LLet’s take a moment to reflect – again and not for the last time – on how good Scottie Scheffler has already been this young season.
In three starts, Scheffler has won the American Express, tied for third in the WM Phoenix Open after shooting 73 in the first round and tied for fourth at last week’s AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am at Pebble Beach after opening with a flat 72.
Now let’s take it back a little bit.
In his last five official starts in 2025, Scheffler won three times, including a T3 and a T4.
That’s eight straight starts with four wins and four top-four finishes. Scheffler is also approaching the one-year anniversary of his last finish outside the top 10, a T20 at the Players Championship last March.
Death, taxes and Scottie Scheffler.
It could have been easy for Scheffler to exhale over the past two weeks when he found himself ten strokes off the lead after 18 holes. Instead, Scheffler did what he does so best: stay true to himself and the way he plays.
Scheffler has often spoken about his competitive fire, whether it be playing pickleball, ping pong or golf with his friends in Dallas. It is his eternal flame. And while his fundamentals are the foundation of his genius, Scheffler’s competitiveness and sense of achievement underpin the swings he makes.
“I look at the way I grew up, like I was playing all kinds of different sports, competing with my friends, and I always had a rational confidence in where I would somehow find a way to beat my friends in whatever it is besides video games,” Scheffler said Wednesday during the Genesis Invitational at Riviera Country Club.
“But if we’re going to play like tennis, pickleball, ping pong, basketball, I like to compete. I like to challenge myself and the people around me, whatever it is. I like to compete. I like to have fun.”
He doesn’t like being hit, not that that has happened much in recent months, but he has learned to accept what he has no control over.
Scheffler was reminded of a moment two years ago at Riviera when he was so frustrated with his putting that he threw his golf ball into the trees as he walked off a green. Soon after, Scheffler switched to a TaylorMade Spider putter and has seemed virtually unbeatable ever since.
The stoicism that Scheffler exudes tends to mask his intensity. He doesn’t like being hit, not that that has happened much in recent months, but he has learned to accept what he has no control over.
“When the tournament ends, one thing I’ve grown a lot in since I was a kid is taking off my hat, shaking hands, saying ‘well done’ and then being done with it…
‘You look at someone like Collin [Morikawa] last week. I’ve been competing against Collin since we were 14 years old. He wins a tournament, he announces [his wife is] pregnant…it’s such a cool moment to see a guy who’s been playing really good golf for the last few years and not quite getting the results and the wins yet, but he’s been playing golf pretty consistently, and then he gets to announce that he’s having a child. It’s this moment, it’s like, wow.
“I tried as hard as I could, got beat and it’s like, man, that’s awesome. You won, congratulations. You’re having a baby, even bigger congratulations.”
Riviera is soggy this week, inundated by a series of storms coming from the Pacific Ocean, softening the edge of one of the game’s classic layouts. George C. Thomas’ design, which will host the 2026 US Women’s Open, the 2028 Olympics and the 2031 US Open, illustrates the idea that the most profound challenges do not need water hazards and outer boundaries to define their difficulty.
“When you look at this golf course and look at it on paper, it seems kind of simple,” Scheffler said. “Then you start playing it and you’re like, hit a ball the rough way [No. 2] and you say, ‘man, this hole is kinda hard.’ Then you won’t get to the fairway [No. 3] and you say, ‘Oh, shoot, I don’t know how I’m going to hit the ball here on the green.’ And then the golf course just eats you up over time.
“I feel like this golf course can be just as frustrating to play as any other golf course on tour, just with the little tricks that come along with it.”
“I think this place is a good case study in certain holes where you don’t have to make golf courses too long if you want to make them difficult. I think that’s something very new in the game of golf.” – Scottie Scheffler
Riviera has no water hazards, but it does have a collection of memorable holes. The par-3 sixth is defined by a bunker in the center of the putting surface and the famous 10th is perhaps the greatest short par-4 in the world.
It requires patience and precision and is on almost every list of architectural gems in the game.
“I think this place is a good case study in certain holes where you don’t have to make golf courses too long if you want to make them difficult,” Scheffler said. “I think this is something completely new in the game of golf. That’s what modern golf course designers do, where they take out trees and make things bigger and wider, and it doesn’t necessarily make them more difficult just because you make a golf hole longer.
“I think the eighth hole here is a really good example of a short hole that is quite difficult, and also gives you a lot of options. You can play it right, you can play it left, and you see guys doing different types of things there. I think that’s something interesting about a golf course, when you have different options.”
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