DUBLIN, Ohio — The knee issue that shut down Brooks Koepka for three months in 2019 is still giving him problems.
Koepka said he had an MRI on his left knee this past Monday, just before the start of the Memorial Tournament.
“Just wanted to check on it, see where it’s at,” Koepka said Saturday. “We got the results right after Korea, and then we just wanted to check, and nothing is improved. It’s still the same. So we’ll figure it out when we’re done.”
Koepka grimaced after hitting an uphill shot out of a bunker on the 17th hole Saturday. He said he had a difficult time getting to his left side during a second shot that went out of bounds on the 15th hole.
Paired with Tiger Woods for the third straight day, Koepka shot a 1-over 73 in the third round.
Koepka had stem-cell treatment on his knee for a partially torn patella tendon in August 2019 — the day after the PGA Tour season ended at the Tour Championship. He didn’t play for three months after slipping on wet concrete, causing him to withdraw from a tournament in Korea in October last year.
He is in Week 2 of a run of five straight tournaments. He is still scheduled to play over the next three weeks at the 3M Open, the WGC-FedEx St. Jude Invitational and the PGA Championship.
Koepka, who is currently 4-over 76 at the Memorial, has missed three cuts this year — as many as he had in the previous two seasons combined.
“You’ve got to play your way into it,” Koepka said about playing in five straight tournaments. “When you don’t have the results you want, you’ve got to go out here and find it. It’s not like you’re just going to sit at home and it’s going to magically … You’ve got to put the work in, put the reps in and it will show eventually.”