2022 Majors Poll: The Votes Are In

The Open takes several big categories including top honor. Plus, McIlroy and Lee are voted major players of the year.

After a week of voting The Quad subscribers have spoken: The Open and U.S. Women’s Open ranked as the top majors in 2022. Rory McIlroy and Minjee Lee took top honors as (Major) Players of the Year, while Matt Fitzpatrick’s epic U.S. Open-saving shot was THE shot this year. The Quad’s first-ever major championship poll provided a solid mix of no-brainers and surprises. Here are the findings followed by my reactions…

Quadrilaterelenoistas could not resist those thrilling final rounds propelled by an excess of incredible skill. What can I say, these subscribers have good taste.

McIlroy wins. Without a win. But his -29 total really was something. And The Open was a beat, not a loss. Scheffler’s brutal PGA Championship luck-of-the-draw put him in the middle of high winds and led to a missed cut. But at least Scheffler was voted PGA Tour player of the year by his players on Saturday (Harig/SI.com). Meanwhile, Cam Smith’s MC at the U.S. Open was an off week in an otherwise incredible season.

I may have tainted this vote by mistakenly giving In Gee a T7 instead of 2 at the Women’s Open, but my lawyers will remind the jury how Lee won the Annika award for best player in the women’s majors. The Australian had legit shots at winning two others. And we don’t really count the Evian here.

Quadsters love their links. And it’s hard to argue with the performance of Scotland’s finest in a warm, dry summer. I have no explanation how, Evian Resort got votes in a year when Muirfield was perfect and two others unveiled killer renovations?

Hard to argue with this result. Golfers appreciate the difficulty of fairway bunker escapes without a U.S. Open on the line. A recovery for the ages.

I’m a little surprised Buhai’s back-to-back course records and third round dominance lost out, particularly since her Saturday afternoon wave averaged two strokes higher than the morning. But it’s hard to argue with Smith’s final day stunner at the The Old Course.

I thought the much-improved 18th at Southern Hills would claim this crown with ease, if nothing else for returning the creek into play and preventing a freak Mito win. But it appears this year’s U.S. Open finish resonated with Quadrilateralstonians above all others.

We certainly saw plenty of Muirfield’s 18th. Due to the absurdity of letting television influence major playoff formatting, this hosted all four holes of sudden-death. Winner Ashleigh Buhai bogeyed the 18th hole in her course record tying 65 and again in her record-breaking 64 the next day.

My vote went to Southern Hills’ little beauty. After all, TOC’s 18th is now a long par-3. Most of you did not see it that way!

A tie between ANGC and the R&A. All four organizations drew a decent number of votes, speaking to solid navigation by all in these unusual times. Augusta National’s bizarre Dude Perfect play continues to look Billy Joe Pattonesque and possibly distracted voters remembering 2022’s continued community, charity and golf outreach. The R&A scored for its handling of the 150th Open, the Women’s Open and Martin Slumbers’ stance on LIV Golf. The USGA saw the Mike Whan era start off in grad fashion with fantastic weeks in Brookline and Pine Needles. A third year without course setup drama never hurts. And on short notice the PGA of America gracefully transitioned from Trump Bedminster to Southern Hills with another stellar course setup and without any controversy.

It’s impossible to beat a limited commercial Tradition Unlike Any Other. I was somewhat surprised the PGA’s much-improved CBS/ESPN broadcast did not fare better. And it looks like the USGA needs to have a tough love conversation with the partners at NBC.

Another unfair fight, with The Masters setting the standard for over 15 years and getting better thanks to the best website content and long overdue embrace of YouTube, Twitter, Instagram and even a newsletter. The other majors are stepping up their YouTube efforts but still have app flaws and inconsistent social strategies. We’ll save the two poll questions regarding 2023 for another day.

Thank you all who voted. This helped me learn how to use Substack’s polling feature. Next year I will not send 2023’s survey in the middle of America’s Labor Day weekend. While I’m pleased The Quad subscriber base was ignoring holiday weekend email, the poll newsletter edition only saw a 23% open rate compared to the normal 75%. My bad. I might also wait longer next year so we’re more removed from The Open and Women’s Open after our extensive UK exit polling team felt there may have been a wee nip of recency bias.

Either way, I will be using the instant poll feature more often based on the positive feedback. Thanks again and have a grand Monday,

Geoff