Joaquin Niemann is riding a high entering the LIV Golf Virginia event this weekend.
He’s won five times in the past 20 LIV events. He’s the league’s season points leader.
But he’s reached the point of the season where he’s juggling some golf balls. He’s got the Virginia event beginning Friday and also is preparing for the season’s next major, the U.S. Open, June 12-15 at the daunting Oakmont Country Club in Pennsylvania. The chance to win his first major is on his mind.
His success — multiple LIV wins and two PGA Tour titles — hasn’t translated into success in the majors. His best finish at a major came last month at the PGA Championship at the Quail Hollow Club in Charlotte, where he tied for eighth. He earned an exemption into the U.S. Open.
“Yeah, obviously we’re a week away from that. Yeah, I had a good finish at PGA,” the 26-year-old Chilean said Wednesday. “I didn’t feel like I played my best game. I felt like there was a lot more at the time to play better. I knew I could have a way better result. But I think we can take the positives and go step by step. It’s my first top 10 in a major, so that’s a positive.”
At the Masters Tournament in April, he finished T29.
He knows his first time playing Oakmont will be difficult.
“I can’t really tell you how I’m feeling, how I’m going to be feeling that week,” he said. “I know it’s going to be a really tough week. I know U.S. Opens are always prepping the course as hard as they can. They want us to win with over par, which talks about how hard they’re going to set it up. I know it’s going to be long rough. You’ve got to hit it long, straight.
“It’s going to be hard. I know it’s going to be a good challenge. Looking forward for that, I guess.”
Niemann only has to look at the other players at the LIV Golf event at the Robert Trent Jones Golf Club in Gainesville, Va., for inspiration. He’s surrounded by majors winners.
Several of LIV’s most prominent players will be in the field with him at Oakmont, outside of Pittsburgh. Bryson DeChambeau, Brooks Koepka, Dustin Johnson and Spaniard Jon Rahm are invited as U.S. Open winners from the past 10 years; DeChambeau is the defending champion.
Englishman Richard Bland was invited after winning the 2024 U.S. Senior Open. A pair of other recent major winners — Phil Mickelson (2021 PGA Championship) and Cameron Smith (2022 Open Championship) — are exempt as well.
LIV player Carlos Ortiz of Mexico made it through a U.S. Open final qualifier last month in Dallas, where Spain’s Sergio Garcia fell one stroke shy of a playoff.
On Monday, seven LIV players — most notably two-time Masters winner Bubba Watson — opted to withdraw from a U.S. Open final qualifying site in Rockville, Md.
The U.S. Open is where Niemann can apply what he’s learned from his LIV rivals.
“I know that I don’t have any majors yet. I know if I have one, I know I’m going to have another one and then another one, and that’s the way it works,” he said. “But yeah, for me, having somebody like Phil or Bryson or Brooks, DJ or Sergio, all these guys, they already won. They’ve already been in that situation.
“Just competing against them, it just makes me in a way feel that I’m — I know 100 percent in myself that I can do it, that I can accomplish that. I feel like there’s probably some information that I can learn here and there from them. So whenever I have a chance, I try to learn.”
He still has the immediate task at hand this weekend in Virginia. And Niemann said he knows the push his LIV league mates will pose for him the rest of the season. He’s already lived it. Rahm edged him out of the individual title on the final weekend of the 2024 season.
“It’s kind of similar from last year. I was in a similar situation, leading the points,” he said. “I know I have a challenge in front of me. I know there’s really good players behind me trying to chase me. You’ve got Bryson, you’ve got Jon, Sergio. Last year I had a good fight with Jon the last half of the season, and now Bryson is underway playing great golf, as well.
“I take it as a great challenge. I know I got to play great and amazing golf to have a chance to win the league, which is the goal. It feels good to be here right now. The way I’ve been playing, winning three times this year is pretty cool, too, so hopefully I can keep that percentage going the way it is.”
–Field Level Media
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