Axios Sports

July 24, 2023
👋 Good morning! Welcome to Monday.
✍️ Some news: After 4.5 years, this will be the final week of Axios Sports. But don't worry — I'll still be writing a newsletter elsewhere. More to come…
Today's word count: 1,499 words (6 minutes).
Let's sports...
1 big thing: ⛳️ Harman dominates the field
Photo: Tom Shaw/R&A/R&A via Getty Images
Brian Harman won the 151st Open Championship on Sunday, cruising to victory at England's Royal Liverpool Golf Club.
Why it matters: It's the first major victory for the 36-year-old American, who hadn't won on the PGA Tour in over six years (May 7, 2017, at the Wells Fargo Championship).
- Harman finished at 13-under, six strokes better than anyone else.
- Four players finished tied for second at seven-under: Tom Kim, Sepp Straka, Jon Rahm and Jason Day.
By the numbers: Royal Liverpool is famous for its nasty bunkers, with 81 total (4.5 per hole). Harman found just three all week.
- The Georgia native put on a putting performance for the ages, sinking 58 of 59 putts (98.3%) from inside 10 feet.
- He's just the third left-handed player to win the Claret Jug, joining Bob Charles (1963) and Phil Mickelson (2013).
What he's saying: Harman wasn't a favorite in Las Vegas (125-1 underdog) or outside the ropes, where fans jeered him most of the weekend. If they didn't want him to win, they should have been nicer…
- "When I made the second bogey yesterday, a guy when I was passing him said, 'Harman, you don't have the stones for this.'"
- "That helped," said Harman, often overlooked as one of the smallest players on tour (5-foot-7, 150 pounds). "That helped a lot."
- "It helped snap me back into, ya know, I'm good enough to do this, I'm going to do this, I'm going to go through my process and the next shot's gonna be good."
The big picture: The first two majors of 2023 were won by big names in Rahm (Masters) and Brooks Koepka (PGA). The last two were won by relatively unknown first-time champions, with Harman following U.S. Open champ Wyndham Clark.
Elsewhere … Akshay Bhatia won the Barracuda Championship on Sunday, marking the first time in PGA Tour history that two lefties won on the same day.
Go deeper:
- Winners and losers (The Ringer)
- Unlikely winner? Not if you knew Brian Harman all along (ESPN)
2. ⚽️ World Cup: Where are all the goals?
The USWNT authored one of the 13 shutouts or scoreless draws so far in the Women’s World Cup. Photo: Brad Smith/USSF/Getty Images
Goals have been hard come by five days into the inaugural 32-team Women's World Cup, Axios' Jeff Tracy writes.
State of play: Both teams have scored in just one of the first 14 games: Sweden's 2-1 win over South Africa. Otherwise, there have been two scoreless draws and 11 shutouts, including six 1-0 wins.
Scoreboard:
- Day 1: New Zealand 1, Norway 0; Australia 1, Ireland 0; Nigeria 0, Canada 0
- Day 2: USA 3, Vietnam 0; Spain 3, Costa Rica 0; Switzerland 2, Philippines 0
- Day 3: Japan 5, Zambia 0; England 1, Haiti 0; Denmark 1, China 0
- Day 4: Netherlands 1, Portugal 0; France 0, Jamaica 0, Sweden 2, South Africa 1
- Day 5: Germany 6, Morocco 0; Italy 1, Argentina 0
The intrigue: Much of those struggles have come from the World Cup newcomers.
- Seven have played — Philippines, Ireland, Zambia, Haiti, Vietnam, Portugal and Morocco — and none have won, nor even scored a goal.
- Panama is the only debutant that hasn't completed a match yet: They kicked off against Brazil at 7am ET this morning.
Notes:
- Huge ratings: The USWNT's opener averaged 5.3 million viewers on Fox, making it the second-most-watched group stage game ever on an English-language telecast.
- Morocco's historic debut: Though they lost to heavily favored Germany, Morocco still made history as the first North African and Arab nation to play in the Women's World Cup.
- The gap is closing: Haiti's 1-0 loss to England, Jamaica's stunning draw with France and New Zealand's upset win over Norway are early examples of a promising new reality in women's soccer: The gap between top teams and the field is closing.
3. 🏁 Red Bull's historic season


