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When Scottie Scheffler walked into the media tent at 11am he was greeted by questions about his suitability for links golf. He left 30 minutes later with an astonishing array of questions of his own about the meaning of life.
If there has been a theme throughout the world No 1’s dominance of the game, it has been that the excitement stops once his last putt drops. Microphones? They are not his thing.
And then there was this, which amounted to a remarkable monologue on his arrival at Portrush, underpinned by one jolting line that he repeated four times: ‘What is the point?’
The deeper recesses of his mind came pouring out here, including the admission that his haul of three majors, 13 PGA Tour wins and £70million in prize money since February 2022 has left him feeling somewhat hollow. His words: ‘This is not a fulfilling life.’
Or these: ‘This is not the place to look for your satisfaction.’
There was more context, naturally, and an assertion that he ‘loves’ golf. But there was also an echo of sentiments expressed lately by his great rival Rory McIlroy, who scaled his Everest at the Masters and then found himself rather unsatisfied by the relentless demand for great achievements to followed by something better.
Scottie Sheffler delivered a stunning existential monologue ahead of the Open on Thursday
The 29-year-old opened up about the hollowness he sometimes feels despite a career glittering with major wins and millions in prize money
During his speech, the world No 1 repeated four times: ‘What is the point?’ and insisted: 'This is not a fulfilling life’
McIlroy called it the ‘hamster wheel’ of professional golf on Monday; Scheffler on Tuesday sounded like a man exhausted by the pursuit of new worlds to conquer ahead of the Open. It was both compelling and extremely unusual for a 29-year-old who has only ever conveyed the impression of being the most unflappable swinger on tour.
‘I think it's kind of funny,’ he said at the beginning of an answer to a query about the longest he had spent celebrating a victory. He ended with a long hard, stare into an existential void.
‘I said something after the Byron Nelson this year that it feels like you work your whole life to celebrate winning a tournament. It only lasts a few minutes, that kind of euphoric feeling. Then it's like, okay, what are we going to eat for dinner? Life goes on.
‘Is it great to be able to win tournaments and to accomplish the things I have in the game of golf? Yeah, it brings tears to my eyes. But at the end of the day, what's the point?’
That was the stage when his answer began to escalate. ‘This is not a fulfilling life,’ he added. ‘It's fulfilling from the sense of accomplishment, but it's not fulfilling from a sense of the deepest places of your heart.
‘There's a lot of people that make it to what they thought was going to fulfil them in life, and you get there, you get to No 1 in the world, and they're like what's the point? I really do believe that because what is the point?
‘Why do I want to win this tournament so bad? That's something that I wrestle with on a daily basis. It's like showing up at the Masters every year - why do I want to win this golf tournament so badly? Why do I want to win the Open Championship so badly? I don't know because, if I win, it's going to be awesome for two minutes.
‘Then we're going to get to the next week, “Hey, you won two majors this year - how important is it for you to win the FedExCup playoffs?” And we're back here again.
Despite his deep realisations, Scheffler still said: ‘I love being able to play this game for a living'
It was both compelling and extremely unusual for Scheffler who has only ever conveyed the impression of being the most unflappable swinger on tour
‘I'm kind of sicko - I love putting in the work. I love getting to live out my dreams. But at the end of the day, sometimes I just don't understand the point.’
At that stage, Scheffler stopped himself long enough to say: ‘I don't know if I'm making any sense or not.’
He went on: ‘I love being able to play this game for a living. But does it fill the deepest wants and desires of my heart? Absolutely not.
‘I love living out my dreams. I love being a father. I love being able to take care of my son. I love being able to provide for my family out here playing golf. But if my golf ever started affecting the relationship I have with my wife or my son, that's going to be the last day that I play for a living. This is not the be all, end all.
‘When I sit back at the end of the year and try to reflect on things, it's just hard to explain how it doesn't satisfy. It's an unsatisfying venture. I guess what I'm trying to say is this is not the place to look for your satisfaction.’
Time will tell if these are the early signs of a burnout, or a golfer hosting an intelligent discussion on the grind of expectations, or both.
Until now, Scheffler has never seemed troubled by any of it in an acquisition of trophies unseen since the Tiger Woods era. Equally true is that his headlines have rarely strayed away from the fairways, to the extent an iffy putting stroke, since corrected, was often the only talking point we had.
Even when that status quo was exploded in the most dramatic of ways, with his arrest over a traffic misunderstanding on his way to the PGA Championship in 2024, he shot a 66 just hours after he was pictured in orange prison scrubs. His longest slump, after he cut his hand on a wine glass at Christmas, lasted barely five months before he won the Byron Nelson and then the PGA Championship a fortnight apart in May.
He has appeared a machine, or a ‘robot’, as he called it earlier on Tuesday, back when we were discussing why he has ‘only’ managed a best of seventh in the quirks of an Open on links courses.
It would surprise no one if he now went and won this tournament, but not as much as it did to hear Scheffler, of all people, sounding like it all weighs too much.
