PGA Tour

It's Moving Day at The Masters, and Brooks Koepka is in contention. Sure, Rory is lapping the field, but Brooks (-3) is hanging around after a strong Friday finish. And no, it is NOT 2018 again. It's 2026! And Brooks Koepka is in the thick of it at a major championship. What a throwback! Naturally, you start to wonder where this has been the past few years. Brooks was the best player in the world at these things for years, and then just fell off the map. Something changed, but I can't quite put my finger on it …Oh yeah! He left the PGA Tour and went to LIV Golf in 2022. That's right. Remember that? What a moment. Back when the golf world was burning to the ground, and players were FLEEING every other day. Fast-forward four years, and Brooks is back. He returned to the Tour this season, and has seemed … normal again. Right? Just normal Brooks. Not miserable. Not disinterested. No longer an afterthought. Happy. He seems happy. His words, not mine!"I'm just enjoying the game a whole lot more," Koepka said after his Friday 72. "I think there's a huge difference if I'm excited to come out and play every week. It is just overall, if your happiness is through the roof, off the golf course and on the golf course, it's really tough to beat it. "You're gonna enjoy every day, everything you're doing." Whooooooooooooof. It's just not a great look for LIV. There's no way to spin that. It's tough. And you couple THOSE comments with how Bryson DeChambeau looked for his brief Masters stint this week, and it's … telling. Bryson missed the cut after folding like a cheap tent on 18 yesterday, and seemed miserable all week. Just miserable. Frankly, the only time he seemed happy was when he and ESPN force-fed us Kevin Hart during Wednesday's Par 3 contest. Other than that? Just miserable. He's not the only LIV player to look awful this week. Only five of the 10 LIV players made the cut, and of those five, only Tyrrell Hatton (T7) and Koepka (T13) are in contention. Jon Rahm, who, like Koepka, was at one time on top of the golf world, is currently in 45th. And no, I haven't forgotten about Patrick Reed. He's the one who could realistically catch Rory McIlroy today, and tomorrow. He's currently six shots back, and he's another cautionary tale. Reed is in limbo right now, no longer with LIV but still suspended from the PGA Tour until this summer. He was adamant earlier this week that he loved his time with LIV, but … again, it doesn't look great. Perhaps it's simply a coincidence that Brooks Koepka is back in contention after officially leaving LIV. Seriously. Golf is a fickle game (duh). You can have your swing for years, and then lose it out of nowhere and never find it again. It happens. But those comments from Brooks weren't by accident. Nothing Koepka says is by accident. He's a lot of things, but ‘vague’ isn't one of them. They were intentional, and they told you everything you needed to know.