ATLANTA, GEORGIA | At some point soon, maybe when baby Bennett is napping and Scottie Scheffler can sink into his favorite chair and think not about what’s next but about what he’s done, the sense of accomplishment should be immense.
It was easy to see the relief on Scheffler’s face Sunday afternoon after he had finally won the FedEx Cup, capturing the Tour Championship in what felt like a send-them-home-happy encore to a rare season.
The urgency was gone for Scheffler’s sun-tanned expression, replaced by a smile that came from that place deep inside where gratitude lives. Lifting his son over his head after his four-stroke win over Collin Morikawa was his trophy moment even before he cradled the shiny silver prize to his chest.
In a season in which Scheffler had done almost everything, all that was left was finishing it off Sunday in the sticky summer heat at remade East Lake Golf Club. He did it with a dash of fleeting drama and a streak of toughness that lives beneath his gentle demeanor. Scheffler did the hardest thing in golf: He invoked comparisons to Tiger Woods.
Tiger awed everyone. The public couldn’t get enough of him. The competition couldn’t keep up with him. He was, in his prime, celestial and, therefore, it’s almost unfair to Woods to compare others to what he accomplished because he was that much superior to everyone else.
What Scheffler has done, particularly this season, is enough to be measured against Tiger because of his sustained level of dominance. He won seven times this season in addition to capturing the gold medal at the Paris Olympics, and he finished second two other times.
Scheffler rightly made the point that the gold medal should count as a tour victory, giving him eight in his mind.
To be fair, Scheffler needs to do what he did this year for another eight or nine years to get into true Tiger territory, but only 10 players have had seasons with more than seven victories, and their names are Nelson, Hogan, Snead, Runyan, Woods, Singh, Smith, Sarazen, Palmer and Miller.
“It’s in the all-time great seasons. It’s quite remarkable,” Adam Scott said. “It’s in the top, top, top seasons.”
“Even when he’s in trouble, he hits it to about 8 feet.”
Adam Scott
As Scott was talking about Scheffler on Saturday afternoon, he was watching him play a shot from the trees on the 17th hole in the third round. Scheffler turned potential trouble into a birdie putt from inside 10 feet.
“Even when he’s in trouble, he hits it to about 8 feet,” Scott said, running a hand through his hair and shaking his head at what he watched.
“It’s hard to really separate yourself today, and he has somehow managed to do that clearly. Xander [Schauffele] won two majors, and it’s hard to get him in the conversation for player of the year. That’s rough.”
Where Woods oozed charisma, both in how he played and how he carried himself, Scheffler’s defining characteristic may be how genuine everything about him seems to be.
He is as real as a Texas summer.
The worst thing that happened to Scheffler this year – being unjustly arrested early Friday morning at the PGA Championship in Louisville, Kentucky – showed him to be a man full of grace. It gave fans an emotional connection to the man they already respected and admired.
When Scheffler teared up hearing the national anthem played as he accepted his gold medal in Paris, the connection was complete.
Scheffler has faith in his faith, his family and the foundation of his golf swing, which features his Fred Astaire footwork and Iron Byron consistency. Scheffler does what he does more consistently than anyone else does what they do.
That’s golf gold.
Scheffler makes the hard game look easy at times even when it isn’t.
“Golf is such a game of momentum, and when the momentum is going with you and you're making birdies and you're shooting scores in the 60s all the time, all you see are birdies and shooting scores in the 60s. It's like a self-fulfilling sort of thing,” said Rory McIlroy, who has floated in that rare air.
“Then when you get it going the wrong way in golf and you're seeing bogeys, all you see is bogeys and you’re shooting in the 70s and you’re struggling – I think at the peak of his powers, his confidence is as high as it ever has been, and it’s a pretty nice feeling to have on the golf course.”
The Tour Championship may have looked easy given his margin of victory, but it was deceptively difficult because he spent the week playing from ahead. Scheffler started with a two-stroke lead by virtue of his points lead, and when he shot 65 in the first round and none of his five nearest pursuers shot better than 69, Scheffler was seven clear of the field.
“I feel like sometime this tournament lasts longer than others, and I don’t know why,” Scheffler said.
Even for a positive thinker, the specter of not winning in that situation weighs heavily. Scheffler came to this season-ending event as the leader the previous two years, but he got run down on Sunday by Rory McIlroy after leading by seven on Sunday in 2022, and he flamed out early last year.
Walking off the eighth green Sunday with dark clouds hovering on the horizon, Scheffler was in a precarious position. What had been a seven-stroke lead over Morikawa 90 minutes earlier was down to two shots, and Scheffler had just shanked a bunker shot on the eighth hole, leading to a second straight bogey.
“I happened to have two bad holes in a row. I really hadn’t had bad holes all week. They just happened to come in a row,” said Scheffler, who was reminded by caddie Ted Scott walking to the ninth tee that he still had control of the tournament.
“If you can describe it in words, more power to you because I don’t think I can.”
Scottie Scheffler
All week, Scheffler had lived with the fact that anything less than a victory would be considered a failure regardless of how many millions he won. It’s why the PGA Tour created its playoff system.
Scheffler was so rattled he striped a 236-yard 4-iron to within 5 feet of the hole on the difficult par-3 ninth, made a calm-the-nerves birdie and then ripped off two more to walk to the 12th tee with a five-stroke lead as if nothing bad had happened.
He tacked on an eagle at the par-5 14th hole because, well, Scheffler is in that place. The rest was a formality.
There is still a Presidents Cup later this month, but Scheffler’s season is essentially complete, and it’s his own unique story.
“If you can describe it in words, more power to you because I don’t think I can,” Scheffler said early Sunday evening.
He doesn’t have to describe it. History can take care of that.
E-MAIL RON
Top: Scottie Scheffler cruises to victory at East Lake.
MIKE MULHOLLAND, GETTY IMAGES