FARMINGDALE, NEW YORK | The gray skies, the muddy ground and the promise of more rain before the clouds part for a Ryder Cup weekend two years in the waiting couldn’t mute the crackle that seemed to follow Bryson DeChambeau around Bethpage Black Thursday as the countdown clock ticked away.
When DeChambeau walked over to sign autographs for the squealing crowd held back by a metal fence near the practice green, grown men quick-stepped their way into the commotion, holding their white pin flags over the heads of youngsters in hopes of an autograph.
On the eve of a Ryder Cup the U.S. team badly needs to win, DeChambeau with his superhero stylings and overt intensity is its X factor.
Rory McIlroy is Europe’s alpha male and Scottie Scheffler is the manifestation of American possibilities but DeChambeau stands apart even as he is embracing and being embraced into the blood-brothers culture crafted by captain Keegan Bradley.
When Golf Channel analyst Brandel Chamblee agitated pre-event conversation by calling DeChambeau “a captain’s nightmare,” it was one more arrow fired at the most controversial player in the game. DeChambeau pushed back gently on social media while his teammates predictably rallied around him.
While he may wear the same uniform as his teammates, DeChambeau’s unconventionality defines him. To a lesser degree, Viktor Hovland’s quirkiness separates him on the European side but, in the case of both players, there is a value in being different.
This may be the perfect stage for DeChambeau. It’s a hefty golf course with its fearsome rough trimmed to be little more than a nuisance and it’s an event that throbs with emotion. DeChambeau plays golf in vivid colors – the Black course seems painted in bright red staging this week – and no golfer is better at playing to the crowd than DeChambeau.
Remember his arms-raised, heavyweight-champion pose when he drove his ball 370 yards across a lake at the Arnold Palmer Invitational a few years ago or the way he swam in a sea of admirers when he won the U.S. Open at Pinehurst, sharing the trophy with them?
Now put DeChambeau on the first tee at Bethpage Black with flags waving and the president looking on and find a character better suited for the scene. That doesn’t mean he will be the best player but the moment won’t be too big for him.
“If he views himself as a gladiator golfer, this is as good as it gets. He’s been awesome. He’s been awesome in the team room.” – Xander Schauffele
Even if you’re not buying everything DeChambeau is selling, his pitch is hard to ignore.
“This is his arena,” Xander Schauffele said. “If he views himself as a gladiator golfer, this is as good as it gets. He’s been awesome. He’s been awesome in the team room.
“I’m excited to sort of see what he can do, and hopefully get a lot of points up on the board because his points might hit harder than maybe my points, for example, just because of how he might celebrate and get these fans into this tournament quickly.”
Taking 10 minutes’ worth of questions from the media before lunch Thursday, DeChambeau resisted any temptation to troll his critics.
Recently, Rory McIlroy said DeChambeau draws attention to himself by talking about others, particularly McIlroy and Scottie Scheffler.
DeChambeau, who made a point in April of saying McIlroy never spoke to him during their final pairing at the Masters, looked and sounded like a man operating under captain’s orders to avoid taking any bait.
“I think rivalries are good for the game of golf, and albeit I have the ultimate respect for Rory as a player. It’s going to be fun to go up against him this week, whether it’s against him directly or through other players. I think it’s going to be a fun challenge this week,” DeChambeau said.
“Would I love to go up against him? Yeah. It would be a lot of fun. Is it going to happen? It’s not likely. I mean, maybe once.”
McIlroy was similarly benevolent.
“If I come up against Bryson at some point, I think that’s great. I think that’s wonderful for the championship and wonderful for us, as well, in some ways,” McIlroy said.
Asked about Chamblee’s comments and the questions he raised about DeChambeau’s YouTube viewership numbers, DeChambeau again chose diplomacy over debate.
“I think any time that people can throw stuff at me like that, I enjoy it. I appreciate it. I think it’s good for ultimately the game of golf because it starts to spur conversation on,” DeChambeau said.
DeChambeau is the player best suited to be the American fire starter this week, waving on the noise and the energy. He will do whatever the team needs him to do.
In the final hours before this Ryder Cup begins, there is a sense that Europe may have a slight advantage in terms of talent and the form each player is in but the Americans have the undeniable edge of playing on home soil, the most telling indicator of potential success over the past two decades.
This is DeChambeau’s third Ryder Cup and he’s a different player from the Ryder Cup rookie he was in Paris seven years ago. He was part of the dominant American team at Whistling Straits four years ago but was not part of the 2023 U.S. team in Rome.
DeChambeau is the player best suited to be the American fire starter this week, waving on the noise and the energy. He will do whatever the team needs him to do, he said, but every player says that.
“Making this team was a passion project of mine. It was A1. It was the thing I wanted to do most, represent my country,” said DeChambeau, who alongside Justin Thomas will face Europe’s Jon Rahm and Tyrrell Hatton in Friday morning’s opening foursomes matches.
DeChambeau’s time has come.
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