Why the rest of 2021 is so important to Rickie Fowler and other big things that matter right now in golf

Throughout a down period in his career that is now approaching three years, Rickie Fowler managed to maintain an air of positivity, sprinkled with some self-deprecation, while seemingly never allowing for any sort of dark moments to consume him.

He approached his slump with hard work, didn’t get impatient by moving on from his coach, John Tillery, talked a good game and simply expected his golf to one day cooperate.

Three tournaments into a new season and there are certainly plenty of positives for Fowler to build on, but also a slap of reality that played out over the weekend in Japan, where he was unable to take advantage of a small field and the chance to improve his world ranking.

Fowler certainly had plenty of time for reflection over recent months. He failed to qualify for either the Masters or the U.S. Open, firsts for him in 10 years. He didn’t make the FedEx Cup playoffs, meaning he was outside of the top 125 and not yet qualified for the 2022 Players Championship — a tournament he won with a stunning flourish in 2015.

The six-week break saw him go to work. He returned to competition and promptly missed the cut at the Shriner’s tournament in Las Vegas. But with a weekend off, he used the opportunity to visit his old coach, Butch Harmon, to make sure what he was working on got a stamp of approval.

With Harmon’s blessing and the ensuing confidence, Fowler took the 54-hole lead at the CJ Cup and ended up finishing tied for third behind winner Rory McIlroy. A victory would have solved a lot of problems, but given that Fowler’s last victory came at the Waste Management Phoenix Open in 2019, a strong showing was welcome.

“[It] was a very good week for me, especially after the last couple years,” Fowler said at the Zozo Championship in Japan. “I played very well tee to green. Unfortunately, I didn’t have a very good feel on the greens with speed, so that is where I struggled a little bit, but very happy with the ballstriking.

“That’s something we’ve been putting a…