Scottie Scheffler is a recent major winner, and he’s finished top four at both majors thus far this season. But despite being installed as the betting favorite to take home the championship at the U.S. Open this weekend in Oakmont, he made his feelings clear on Tuesday about what being a favorite ultimately might mean on the course.
“I don’t pay attention to the favorite stuff or anything like that,” Sheffler said during his U.S. Open press conference. “Starting Thursday morning we’re at even par, and it’s up to me to go out there and play against the golf course and see what I can do.”
How does the PGA Championship winner tune out the noise? He acknowledged it isn’t easy, especially in this modern era of increased sports betting, and that it even occasionally demands a drastic action or two.
“I think everybody hears from fans whether they have a financial benefit or anything in their outcome,” Scheffler said. “That’s why I had to get rid of my Venmo because I was either getting paid by people or people requesting me a bunch of money when I didn’t win. It wasn’t a good feeling.”
What is a good feeling is winning golf tournaments, and Sheffler has done that three times already this season. In addition to his win in Charlotte last month, he also boasts wins at the Memorial Tournament earlier this month and at the Byron Nelson in early May – meaning he has won three of the past four events he has taken part in.
Still, that hot streak isn’t exactly an anomaly, as the 28-year-old has nine Top-10 finishes since February.
“Houston I finished second, and that was right before the Masters (a fourth-place finish). That was when I really felt like I was starting to do some good things,” Scheffler said. “I felt like if I could sharpen up my swing a little bit more, I felt like I was going to get into the right — the place where I wanted to be.”
When he tees off at the golf course at Oakmont (Penn.) Country Club, he’ll do so not only with the confidence of a golfer playing exceedingly well, but also in feeling prepared and rested.
“Having the week off was really important for me to get home, get some rest, recover, and I showed up here on Sunday and was able to play maybe 11 holes and really get used to the conditions,” he said, noting that approach came in sharp contrast to last year’s U.S. Open, where he came in the week after a win at the Memorial Tournament and felt less prepared than he could have been.
“It feels much more like my normal major prep versus last year where you’re coming in from basically a major championship test, coming into another one is pretty challenging. … I’ve learned over the course of my career to focus a little bit more on the rest side of things.”
A big part of that feeling of confidence probably also stems from the Pittsburgh-area’s course difficulty, where the bunkers are prominent and deep. It’s not an easy course for golfers to absorb bad tee shots.
Scheffler is the clear betting favorite, at +270, and with good reason, given his hot streak of late and his history with this tournament, where he has three top ten finishes, including a tie for second in 2022 and a third-place finish in 2023.
And while he doesn’t subscribe to the thought process of his being favored to win, he does have a winning strategy in mind.
“I don’t really know if this is a golf course you can necessarily just overpower with kind of a bomb and gouge type strategy, especially with the way the rough is. You have to play the angles,” Scheffler said. “If you hit it in the right rough, you’re probably not going to get it to the green; if you hit it in the left rough, you’re probably not going to get it to the green. So might as well try and split the difference there and hit it in the middle.”
–Field Level Media
