SportsLine golf expert Brady Kannon just locked in his PGA Tour best bets for the 2025 British Open at Royal Portrush Golf Club

Scottie Scheffler is the favorite to win The Open. Jon Rahm is right behind him. Collin Morikawa, Xander Schauffele, Shane Lowry... Yes, we know, we know.

Fourteen years ago this week, as he calmly strutted up the 18th fairway at Royal St. George's Golf Club — his first and perhaps only major championship firmly in his back pocket — Darren Clarke admits there was a feeling of joy that swept over him like none he'd ever felt.

Royal Portrush is not only open to visitors, but its yearly membership dues are what the average American golfer spends on public tee times.

As the best players in the world prepare for this 153rd Open Championship at Royal Portrush, it’s important to note just how different Irish golf – and particularly this one – is from those classic Scottish or English rota courses.

This is about the Open, a championship in its 153rd year. And it’s about Portrush, a seasonal town of 6,000 or so, one with a Ferris wheel and a long swath of beach, and dogs off leashes, and a gem of a links course that’s carved its place in the Open rota. And it’s about Irish golf.

If we have any quarrel with the mural, it's that Lowry stands alone. Portrush proper is home to barely 6,000 souls, yet the R&A expects over a quarter-million pilgrims this week. The mathematics should spell chaos, but when an entire community vibrates at the same frequency—when everyone wants to be here—logistics become footnotes. It just works.