Rickie Fowler closes in on massive comeback victory: How to watch

It’s been a struggle for Rickie Fowler for the last three years. It can not be denied.

The 33-year-old has been in a steady decline in form since early 2019. For the past 18 months he’s been essentially the epitome of average, mostly winning as many positive shots as negative rounds. As one of the most popular players in the world, we all gave him a lot more attention than, say, any other player ranked outside of the top 100. We’ve mostly noticed Fowler’s drop to 160th in the OWGR because so many people care about him. All of which makes it quite ironic that his sudden rise from that averageness comes this week during football season while he plays in Japan and while American fans will struggle to see it with their own eyes.

Rest assured it will happen. Fowler is just 18 holes away from completing a tremendous win at the Zozo Championship outside of Tokyo.

For the second day in a row, fans woke up to find Fowler’s name at the top of the leaderboard, but this time he’s flying solo. After a Saturday 66, Fowler sits at 14 under, a shot ahead of Keegan Bradley at Accordia Golf Narashino Country Club. How was it? Apparently it was pretty stress free for Fowler.

“I’ve done a lot of things well,” Fowler said. “I mean, I kept it pretty simple to myself and performed pretty well out there today. Didn’t putt as well as I have in the last two days. Good day. Like I said, it was pretty stress free. I hit a lot of good putts but the greens got pretty busted late in the day and in the soft conditions but all you can do is hit good putts and see what happens from there. Hopefully we’ll get a few more tomorrow.”

Fowler has shown a lot of his old self in recent years, but it just hasn’t stayed. He entered the finals of the CJ Cup a year ago by two shots but was chased by Rory McIlroy on Sunday. He had positive shots in every round of the 2022 PGA Championship, but that wasn’t even good enough to shoot under par. He opened with a 65 in the FedEx St. Jude in September, but then failed to break the 70 in any of the following three rounds. The ups and downs have also put his PGA Tour membership in question, as Fowler flirted with not making the top 125 at the FedEx Cup last fall.

But this week, something sustainable. Something else. Which makes a bit of sense since Fowler made some changes.

As our Jonathan Wall reported, Fowler has changed his irons and opted for a slightly more appealing cavity back set. He quietly switched back to Butch Harmon from coach John Tillery. The legendary swing coach has helped guide Fowler to some of the best performances of his career. And then there is the caddy change. After more than a decade, Fowler split from Joe Skovron, who basically looped his entire career for him. While it was a friendly departure, Skovron has felt like the biggest benefactor so far, picking up the bag for Tom Kim, who dazzled at the Presidents Cup and won the Shriners Children’s Open last week.

This week, Fowler is the man making headlines. The PGA Tour’s Shotlink system isn’t operational this week, so we can’t say exactly what’s working best for Fowler, but he’s hit 43 of 54 greens so far. Doesn’t get in trouble off the tee. And he’s shot 13 under since a double bogey midway through his first round on Thursday. It’s not a total birdie-fest aerial attack. It’s head down, focused, ponderous and simple.

“When we came here, we came here to win,” Fowler said toward the end of his stint with the press. “The last few months have been really good and we’re starting to see a lot of positive things. I think I can do it, but like I said, I know it’s going to be tough. It’s going to be a challenge, but I just have to keep doing what I’ve been doing for the past few days.”

For the Fowler fans with a clear Saturday night schedule, Golf Channel will have live coverage from 11pm ET until 3am ET Cable cutters can also stream it to Peacock at the same time. Fowler tees off alongside Bradley and Andrew Putnam at 9:42 p.m. ET Saturday night.

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