For the second consecutive year, Bryson DeChambeau finished runner-up at the PGA Championship. It was the latest in a string of top results at majors for the Mad Scientist-turned-Big Golfer-turned-crossover cultural icon; he’s now logged five top-six finishes (including a U.S. Open victory) in his last six starts. But for the second consecutive PGA — and second consecutive major — he came off the course focused on what might have been.
“I don’t even know. I’m baffled right now,” DeChambeau said when asked to evaluate his performance. “Just felt like things just didn’t go my way this week.”
Some things went his way, of course, enough that he finished the week T2. But that reaction was partly inspired by an 18th-hole bogey that he undoubtedly could still taste. It was also partly a testament to the otherworldly performance of tournament winner and World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler, who was the only golfer to beat DeChambeau — but the fact that he beat him by five made the gulf feel especially significant.
Mostly DeChambeau sounded “baffled” because he felt like he had the game to win, and because through nearly three rounds he was in position to do so. He’d played his way to the top of the leaderboard late Saturday afternoon, before bogeying 16 and doubling 17, two of the famously brutal “Green Mile” finishing holes. That spot of messiness left him six back of Scheffler heading to Sunday’s final round, and although things did tighten up — DeChambeau briefly got within two strokes of the lead — he’d dug too deep a hole.
“It was a good fight, good battle, take a lot from it. It’s just burning a bigger fire in my belly,” DeChambeau told CBS’s Amanda Balionis post-round. “Definitely had an opportunity to beat Rory [at last month’s Masters] and definitely had an opportunity to give Scottie a run this week. Even though I was leading into the third round — or after 16 holes on the third round, but, man, I just didn’t get it done.”
Still, DeChambeau’s week cemented two things as fact.
One, he’s part of the top tier of the current era of men’s professional golf; he’s arguably a half-step down from Scheffler but in good company with Rory McIlroy and Xander Schauffele as the guys most likely to step up when the lights are brightest. It’s no coincidence that those guys have won each of the last six majors. (We can argue who comes a half-step down from there — Jon Rahm, for sure, plus some other flushers.)
And two, DeChambeau has ascended to this latest level by being himself. That means leaning into his man-of-the-people persona, playing to the camera and high-fiving fans at every opportunity. And it means embracing his innate curiosity and leaning into his inner gear junkie — which meant his mind was already whirring before the ink had dried on his scorecard.
“I’ve got to learn how to be a little more precise with the wind, not let the wind affect the ball as much,” he told Balionis. That’s particularly tough for him, he explained, because he hits the ball much higher (and harder) than most of his peers. But he teased a potential change in the works, in trademark Bryson fashion, on live TV.
“I’ve got some tricks up my sleeve that I’m going to be working on and hopefully bring for the U.S. Open,” he said. “I’ve got to get some equipment here soon.”
DeChambeau’s what-if musings continued after his CBS hit; when he spoke to assembled media he ticked, relatably, through missed opportunities and shots that could have been.
“I’ve got a dozen shots I could look back at and be like, ‘Man, that could have been way different.’ And we’re looking at a different story,” he said.
As for the equipment specifics?
“What I really think needs to happen, being pretty transparent here, is just get a golf ball that flies a little straighter,” he said.
Feel free to eye-roll at that one — A straighter golf ball? Deal us in, Bryson! — but DeChambeau’s outside-the-box thinking has unlocked efficiencies through the bag and it’s reasonable to think he could break new ground with the ball, too, particularly at his speeds.
“Everybody talks about how straight the golf ball flies. Well, upwards of 190 [mph ball speed] like Rory and myself, it’s actually quite difficult to control the golf ball,” he said. “The ball sidespins quite a bit and it gets hit by the wind quite a bit because our golf balls are just in the air longer. So I’m looking at ways of how to rectify that so that my wedges can be even tighter so it can fly straighter.”
That sounds like a challenge for his engineers. It sounds like bad news for his competitors. And it sounds like great news for golf fans, whose most intriguing characters are locked in an arms race — and each seems to keep getting better.
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