PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Florida – During the second round of the Players Championship on Friday, a fun team of the best golfers in the world vied for the leadership of the tournament. But for several hours, most fans were paralyzed by a different question: whether Bryson DeChambeau would hit a prudent iron or take a strong lash with his driver in hole after hole.
In this recurring drama, it seemed that most of the nearly 10,000 spectators allowed on the spacious grounds of the TPC Sawgrass golf course were huddled behind DeChambeau as he stood up in a tee box and deliberated on the best way to attack a par 4 or pair. – 5 The tension was palpable and the fans fell silent when DeChambeau approached his golf bag.
As DeChambeau explained later, if he finally pulled an iron out of the bag, the answer would be a despondent shout, as if the crowd had seen a child’s newly purchased ice cream cone fall and splash on the floor.
“It’s always like a big ‘Awwww’ for an iron,” said DeChambeau after his spin on Friday.
What if he pulled his gigantic driver out of his bag? Think of a climactic movie scene where a hero finally defeats the villain.
“If it’s the driver, it’s like, ‘Yes!’ – DeChambeau said with a warm smile.
It got to that point on the PGA Tour, and it might not be a surprise. Winning golf is entertainment, but it is no match for a dose of boastful charisma mixed with the sight of a broken golf ball up to 380 meters away.
The DeChambeau era in professional men’s golf continues with a resounding impact. After Friday’s round, Rory McIlroy, a four-time major league winner who missed the cut, blamed the attempt to play a lot like DeChambeau for his poor performance.
While hitting very high pitches, the current US Open champion DeChambeau also hit 69 points below par on Friday, leaving him six strokes down for the tournament and just three strokes behind the second round leader, Lee Westwood. The game was suspended on Friday night because of the darkness, with a small number of players unable to finish the second round.
DeChambeau, who defeated Westwood in a final round duel last week to win the Arnold Palmer Invitational, is clearly excited by the fans’ attention. Their energy seems to inspire him, although he may not hit the driver as often as he would like in the compact layout of the TPC Sawgrass. Between shots, he plays freely and warmly with the crowd.
“They always ask how many protein shakes I took, which is funny,” he said, “and I always answer with how many shakes I had that day, most of the time.”
Protein shakes are a staple of the diet that helped DeChambeau gain 18 pounds last year, although he has lost at least 15 now. As an explanation, DeChambeau said he had consumed only four shakes on Friday afternoon, or about half of his intake four months ago.
While DeChambeau hit several exceptional passes and approach shots on Friday, ending with five birdies and a double-bogey, he was disappointed with his hitting the ball and went to the training area shortly after his round. He was still there hitting balls three hours later.
Asked if he ever left the golf course satisfied and skipped post-round training, DeChambeau, 27, blurted out: “Never. Because my brain is – I mean, I’m a perfectionist, and I will continue to be until the day I die and until the day I stop playing this game. That’s how I am. I love it about me. “
He smiled and added: “But at the same time, I worry a lot about things.”
Although DeChambeau once again cast a big shadow over a PGA Tour event, he was far from the only golfer to make the news.
Viktor Hovland, the 23-year-old ascendant who is in 13th place in the world ranking, missed the cut on Friday in part because his mother, who was watching the tournament at home in Norway, noticed a violation of the rules he had committed in the first round and caught your attention later. His intervention resulted in a two-stroke penalty.
Hovland ended Friday with two strokes for the tournament, or two strokes above the court line. He took the penalty for inadvertently throwing his ball from the wrong spot on lawn 15 in the first round on Thursday.
As usual, Hovland had moved his ball out of the competitor’s putter line. But then he failed to put it back in the proper place, although he did not move it any closer to the hole or gain any apparent advantage.
According to the NBC broadcast of the Players Championship on Friday, Hovland received a call from his mother after the first round and then contacted the PGA Tour officials, who analyzed the video of the incident and checked for Hovland’s error.
“It’s unfortunate; I already left it behind,” Hovland said calmly after filming 74 on Friday. “I’m just more disappointed that I haven’t been able to play better.”
Hovland was not as disconsolate as McIlroy, who scored 75 on Friday, after 79 on Thursday. Like so many others at this year’s Players Championship, McIlroy had DeChambeau in mind and believes that trying to keep up with DeChambeau’s prodigious distance led him to his recent below-average game.
At the end of last year, after DeChambeau’s victory at the United States Open, McIlroy, already one of the tournament’s biggest hitters, altered his swing in an attempt to add even more yards to his shots.
“I would be lying if I said it has nothing to do with what Bryson did at the United States Open,” said McIlroy. “I think a lot of people saw this and thought, ‘Wow, if that’s how they are going to set up golf courses in the future, it helps.'”
McIlroy now considers this a mistake.
“I thought being able to get a little more speed is a good thing,” he said. “And maybe – damaging my swing a little – I got there. But I just need to control it a little bit. “