’s the drama in that?

Ultimately, Rahm held on for his fourth career win, but it wasn’t easy.

On a sweltering hot summer day, where play was suspended for about 50 minutes as a storm moved through the area, it was a tough day to play golf. On the front 9, the field all faded in the tough conditions, but not Rahm. He actually played pretty well on the front nine, going 2-under.

As a result, Rahm’s four-shot lead over Tony Finau and Ryan Palmer at the start of the day ballooned to an 8 shot lead after the first 9 holes Sunday. Rahm was 14-under at the turn while his playing partner, Palmer was 6-under, having gone 2-over on the front 9. Finau, who got off to a horrible start, shot 6-over on the front nine to drop to 2-under at the turn.

But then things got interesting. Rahm made a bogey on 10 and then hit his drive in the woods and got a double bogey on the par 5 11th. Now he was back to 11-under, but still had a 5 shot lead over Palmer.

But then on the par-3 12th hole, Palmer made birdie to get to 7-under and cut Rahm’s lead to four. On the 14th hole, a tough par 4, Rahm hit his approach shot in the bunker and then 3-putted for a bogey to fall to 10-under. Palmer made par to stay at 7-under.

So, after 14 holes, Rahm’s 8 shot lead at the turn had shrunk to just 3 shots. All of a sudden, we had a golf tournament.

On the par-5 15th hole, both Palmer and Rahm hit wayward second shots, with Palmer’s almost in the water and in deep rough. Both men managed to scramble for pars and Rahm’s lead held at 3 shots with 3 holes to go. Last week at the Workday Charity Open here at Muirfield, Justin Thomas had a 3 shot lead with three holes to go over Collin Morikawa and Morikawa won it in a playoff.

At the difficult par-3 16th, Palmer just missed going in the water as his shot held up on the bank near the green. Rahm’s tee shot went deep and over the green. His ball was buried pretty deep in the rough.

And then Rahm hit the shot of the tournament, a chip in for a birdie 2. It was an amazing shot because as Rahm had very little green to work with and a pond on the other side of the green. If there were galleries, they would have exploded in a roar.

That sealed it as Rahm moved to 11-under and had a four-shot lead with 2 holes to go. He finished 11-under, 5 shots head of Palmer, who finished alone in second at 6-under. With the win, Rahm moved to No. 1 in the world rankings and No. 8 in the FedEx Cup standings.

Only 9 players finished under par. Matthew Fitzpatrick finished alone in third at 5-under, while Matt Wallace and Jason Day finished tied for 4th at 4-under. Mackenzie Hughes and Henrik Norlander were both 3-under, while Finau was 2-under and Kevin Na was 1-under. Tiger Woods finished his first tournament since February on a disappointing note, shooting a 4-over round of 76 to finish the tournament at 6-over.