2023 PGA Championship missed cuts: Jason Day, Matt Fitzpatrick among stars not playing weekend at Oak Hill

Big names have raced to the top of the leaderboard at the 2023 PGA Championship at Oak Hill Country Club. Stars such as Scottie Scheffler, Bryson DeChambeau and Viktor Hovland will vie for the second major championship of the season over the weekend, but not big names were as lucky.

Reigning U.S. Open champion Matt Fitzpatrick dropped shots on 17 and 18 late Friday to card an 8-over 148 pushing him one stroke outside the cutline. Fellow major champion and last week’s winner at the AT&T Bryon Nelson, Jason Day, made a fatal late mistake as well. Missing a par attempt from 3 feet on the 16th hole before double bogeying the 17th, the Australian also fell on the wrong side of the cut.

Young Americans Sam Burns and Cameron Young are among those who were sent packing early. Meeting in the final of the WGC-Match Play, both players had high expectations with Young being a popular pick among prognosticators. The New York native arrived with a stellar major championship résumé with three top-10 finishes, two of which were top-three results.

Capable of dismantling a long difficult golf course such as Oak Hill, Young fell short with rounds of 74-75. While he looked to make a charge Friday morning, his momentum was halted when he received a two-stroke penalty for moving his ball mark on the green and failing to return it to its original spot.

Tom Kim was a player who tried his best to avoid a penalty when his tee shot found the water on the par-4 6th in Round 1. Despite his efforts, the two-time winner on the PGA Tour will be an omission from the weekend in his PGA Championship debut. He and fellow South Korean Sungjae Im, who won last week on the Korean Tour, round out the top 20 players in the Official World Golf Rankings to miss the cut.

A resurgent Rickie Fowler signed for rounds of 73-73 to miss the cut by a stroke. The five-time winner on the PGA Tour had 10 top-20 finishes in his first 14 starts of the season and was believed to factor in just his fourth major championship since the 2020 Masters.

Notable LIV Golf players to miss the cut include Abraham Ancer, Joaquin Niemann and Talor Gooch, the latter of whom is of particular interest given his status for the next major championship, the U.S. Open. No longer exempted given the USGA’s changes to qualifying criteria in February, the two-time LIV Golf winner was unable to garner enough OWGR points to climb inside the top 60 in order to earn a spot in the national championship. 

2023 PGA Championship notable missed cuts