The easy joke that came to mind as Scottie Scheffler removed his cap and strode up the 18th fairway Sunday at Royal Portrush Golf Club, the British Open long since grabbed by the throat: Will he enjoy his fourth major championship for more than two minutes? When the final putt fell, he did not pump his fist. He did not buckle at the knees. Only when he saw his wife and young son at the side of the green did he thrust his arms in the air and toss his cap high. He finally saw what matters to him.
The year’s final major was about Scheffler’s golf, sure, because it was nearly impeccable. History will show it was more about his ethos. Before he even put a peg in the ground, the best player in the world — by a mile, it turns out — not only allowed raw insight into how he handles his life, he inadvertently explained why his golf is unmatched at the moment.
“Sorry,” he said during his speech to the stadium crowd that surrounded the 18th green, returning a small piece of paper to his back pocket. “I had to check my notes.”
Victory speech notes, prepared before the round? At 29, with three-quarters of the career Grand Slam achieved, that’s how dominant and confident this guy is. He finished at 17 under, four shots clear of the field. He has no peer.
“He’s been on a different level all week, and he’s been on a different level for the last two years to the rest of us,” Northern Irishman Rory McIlroy told NBC after finishing tied for seventh, seven shots back. “He is the bar that we’re all trying to get to at this point.”
That was Sunday. Go back to Tuesday to get to the heart of the week and the brain of Scheffler. Scheffler was asked a question about why, when so many players seem uncomfortable bearing the title of top-ranked player in the world, he seems to wear it like a breathable T-shirt and a pair of gym shorts.
His answer was fascinating. It took a while. Hang in there. It’s worth it in its entirety.
“As a professional, to be ranked as the best in the world, I think is a huge accomplishment,” Scheffler said. “I don’t think it should be taken lightly. But you don’t become No. 1 in the world by thinking about rankings. You don’t stay No. 1 in the world thinking about rankings. Each tournament is its own challenge.”
Let me interrupt for a second. Take that philosophy — about what might be a career goal and understanding how to not only reach it but maintain it — and apply it to Scheffler’s golf game. How did he win his second major of the year? Not by thinking about his second major of the year. How did he overcome his only glitch of the weekend, a double bogey at the eighth Sunday, when he misjudged his ability to elevate a ball out of a bunker, caught the lip and ended up back where he started? Not by dwelling on that error but by playing the next shot he faced. Then the one after that. Then the one after that. It was peak Scheffler that after he made a mess of No. 8, he birdied No. 9.
Back to Tuesday’s answer.
“It’s funny,” he said. “Look at this week, for example. What’s the best-case scenario? I win this golf tournament. And then I’m going to show up in Memphis [after two weeks off], and it’s like: ‘Okay, listen, you won two majors this year. What are you going to do this week?’ That’s the question you’re going to get asked.
“If I come in second this week or if I finish dead last, no matter what happens, we’re always on to the next week. That’s one of the beautiful things about golf, and it’s also one of the frustrating things, because you can have such great accomplishments, but the show goes on. That’s just how it is.”
Sorry. Have to interrupt again. There would seem to be something existential here, a what-does-it-all-mean tenor to Scheffler’s words. Lay it over the golf, though, and Scheffler is merely revealing what’s behind his brilliance. Finish second or dead last, the next thing on his schedule is the St. Jude Championship in August. Stiff a shot to two feet or catch the lip of a bunker and end up back in it, the next shot is still the next shot.
Okay, Scottie. Finish up.
“It’s great to win tournaments,” Scheffler said. “It’s a lot of fun. Sometimes the feeling only lasts about two minutes, it seems like, when you’re celebrating. And then it’s like, ‘Okay, now you’ve got to do all this other stuff,’” meaning trophy presentations and interviews and interactions with sponsors, “which is great. But sometimes the feeling of winning only lasts a few seconds. It’s pretty exciting and fun, but it just doesn’t last that long.”
That vibe was all over Scheffler’s postgame interviews immediately after that final little putt dropped Sunday in Northern Ireland. Modern athletes — heck, modern executives — are coached to put process over results. Scheffler may be the best current example of a person who has that approach embedded in his DNA. It’s not what he has learned. It’s who he is.
“He doesn’t care to be a superstar,” Jordan Spieth, who grew up playing junior golf alongside Scheffler in Texas, told reporters Sunday. “He’s not transcending the game like Tiger [Woods] did. He’s not bringing it to a non-golf audience, necessarily. He doesn’t want to go do the stuff that a lot of us go do, corporately, anything like that.
“He just wants to get away from the game and separate the two. … I think it’s more so the difference in personality from any other superstar that you’ve seen in the modern era — and maybe in any sport. I don’t think anybody is like him.”
At the moment, nobody is playing golf with the methodical consistency and brilliance when it’s needed like Scottie Scheffler. This isn’t an existential crisis. It’s an understanding of what’s important and a master class at remaining present. He didn’t win his fourth major by thinking about winning his fourth major. Because of that, who’s to say he won’t win four more?
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