Halfway through the F1 season, Max Verstappen and Red Bull's campaign has gone from dominant to historic, Jeff writes.
Driving the news: Verstappen won Sunday's Hungarian GP for his seventh straight victory, tied for the second-longest winning streak ever (Sebastian Vettel, nine straight).
Why it matters: It was also Red Bull's 12th consecutive victory dating back to last season's finale, breaking a 35-year-old F1 record (11 straight by McLaren in 1988).
- Verstappen has won nine of 11 races this season, finishing second in the other two. He has 11 races left to break his own single-season record of 15 victories, set last year.
- Teammate Sergio Pérez won the two races in which Verstappen finished second and has four other podiums including Sunday's third-place finish.
Where it stands: Red Bull is a lock to win its second straight championship, while Mercedes, Aston Martin and Ferrari are battling for second.
- Red Bull: 452 points
- Mercedes: 223
- Aston Martin: 184
- Ferrari: 167
- McLaren: 87
- Alpine: 47
- Williams: 11
- Haas: 11
- Alfa Romeo: 9
- AlphaTauri: 2
4. ⚡️ Lightning round
Photo: Sean M. Haffey/Getty Images
🛹 Tony Hawk in action: 55-year-old Tony Hawk made a surprise appearance on Sunday at X Games California, competing in the men's skateboard vert best trick event.
⚾️ Ohtani goes yard: Shohei Ohtani hit his MLB-leading 36th homer on Sunday — the Angels' final home game before the trade deadline. Will the two-way superstar get moved?
🏀 Aces on fire: The Aces beat the Lynx, 98-81, on Saturday for their record-tying fifth straight win by 15+ points. Vegas has won 21 of 23 games while outscoring opponents by 357 points.
🏈 RBs meet on Zoom: Several star NFL running backs held a Zoom meeting on Saturday to discuss the depressed market for players at their position.
🥍 121 mph: Jarrod Neumann recorded the fastest shot ever during Premier Lacrosse League All-Star Weekend.
5. 📺 Hollywood strikes upend fall TV
Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios
As the writers and actors strikes continue, TV networks are cobbling together schedules for the fall season and putting their hopes on unscripted content, Axios' Sara Fischer and Ivana Saric write.
Driving the news: NBC, CBS, Fox and The CW have all shaken up their fall lineups as Hollywood comes to a historic halt.
- The new schedules are heavy on game shows, reality TV, shows from streaming platforms and live sports.
- For example: Fox will feature WWE wrestling on Friday nights. The CW has added ACC football and basketball. ABC will air Disney+'s "Ms. Marvel."
Between the lines: While streamers are the least impacted by the strikes due to their large catalogs and international content, they're also not totally immune and will need to explore more broadcast-like programming — like live sports.
- Netflix plans to stream its first live sporting event this fall, per WSJ: a celebrity golf tournament.
- Apple+ will look to make good use of its streaming deal with MLS, especially now that Lionel Messi has joined the league.
6. 🇺🇸 Photos across America

COOPERSTOWN, N.Y. — Fred McGriff and Scott Rolen were enshrined in Cooperstown on Sunday, becoming the 341st and 342nd members of the Baseball Hall of Fame.

LAS VEGAS — SlamBall's return brought exactly what it promised: thunderous dunks courtesy of Olympic-grade trampolines. What a sport.

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — The Orioles took three of four on the road against the Rays this weekend, leaving Tampa with a two-game division lead and the second-best record in the majors.
7. 🌎 Photos around the world

PARIS — Denmark's Jonas Vingegaard completed his dominant Tour de France victory on Sunday, finishing 7:29 ahead of Tadej Pogačar to win for the second straight year.

FUKUOKA, Japan — Michael Phelps' last individual world record, the 400-meter individual medley, was broken on Sunday at the world championships by France's Leon Marchand. Phelps was there, calling the race for NBC.

MONACO — Kenya's Faith Kipyegon, 29, smashed the women's mile world record on Friday by nearly five seconds, finishing in 4:07.64 to break the four-year-old mark.
8. 📺 Watchlist: World Cup, Day 5
Photo: Saeed Khan/AFP via Getty Images
Day 5 of the Women's World Cup is underway. Panama and Brazil kicked off this morning (7am ET, FS1), while South Korea and Colombia go head-to-head tonight (10pm, FS1).
- Panama-Brazil: Marta, 37, is appearing in her sixth World Cup as she looks to add to her record tally of 17 goals and become the first man or woman to score in six World Cups.
- South Korea-Colombia: In a group with a heavy favorite (Germany) and underdog (Morocco), the winner of this match could determine who advances to the Round of 16.
More to watch:
- ⚾️ MLB: Rangers at Astros (8:10pm, MLB.TV free game) … The top two teams in the AL West battle in Houston.
- 🏀 The Basketball Tournament: Five games (2-9pm, ESPN/ESPNU/ESPN+) … Day 6 of the 64-team tournament for a $1 million prize.
9. ⚾️ MLB trivia
Fred McGriff in action for the Braves circa 1994. Photo: Focus on Sport/Getty Images
Fred McGriff, now in the Hall of Fame, is one of two players in MLB history to hit 30 home runs in a season for five different teams (Blue Jays, Padres, Braves, Rays, Cubs).
- Question: Who's the other player?
- Hint: Padres, Marlins, Dodgers, Braves, Yankees.
Answer at the bottom.
10. 🍿 Top plays: Weekend edition
Photo: Stacy Revere/Getty Images
Lionel Messi scored the game-winner in his Inter Miami debut on Friday, connecting on a perfect free kick in the 94th minute to seal a 2-1 win over Cruz Azul. Can't script it much better than that.
Talk tomorrow,
Kendall "Stay tuned" Baker
Trivia answer: Gary Sheffield
🙏 Thanks for reading! Follow us for more (@kendallbaker and @jeffreytracy). Friends can sign up here. Thanks to Matt Piper for copy edits.
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