Bryson DeChambeau stands out as a showman supreme and one of golf’s most popular players.
PINEHURST, NORTH CAROLINA | Watching Bryson DeChambeau play golf while attempting to reinvent how the game is played brings to mind what P.T. Barnum once said. “No one ever made a difference being like everyone else,” said Barnum, an American businessman who demonstrated that being a politician and a circus operator could be mutually exclusive endeavors. DeChambeau is still golf’s ultimate iconoclast. He’s a standalone curiosity in part because of his own curiosity which has taken him down more rabbit holes than Peter Cottontail.
Now, DeChambeau is threatening to win a second U.S. Open, this time at Pinehurst No. 2 which could hardly be more different than Winged Foot where he won in the COVID year of 2020. Through 36 holes on an increasingly dangerous Pinehurst No. 2, DeChambeau sits at 4-under-par 136, and it’s not unreasonable to think that 4-under after 72 holes might be good enough for the trophy engraver to do his work Sunday evening.
“I think 4-under is going to have a really good shot,” said DeChambeau, who added a second-round 69 to his opening 67.
Staying there is DeChambeau’s challenge because U.S. Open setups aren’t known for getting easier as the weekend rolls around. Many things have changed since DeChambeau overpowered mighty Winged Foot, treating its fearsome rough as if he were flicking a bit of lint off a shirt.
DeChambeau is thinner now, having forsaken his linebacker look for a sleeker but still muscular physique. He has left the PGA Tour for LIV Golf. He’s playing 3D-printed irons with faces that bulge in the middle, a concept he can explain, but chances are most don’t care to have the physics explained to them. Most notably, however, is that DeChambeau has evolved into one of the game’s most popular players.
And, of course, it’s because DeChambeau still mashes golf balls like car crushers turn old Chevrolets into giant doorstops. When he birdied the par-4 13th hole Friday, a roar erupted from the crowded grandstand behind the green. After getting his ball out of the hole and walking toward the bleachers to watch his playing competitors finish, he got a second round of cheers.
Maybe it’s because PGA Tour fans rarely see him now. Maybe it’s because his many eccentricities have become endearing more than off-putting. And, of course, it’s because DeChambeau still mashes golf balls like car crushers turn old Chevrolets into giant doorstops.
As DeChambeau stood on the tee of the 523-yard, par-4 16th hole Friday, the gallery stood two and three deep along the length of the hole.
“Hi, momma,” he said into his phone, the drawl practically dripping off his words. “I’m at No. 16, waiting to see DeChambeau hit it 380. Then I’m going to go watch Tiger.”
If the man was disappointed that DeChambeau’s tee shot traveled only 343 yards, he didn’t show it. Professional golf, for all of the mastery demonstrated by the players, is best when it has characters front and center. Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson carried the game as much for who they are as for how they played. These days, Rory McIlroy is adored, Scottie Scheffler is admired and Xander Schauffele is appreciated. DeChambeau is the eye magnet. His day job, so to speak, is with LIV Golf and, along with Jon Rahm, Brooks Koepka and Cam Smith, DeChambeau’s presence on the rival tour is missed by the PGA Tour.
Amid rumors that a potential deal between the two sides is becoming increasingly likely, the prospect of more cross-pollination is encouraging. DeChambeau flickered at the Masters in April when he tied for sixth, and he pushed Schauffele until the bitter end last month at the PGA Championship, ultimately falling a shot short at Valhalla while playing in the vocal embrace of the Louisville fans.
“Being able to entertain the fans is what we’re all here to do, and I think that’s what’s the most important thing.” – Bryson DeChambeau
When a grown man grabbed a ball DeChambeau had tossed toward a youngster in the immediate aftermath of his near-miss at Valhalla, he went back like Galahad to return the ball to its proper recipient, and the video went viral.
“Being able to entertain the fans is what we’re all here to do, and I think that’s what’s the most important thing,” DeChambeau said on that Sunday through his disappointment. Without the golf magic, however, the entertainment value declines. Put them together, throw in nearly 700,000 subscribers to DeChambeau’s entertaining YouTube channel and the game has found an intersection between today and tomorrow. P.T. Barnum would appreciate DeChambeau’s desire to be in the center ring where eyes are focused.
“YouTube has helped me understand that a little bit more,” DeChambeau said. “When the moment comes, knowing what to do, what to say, how to act is really important.
DeChambeau doesn’t exactly play golf by the book. “When I was younger, I didn’t understand what it was. Yeah, I would have great celebrations and whatnot, but I didn’t know what it meant and what I was doing it necessarily for. Now I’m doing it a lot more for the fans and for the people around and trying to be a bit of an entertainer that plays good golf every once in a while.”
There are moments when DeChambeau comes across as wonky and patronizing, but there are also times when he seems amused by what he’s doing and saying. He knows how some of the things he says sound, especially when he starts talking about things such as finite element analysis. As a youngster, DeChambeau wore a flat cap like those worn by his idols Ben Hogan and Payne Stewart. When DeChambeau was considering attending SMU, he didn’t realize Stewart had gone to college there until he saw a mural of the late U.S. Open champion.
To honor the man who won the 1999 U.S. Open at Pinehurst, just four months before he died in a plane accident, DeChambeau has a flat cap clipped to his golf bag this week. It’s a way of remembering Stewart and, at the same time, of reminding DeChambeau of who he is. Like no one else.
