PIED PIPER PEPPERELL

That headline appeared on GolfDigestMe.com just before the now 27-year-old Englishman finished T-48 at last year’s DP World Tour Championship and 41st in the overall Race to Dubai rankings. It was the preface to an absorbing feature by the renowned Scottish scribe John Huggan on one of the most intelligent and insightful minds in golf, charting the rise and fall and rise again of the Oxford University graduate turned professional golfer.

It previewed Pepperell’s fascinating blog — eddiepepperell.wordpress.com if you haven’t yet been enlightened—and delved to places golf interviews normally don’t go.

“My writing improved markedly last year when my golf was so bad,” Pepperell told Huggan. “I tell people I don’t want to be blogging. When I’m playing well, I don’t think as much or write as much. And when I do, it isn’t from a place of such deep reflection. Last year [2016], when I was feeling low I was able to articulate my thoughts more honestly. So I think the difficult thing for me is writing like that when I’m playing well and not sounding arrogant.”

Pepperell has managed to achieve both tricky things this season, capturing both the Qatar and British Masters and more online fans with his musings.

“…I’ve always maintained that the most important thing in life is to be a nice person, because careers come and go, but if you sacrifice being a good person in order to become a great achiever, you’ll experience the unintended side effects once it’s all over. And loneliness will probably top that list.”

You can bet Pepperell won’t be lonely when the galleries spread out around Earth for the 10th edition of the DPWTC.

“Is Eddie Pepperell too smart for his own good?”