Collin Morikawa withdrew from The Players Championship after one hole with a back injury. The world No. 4 golfer, who had been among the pre-tournament favourites, abandoned his opening round at TPC Sawgrass in Florida after suffering the injury early Thursday morning.
Morikawa was seen in discomfort while taking a practice swing on the 11th tee box, just moments after making par on his opening hole of the day. According to Morikawa, he felt fine during warm-up with no signs of back problems before teeing up on 11 and taking one practice swing, after which he immediately knew something was wrong.
The injury represented a sharp reversal for Morikawa, who arrived at the tournament in career resurgence form. Morikawa had been winning at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am and notching top-7 finishes in each of the last two signature events. He leads the FedEx Cup in the early going with three top-10 finishes this season. He came into Thursday's first round as the third-favourite on the odds sheet, only trailing Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy.
Morikawa reached for his back and grimaced before calling for a trainer, spending some time assessing his status before being carted off the golf course and officially withdrawing from the tournament. The withdrawal marks just the second of his PGA Tour career and first since The Memorial in 2023.
What frustrated Morikawa most was the unpredictability of the injury. He said it was just frustrating because he did not know what caused it, adding that perhaps something was not activated enough, but he went through all the warm-ups. Morikawa had some lingering back issues in 2021 at the Tokyo Olympics and in 2023, forcing him to withdraw from the Memorial tournament that year. This time, he had received no warning until the moment he took his practice swing.
Morikawa called over his trainer and talked about it with his caddie Mark Urbanek, describing the situation as one that just sucks and saying he did not know how to put it in words. Morikawa became the second high-profile player to be impacted by an ailing back this week, with world No. 2 Rory McIlroy having withdrawn after two rounds at the Arnold Palmer Invitational with back spasms and arriving only Wednesday afternoon at TPC Sawgrass.
For Morikawa, the timing could hardly have been worse. The pre-tournament favourite had already posted a victory this season at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am and finished T7 at the Genesis and solo fifth at the Arnold Palmer Invitational last weekend. His playing partners Ludvig Åberg and Si Woo Kim will play as a twosome for the remainder of Thursday and Friday.