Rickie Fowler is perhaps the best golfer currently on tour not to have won a major. He has experienced a number of near misses, finishing as runner up on three different occasions. In total, he has had 10 top-10 finished in golf's flagship events.
The 30-year old will be hoping to finally end his major drought this week in Portrush, but he will have to do so without one of his lucky charms.
Much like Tiger Woods and his famous tradition of wearing red on the Sundays of tournaments, Fowler opts to wear orange on the final day. It is something he has done since his time in college golf at Oklahoma State, explaining to Fox Sports:
Yeah, I started doing that while I was in school. Obviously not many guys wear orange, so it was a way to be my own man out there.
A few of my [Oklahoma State] teammates wore the same colours, so at the time it was a bit of a bonding thing. But nobody really does it on tour. I like to think of it as my own little personal style.
It looks like he will be breaking from tradition this weekend.
While it is a merely a bold fashion choice for Fowler, the colour orange has a much different meaning in Northern Ireland, the venue of this year's Open Championship.
The significance of the colour has reportedly been explained to Fowler by Ricky Elliott, the caddie to Brooks Koepka, who hails from the Porturush area.
The golfer's clothes supplier Puma also tweeted a photo earlier today displaying Fowler's planned outfits for the week, featuring a noticeable lack of orange. Instead, it appears he will opt for green on Sunday.
Rickie is ready to make his mark at #TheOpen. #PUMAXcollection https://t.co/uFiNv4RDBS pic.twitter.com/tyV7hX3meq
— pumagolf (@PUMAGolf) July 17, 2019
Of course it is unlikely there would be any major fallout had the player opted for orange, but it shows the different dynamic around this tournament in comparison to previous Opens.
The history of Northern Ireland has very much been a topic of discussion in the buildup to this week, and the event in Portrush has been given as an example of the progress that has been made in the region.
