Yes, golf is golf, but the sport’s two megastars haven’t always followed the traditional route when practicing and playing. Take McIlroy, for example, who played many solo rounds around Holywood Golf Club in his native Northern Ireland as a child. To really gauge where his game was at, McIlroy played two balls and then hit each subsequent shot from the worse of the two positions. McIlroy once remembers shooting 3 under on his childhood layout, maybe even 4 under.
“That’s something I still use to this day,” says McIlroy.
Scheffler was about the same age when he saddled up with PGA Tour players like Harrison Frazar, Justin Leonard and Colt Knost at Royal Oaks in Dallas.
“You name it, I mean chipping contests, nine-hole putting contests, 18-hole putting contests, trying to hit the yellow post,” Scheffler said, referring to the small posts on the Royal Oaks driving range. “…They showed up at the shooting range and when I was there, they knew something was going to happen.”
Next week in South Florida, something will happen. Producer Mark Loomis called it an All-Star weekend, but with golfers, a new twist on Drive, Chip and Putt, mixed with some elements of Golf Channel’s Big Break, a shot clock and eight of the best pros in the game.
One of the goals, Loomis adds, is this: “How can we do things that people may not have seen before?”
The result: these golf channel games.
The first-of-its-kind competition featuring four-man teams led by Scheffler and McIlroy, currently the two best players in the world, will take place on December 17 from 7pm ET at Trump Jupiter. The event will be broadcast live on Golf Channel and USA Network and produced by Loomis, who has TrackMan, drone tracing and plenty of cameras. The competition arena will utilize the club’s driving range and practice area, plus hole Nos. 1, 9 and 18.
The challenges include racing and short game competitions, a 14 club challenge, team relay and captain’s challenge, which is just one of five challenges that do not feature all eight competitors. McIlroy and Scheffler determine the matchups, with a coin toss deciding who gets to name or defer a player/duo for each challenge.
McIlroy will team up with Shane Lowry, Luke Donald and Haotong Li, while Scheffler’s team includes Sam Burns, Keegan Bradley and Luke Clanton.
“Scottie and I have participated in a number of these [made-for-TV] previous games, and you know, they’re great and hopefully they provided some entertainment, but I just think this is an opportunity to do something different,” McIlroy said. “Kind of leaning on other sports, like the NFL Combine, or the 3-Point Contest in basketball, or the Home Run Derby in baseball. It’s just an opportunity to try something new, to try something different. And I think we’ve put together a collection of pretty good players, different personalities, different skills, and I think it’ll be really cool to see us compete against each other in some of these different challenges.
Most of the challenges come down to hitting the shots, even if some of them require conquering the 10-foot flop wall made famous on Big Break, a show Scheffler noted he enjoyed growing up. But the 14-club challenge has the potential to throw these pros off their game, requiring players to hit a green from a likely mid-iron distance with every club in the bag, including the putter. Scheffler says he’ll carry a backup putter in case he gets the short end of the stick, though he probably won’t practice that shot in the run-up.
“I’m certainly not going to be on the course ripping full putters trying to figure out that shot,” Scheffler said. “I’m just going to figure that out as naturally as possible within the competition.”
However, the possibility of a shot to the left has the attention of both players. McIlroy is fairly confident in his opponent’s abilities, although he admits the pilot only flies about 600 feet. Scheffler is at least honest in the meantime.
“My links game is not very good, to say the least,” Scheffler said. “And Sam, you know, one of my partners, his isn’t much better either. … Maybe that’s something I’ll hit some left shots with next week. [in preparation].”
McIlroy’s preparation included a TaylorMade shoot with Tiger Woods and other brand ambassadors last week. McIlroy was tasked with hitting a flop shot not over a wall, but over Woods himself.
“I was probably as nervous as I have been in a long time,” McIlroy said. “His body is already beat up, I didn’t want to add anything to it.”
How did it go?
“He lived to tell the tale,” McIlroy added.
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