As if Scottie Scheffler’s year wasn’t lively enough, the unassuming world number 1 was embroiled in an on-course flare-up with his great friend Tom Kim as the one-sided Presidents Cup turned the entire Ryder Cup around for a while.
In a match that is such a pale facsimile of the ultimate, and much older and competitive, team fights, Scheffler probably didn’t expect tensions to boil over on the first day of the match between Team USA and The Internationals (the rest of the world without Europe), especially since he was playing against his closest ally.
However, 22-year-old Kim was apparently keen to get into Scheffler’s shoes as the home side of Royal Montreal looked to win for the second time in the 30-year history of the PGA’s unapologetic cash cow.
It didn’t work. Scheffler and Russell Henley won 3&2 against Kim and Korean compatriot Sungjae Im, while the US whitewashed the opening session of the Fourballs 5-0. The score was pathetically predictable in this biennial mismatch, but at least golf saw Scheffler, aka Mr Nice, raise his hackles.
Granted, Scheffler was jailed during the USPGA in May, but that was only after an enthusiastic police officer arrested him for a traffic violation, for which he was later acquitted.
The Texan is considered the easiest character on Tour and Kim quickly rattled the cage, charging after Scheffler on the seventh after holed a long putt for birdie and shouting “Come on!”
As he did so, Scheffler then converted half his own considerable effort and turned on his heel before shouting back at Kim, “What was that?!”
Now that everyone was aware of their relationship — at the Olympics in August, gold medalist Scheffler brought Kim to tears with his kind words on the 18th — it seemed on the jocular side of good-natured. But on the next hole Kim crossed the line.
Kim gallantly birdied that par four, but as Scheffler lined up his putt for half, Kim and his partner walked 50 yards to the ninth tee without looking back. Scheffler missed and in the Sky Sports booth, former Ryder Cup captain Paul McGinley was unimpressed. “That, in my opinion, is disrespectful,” McGinley said. “Bad behavior. And don’t poke the bear.”
The respective post-match vice-captains, Kevin Kisner and Camilo Villegas, had “words” following the incident, according to another analyst. “It didn’t look very friendly,” John Wood said.
All of this would be music to the ears of the PGA Tour brass pining for the Presidents Cup to rival the Ryder Cup. A laughable ambition.
Needle is crucial, as is ribaldry, but Canadian Mackenzie Hughes fell short when he placed a can of beer on the first tee in an attempt to lift the crown. Only one thing was taken down: the Internationals – again.
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