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PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla .– Throughout the second round of the Players’ Championship on Friday, an entertaining team of the world’s best golfers vied for the lead. But for several hours, most fans were mesmerized by one more question: whether Bryson DeChambeau would hit a careful iron or take a strong whip with his pilot hole after hole.
In this recurring drama, it seemed that most of the 10,000 or so spectators allowed on the spacious grounds of TPC Sawgrass Golf Course were crammed behind DeChambeau as he stood on a tee box and pondered the best way to attack a par. -4 or -5. The tension was palpable and fans fell silent as DeChambeau walked over to his golf bag.
As DeChambeau later explained, if he finally pulled an iron out of the bag, the response was a despondent howl, as if the crowd had seen a child’s freshly bought ice cream cone drop and splash the ground.
“It’s always like a big ‘Awwww’ for an iron,” DeChambeau said after his Friday round.
What if he took his gigantic driver out of the bag? Think of a climate movie scene in which a hero finally defeats the villain.
“If it’s the driver, it’s like, ‘Yeah!’ DeChambeau said with a warm smile.
It happened on the PGA Tour, and maybe it’s no surprise. Winning golf is fun, but it’s not a match for a dose of swashbuckling charisma mixed with the sight of a golf ball smashed up to 380 yards.
The DeChambeau era in men’s professional golf continues with resounding impact. After Friday’s round, four-time Major Championship winner Rory McIlroy who missed the cup blamed for trying to play too much like DeChambeau for his poor performance.
While hitting towering records, DeChambeau, the defending United States Open champion, also shot a three-under-69 on Friday, which put him down to six under for the tournament and just three shots. behind the leader of the second round, Lee Westwood. Play was suspended Friday night due to darkness, with a small number of players unable to complete their second round.
DeChambeau, who beat Westwood in a final duel last weekend to win the Arnold Palmer Invitational, is clearly supported by fan attention. Their energy seems to inspire him, although he might not hit the driver as often as they would like on the narrow track of TPC Sawgrass. Between shots, he jokes freely and warmly with the crowd.
“They always ask me how many protein shakes I’ve had, which is funny,” he said, “and I always answer with the number I had that day, for the most part.
Protein shakes are a staple that helped DeChambeau gain 40 pounds last year, although he’s lost at least 15 pounds by now. As an explanation, DeChambeau said he had only consumed four shakes on Friday afternoon, about half of his consumption four months ago.
As DeChambeau hit several outstanding practice and approach shots on Friday, finishing with five birdies and a double bogey, he was disappointed with the hitting of his ball and made his way to the practice pit shortly after his round. He was still there beating bullets three hours later.
When asked if he comes off the golf course satisfied and skips practice after the round, DeChambeau, 27, blurted out, “Never. Because my brain is – I mean, I’m a perfectionist, and I’ll continue to be until the day I die and until the day I stop playing this game. It’s just like that. that I am. I love it about me.
He smiled and added, “But at the same time, it makes me very worried about things.”
Although DeChambeau once again cast a long shadow over a PGA Tour event, he was far from the only golfer making the news.
Viktor Hovland, the 23-year-old ascendant ranked 13th in the world, missed the cut on Friday in part because his mother, who was watching the tournament at home in Norway, noticed a rule violation he made during the first round and brought it to his attention later. His intervention led to a penalty of two strokes.
Hovland finished two for the tournament on Friday, or two strokes above the cut line. He received the penalty for inadvertently playing his ball from the wrong place on the 15th green in the first round Thursday.
As usual, Hovland had moved his ball out of a competitor’s putting line. But then he failed to put it back in the right spot, although he didn’t get it closer to the hole or gain any apparent advantage.
According to the NBC Players’ Championship broadcast on Friday, Hovland received a call from his mother after the first round and then contacted PGA Tour officials, who reviewed video of the incident and verified Hovland’s error.
“It’s unfortunate; I’ve kind of put that in front of me already,” Hovland said calmly after shooting 74 on Friday. “I’m just more disappointed that I couldn’t have played better.”
Hovland wasn’t as inconsolable as McIlroy, who shot 75 on Friday after a blatant 79 on Thursday. Like so many others at this year’s Players’ Championship, McIlroy had DeChambeau in mind, and he believes that trying to keep up with DeChambeau’s prodigious distance led to his recent poor play.
Late last year, after DeChambeau’s US Open victory, McIlroy, already one of the longest hitters on the tour, changed his swing in an attempt to add even more yards to his practices.
“I would be lying if I said it had nothing to do with what Bryson did at the US Open,” said McIlroy. “I think a lot of people saw that and were like, ‘Whoa, if that’s how they’re going to create golf courses in the future, that helps.'”
McIlroy now considers this to be a mistake.
“I thought being able to gain more speed was a good thing,” he said. “And maybe – to the detriment of my swing a bit – I got there. But I just need to maybe get a handle on it a bit.
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