Henley tries to take next step up at The Open after two straight solid outings in the UK
What they’re writing
PGA Tour.com
As it concerns the 37-year-old in his 12th start at The Open, experience finally paid off in the last two. He finished a career-best fifth at Royal Troon in 2024, and then answered that with a next-best T10 at Royal Portrush last year. Four starts ago, he won the Charles Schwab Challenge, where he stunned Eric Cole with a birdie-birdie-birdie finish to force a playoff, and he finished T3 in the Masters four starts before that, so if you’re keen on quirky trends, that one is for you.
Golf Channel
20. Russell Henley: Riding a streak of two straight top-10s in Opens and a good course fit here, though he’s outside the top 70 tee to green in the last month
NBC Sports
16. Russell Henley: Henley seems to go two ways at majors: in contention or missing the cut. Since his T-4 at the Masters in 2023, he has six top 10s and five MC.
Draftkings
Russell Henley has quietly developed into one of the better major players over the past few years, and he has recorded back-to-back top-10s at the Open Championship, as well as a third-place finish at the Masters this year.
Royal Birkdale should seriously mitigate the value of distance this week, and place a lot of that emphasis on middle iron approach play and short game. This is a great setup for Henley.
Golf Digest
12. Russell Henley: Russell Henley has been racking up top-10 results in major championships. Two of those top-10 finishes are in his past two Open Championship starts. Henley is accurate and good in challenging conditions. Royal Birkdale is a true ball-striker’s test.
If Russell were going to capture the claret jug, this venue would be a great fit for his skill set.
ESPN
16. Russell Henley: No one on tour hits drives more accurately than Henley, who ranks No. 1 in driving accuracy (73.4%). His iron play hasn't been as good as it was in the past, but he's still capable of hitting plenty of greens this week. Henley had back-to-back top-10 finishes in The Open, finishing solo fifth in 2024 and tying for 10th last year.
Golf Digest/Read The Line
All aboard the Russ bus. The first-round leader in the 2018 U.S. Open, the last time it was held at Shinnecock, arrives to Southampton fresh off a recent victory and in peak form. The widened corridors should allow the most accurate driver on the PGA Tour to easily play from the fairway, opening up proper sightlines and angles to carefully attack these greens.
Russell Henley has been a winner from the very start as a professional, but there were times when it was fair to question if his game was built to compete on long, difficult courses amongst the best fields. He’s answered the bell, finishing inside the top 10 in three of the past four majors. Shinnecock has always found a way to neutralize power and reward strategy, playing right into the hands of a confident Henley.
Russell Henley wasn’t exactly down the middle of the fairways, figuratively speaking, in the week leading up to his win in the Charles Schwab Challenge.
He followed that up to another short run of unpredictability, finishing tied for 22nd, tied for 65th, and tied for 12th.
Now comes the British Open, which hasn’t exactly been a Henley-friendly trip.
The Stratford and Georgia grad has barely made more cuts than missed at The Open, with six full weekends in 11 tries.
Three of those finishes were in the top 25.
But he’s on a roll, taking fifth in 2024 and tying for 10th last year.
In both tournaments, he gutted out rough rounds. He followed a 69 with a 75 in 2024, and opened with a 72 last year.
That followed a rough go in the UK, missing cuts in 2018 and 2021, tying for 62nd in 2022, and missing the cut in 2023.
In those 11 visits, covering 34 rounds, Henley is a whopping 28 over par, with only 10 rounds under 70.
Henley tees off Thursday at 4:36 a.m., EST, 9:36 a.m. local time at Southport, in the middle of the 156-player pack for the 154th Open.
The Open rotates courses, one reason for Henley’s struggles. Royal Birkdale is hosting for the first time since 2017, a Jordan Spieth win.
Henley finished 37th that year, with rounds of 70, 70, 75, and 67 for a 2-over 282.