Sunday’s final round of the PGA Championship at Kiawah Island ended in Phil Mickelson’s historic win as he became the oldest major champion at 50. It also featured a ridiculously large crowd that passed through security to follow Phil to the 18th green.
As awesome as those scenes were, not everybody was thrilled to navigate through a large crowd at The Ocean Course.
Following his second-place finish, Brooks Koepka told reporters that his surgically repaired knee was in pain after it got “dinged” a few times by spectators who spilled onto the course. He also claimed that Rickie Fowler got “drilled in the face.”
All eyes on Phil. pic.twitter.com/7pspQIFpni
— CBS Sports (@CBSSports) May 23, 2021
Incredible. pic.twitter.com/MX1xN9ESh6
— Austin (@rondarouseyszn) May 23, 2021
Koepka said via Golf Channel:
“I’m not happy. I don’t know if there’s a right word I can say on here without getting fined, but it hurts a little bit.”
He continued:
“I don’t think anybody really understands. There’s five people kind of standing by your knee, you get a little skittish. Like I don’t mind waiting or being in that crowd but getting my — I don’t know, it felt like somebody tried to, I don’t know what the deal was, but it’s what it is. Be putting it in ice today. It feels like (expletive) right now.”
That’s a tough situation to be in for sure, and you obviously want to see PGA do everything it can to keep spectators away from golfers. Hopefully, Koepka’s knee wasn’t hurt from the encounter.
