2020 Tokyo Olympics golf competition proved allure of playing in Summer Games is bigger than the sport

The golf is overshadowed by the magnitude of the Olympics, and the sport has a bright future ahead at The Games

The actual golf at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics could have been golf at nearly any number of PGA Tour stops. It was good golf played by solid golfers on a fine golf course that resulted in a fun golf ending. That is a sentence that could have been written 25 times over the last year. And the back nine of the event on Sunday was as wacky (Xander Schauffele's closing kick) and bizarre (the seven-way playoff for third!) and, yes, enjoyable (that final shot from Schauffele!) as any tournament in 2021. There were transgressions. It is extraordinarily difficult for me to watch Golf Twitter's favorite adopted son, Rory Sabbatini, shoot a 61 on a Sunday at a big-time event and find that type of setup or course to be anywhere near akin to what we find at major championships. Perhaps it is unfair to compare golf at the Olympics to majors, but that is the barometer. Instead, this golf, the style and the play, felt more like a Sunday at the Travelers Championship. This is fine, though. The Travelers Championship is a great event, one many of us look forward to annually. Not everything has to be a war against the very earth this sport is played on like the major championships so often are. The weather -- wet and calm -- did not help matters at Kasumigaseki Country Club.