The final major of the year begins with first round action on Thursday at the 151st Open Championship.
This year’s Open Championship is taking place at Royal Liverpool in Hoylake, England.
Everyone has their favorites to win this week to claim the Claret Jug, from 2014 Open Championship winner at Royal Liverpool, Rory McIlroy to World No. 1 and 2022 Masters Champion Scottie Scheffler.
However, this story is on those non-favored players, similar to last month’s U.S. Open when Wyndham Clark opened at +6000 to be in the winner’s circle, according to Vegas Insider. The +6000 odds were the same when Gary Woodland won the 2019 U.S. Open.
In the last 12 Open Championships since 2010, there have been three players who opened at +7000 or higher, including Shane Lowry at +7000 odds in 2019, Louis Oosthuizen at +25000 odds in 2010 and Darren Clark at +20000 in 2011.
Here are five wild cards for this week’s Open Championships
Related: 2023 Open Championship preview: TV schedule, predictions, tee times and more
Open Championship wild card No. 1: Min Woo Lee
Those of Asian decent have not seen as much success at the Open Championships as they have had a tough time adjusting to links courses.
However, the more experience one has on links courses, the better. One of those players is Min Woo Lee, the Australian who also has roots for Korea. Lee, who turns 25 in a couple weeks, has been on the DP World Tour since 2018 and is currently No. 47 in the Official World Golf Rankings.
On the DP World Tour this season, Lee ranks third in scoring average and second in strokes gained: total. In the three previous majors this season, he has improved the as the majors have progressed. After recording a T65 at the Masters, he finished tied for 18th at the PGA Championship and tied for fifth in last month’s U.S. Open.
Lee currently sits at +6000 to win.
Related: Ranking each hole at the 2023 Open Championship by difficulty
Open Championship wild card No. 2: Robert MacIntyre
Robert MacIntyre has been another star on the DP World Tour this season like Lee. MacIntyre came up just short to McIlroy last week on home soil at the Genesis Scottish Open. He also tied for fourth at the Made in HimmerLand event on the DP World Tour the week before.
This season, MacIntyre has five top-10 finishes and currently sits in sixth in the Race to Dubai standings.
MacIntyre has played in three of the last four Open Championships. He finished tied for sixth in 2019 at Royal Portrush and tied for eighth in 2021 at Royal St. George.
He currently opens at +6000 odds with Lee as well as Justin Thomas and Hideki Matsuyama.
Open Championship wild card No. 3: Jason Day
The one thing about a wild card is that the unexpectedness to come on top. For a few players, success at previous tournaments led to a feeling that they were going to win. Jason Day was one of those players.
It all started in his second start this season when Day tied for eighth at the Shriners Children’s Open and tied for 11th at The CJ Cup in October.
Two months later, he started a stretch of four straight top 10 finishes at the Farmers Insurance Open, WM Phoenix Open, The Genesis Invitational and the Arnold Palmer Invitational. He also tied for fifth at the World Golf Championships-Dell Technologies Match Play event in March.
Fast forward to May, that time finally came for Day to back in the Mother’s Day when he was victorious at the AT&T Byron Nelson for his first PGA Tour win since the 2018 Wells Fargo Championship.
Day, who currently sits at +8000 odds, is looking for his first major victory since the 2015 PGA Championship, when he won five times that season.
Open Championship wild card No. 4: Russell Henley
Russell Henley comes into the Open Championship with two top-15 finishes among the three majors this season. That includes a fourth-place finish at the Masters Tournament as he was able to sneak his way up the leaderboard, shooting under par in his final three rounds at Augusta in April.
Henley, who won the World Wide Technology Championship at Mayakoba after going 63-63 to begin his path to victory in November, currently sits at No. 31 in the FedEx Cup standings. Although his best Open Championship came in 2015 when he tied 20th, Henley is wild card this week looking to have the same run like Clark last month.
He begins at +10000.
Related: Greatest performances in the history of The Open Championship
Open Championship wild card No. 5: Keegan Bradley
Rounding out this list is a player that is in the top 10 of the FedEx Cup Standings but currently sits at +11000 to win this week.
That player is Keegan Bradley, who sits at No. 6 in the standings. Bradley won the ZOZO Championship in Japan during the fall and won the Travelers Championship one week after missing the cut at the U.S. Open last month.
At the Travelers Championship, Bradley began his tournament 62-63 during the first two rounds.
Bradley, who sits at +11000 with Louis Oosthuizen and Brian Harman, has scattered his four missed cuts with five top 10s and a runner-up finish at the Farmers Insurance Open in January to remain in position to get some strokes at the Tour Championship next month to end the 2022-23 PGA Tour season.
Bradley, who won the 2011 PGA Championship in his first major tournament start, has not made the cut in the last three Open Championships and has not finished better than 18th since 2016, making him a wild card this week.