The good news is that it is officially Open Championship week. The bad news, however, is that we are one week away from golf's major season coming to an end.
So far, it's been a pretty remarkable championship season, starting with Jon Rahm winning the Masters in April. Brooks Koepka then completed his comeback with an impressive win at the PGA Championship at Oak Hill, followed by Wyndham Clark's long-shot breakthrough at Los Angeles Country Club to capture the U.S. Open.
You also couldn't ask for more coming into this "British Open" at the Royal Liverpool Golf Club. The PGA Tour's European swing started off with a bang, as Rory McIlroy's sensational final two holes earned him the Scottish Open crown, as he pushed aside the crowd-favorite countryman Robert MacIntyre.
As late as this weekend, Scottie Scheffler was the standalone betting favorite, a position he now shares with McIlroy, who made a small jump up the betting board with his win Sunday.
Here's an early look at the top of the British Open betting board with odds from FanDuel Sportsbook.
Rory McIlroy +650
Scottie Scheffler +650
Jon Rahm +1200
Cameron Smith +1800
Viktor Hovland +2200
Brooks Koepka +2200
Patrick Cantlay +2200
Rickie Fowler +2500
Tyrrell Hatton +2500
Tommy Fleetwood +2500
Xander Schauffele +2500
Collin Morikawa +3300
Shane Lowry +3500
Dustin Johnson +3500
Jordan Spieth +3500
-- McIlroy comes in not only as the Scottish Open champion, but he won the British Open in 2014, the last time it was held at Royal Liverpool.
-- Scheffler is on a simply insane run. He's in another stratosphere in tee-to-green this season, and as Justin Ray pointed out, Scheffler has seven straight (!!) top-five finishes, the longest such streak since Tiger Woods went 11 straight in his prime.
-- Smith is one of the more interesting cases on the betting board. He's the defending champion and won his last time out at the LIV Golf event in London. He was a good fit at St. Andrews last year when driving accuracy -- his biggest weakness -- wasn't an issue with wide-open fairways. There's a much bigger premium on accuracy at Hoylake this year, though.
