Kind of stupid’: Players, including Xander Schauffele and Scottie Scheffler, bemoan mudballs

CHARLOTTE – It is quaint, cute even, in this age of polarization and greed in professional golf that the top storyline on Day 1 at the PGA Championship was mud on golf balls — but here we are.

Before we allow for a collective harrumph on the idea of millionaires complaining about the accumulation of wet dirt on golf balls — a phenomenon that creates the kind of unpredictability that drives professional golfers to rage — consider how the potent combination of Mother Nature and a strident adherence to the ethos of the game coalesced Thursday at Quail Hollow.

For context, Scottie Scheffler is the game’s preeminent ball-striker who has dedicated his life to perfecting his craft. He’s also one of the most level-headed and understated champions to play the modern game, which is why his comments regarding Thursday’s conditions felt like a pointed response to the PGA of America, which runs the PGA Championship.

“When you think about the purest test of golf, I don’t personally think that hitting the ball in the middle of the fairway you should get punished for,” he explained following an opening 2-under 69 that left him four off the lead. “On a golf course as good of conditioned as this one is, this is probably a situation in which it would be the least likely difference in playing it up [with preferred lies] because most of the lies you get out here are all really good.

“I understand how a golf purist would be, oh, play it as it lies. But I don’t think they understand what it’s like literally working your entire life to learn how to hit a golf ball and control it and hit shots and control distance, and all of a sudden, due to a rules decision, that is completely taken away from us by chance.”

Despite that take, which is as hot as you’ll get from Scheffler, he was quick to remain on-brand. “I don’t make the rules,” he said. “I deal with what the rules decisions are.”

Scheffler, like many players in the field, came by his anger honestly, having endured one of the most egregious mudball incidents in recent memory at the par-4 16^th hole.
Following a perfect 322-yard drive into the middle of fairway, Scheffler’s approach shot from 212 yards snapped wildly left off his clubface and into the water. He made a double-bogey 6 on the hole.

From 200 yards, Scheffler is ninth on the PGA Tour this season in approach distance (47-foot average). His wayward approach on No. 16 was more than 100 feet left of his intended line.

The incident would have likely been overlooked, if it had been isolated. Following a similarly impressive drive at No. 16 (323 yards), Xander Schauffele suffered the same muddy result and watery fate with his approach for his own double bogey.

“Had a ridiculous mud ball there on 16 with Scottie. We were in the middle of the fairway, and I don’t know, we had to aim right of the grandstands probably. I’m not sure,” said Schauffele, who was outside the top 60 following a 1-over opening card. “I aimed right of the bunker and it whipped in the water and Scottie whipped it in the water, as well.