PUTT IN THE WORK
Scheffler adds coach to help on greens
ROME — Scottie Scheffler enters the Ryder Cup this week as the world’s No. 1 player in spite of what can be best described as spotty putting.
Scheffler has had the kind of ball-striking season that rivals that of Tiger Woods in his best days, but his inconsistent putting has been the subject of much scrutiny.
That scrutiny has been amped up this week as Scheffler has been working on the practice greens with Phil Kenyon, one of the most renown putting gurus in the game, ahead of the Ryder Cup at Marco Simone Golf & Country Club.
“I’ve watched Phil for a while [and] I’ve never really had an instructor teach me anything really other than Randy [Smith],” Scheffler said Wednesday shortly after having a putting session on the practice green. “It was something I was thinking about kind of towards the end of the year, and Phil was a guy that I had watched, and he teaches a lot of really good putters. He didn’t seem like a method guy. So, he was the first phone call that I wanted to make.”
Scheffler said he reached out to Kenyon immediately after the Tour Championship. A few days later, Kenyon was on a plane to Dallas, where Scheffler lives, and they spent a few days together.
“Basically, he just told me I sucked [and that] he couldn’t believe I ever won a tournament with how I putted,” Scheffler joked. “That’s what you want to hear, right? No, on a serious note, I had a feeling what I was doing wrong. My suspicions were kind of answered. I was trying to fix it in the complete wrong way. He’s a fascinating person to work with.”
Scheffler said he’s now seeing the ball “rolling end over end a lot more than I did a month ago, and it’s exciting.”
“It’s good for me to have a little bit of direction [and] I think the second set of eyes with Phil was really, really helpful,” he said. “It was good to get my brain in order and feel like I’m working in the right direction versus playing a bit of a guessing game. I feel the benefits already. I’m more comfortable over the ball. I have more direction in what I want to do. I feel like at times this year I would try one thing and a few weeks later I’d try another.”
➤ They miss us more than we miss them.
That was the essence of Rory McIlroy’s words about the noticeably absent players from LIV Golf on Wednesday.
Among the 24 players from the U.S. and Europe competing this week only one — Brooks Koepka — is a member of the controversial Saudi-backed tour that has set the game on its ear.
Not present this week are European Ryder Cup stalwarts like Sergio Garcia, Ian Poulter, Lee Westwood, Graeme McDowell, Martin Kaymer and Henrik Stenson, all of whom are members of LIV Golf.
Stenson was tabbed as the European captain but was stripped of that title when he joined LIV, replaced by Luke Donald.
McIlroy conceded that “it’s certainly a little strange not having [LIV players] around this week.”
Since the inception of LIV Golf, McIlroy has been aligned with the PGA Tour in denouncing LIV.
So Wednesday, he couldn’t help from taking a gratuitous jab.
“This week of all weeks, its going to hit home with them that they are not here and I think they are going to miss being here more than we’re missing them,” McIlroy said. “I think this week is a realization that the decision that they made has led to not being a part of this week, and that’s tough.”