He’s Not Tiger—But He Is

No wonder Phil Mickelson allegedly lost 100 million dollars gambling. He isn't exactly a foreseer.

Imagine thinking Scottie Scheffler—Scottie Scheffler, for God’s sake!—wouldn’t win before the Ryder Cup? To be honest, I don’t think anyone’s ever been more wrong about anything.

Since Lefty’s tweet on March 16, Scheffler’s finished T-8 or better in 13 straight starts and has now taken home five pieces of hardware after his win at the BMW Championship, including the Wanamaker Trophy and Claret Jug. He’s now just a U.S. Open victory away from the Career Grand Slam.

Now, as a hot-take admirer, credit to Mickelson for going out on a limb. It’s just so happened that the limb ended up being a twig struggling to hold on to the top of a 200-foot pine tree.

But let’s return to Mr. Scheffler. He’s not Tiger Woods…but he is, isn’t he?

I’m not an idiot, I understand that Tiger did the damn thing for a few decades—and his numbers would be even more absurd if injuries didn’t start to take their toll (and, well, the other thing, too). But if we’re talking peak performance, best stuff versus best stuff, Scheffler is second-to-none.

What he’s doing on the PGA TOUR week in and week out is truly insane. And one of the best examples came this weekend. The man was seven shots back of Robert MacIntyre on Friday afternoon, and Las Vegas had him listed at +150 to win. Almost even money, seven shots back!

And this is nothing against MacIntyre, but at no point this weekend did I ever think he was going to win. Not even when he was shushing the crowd on Saturday. Scheffler is Thanos with the Infinity Gauntlet—inevitable.

The most telling thing of all, however, is that his greatness is starting to spill over into other sports. Sure, certain moments have the power to grab the attention of great athletes in other arenas, but it takes true all-time talent to do it on a weekly basis. Scheffler had Patrick Mahomes and LeBron freakin’ James locked into the BMW Championship on a Sunday afternoon. He’s the only guy in this sport who could do that.

And if you needed any more convincing that Scheffler is entering Woods’ air space, take a look at this stat from Twitter’s favorite statistician, Justin Ray.

But again, Tiger did this same thing four times! Scheffler has a long, long way to go before he catches the 15-time major champion in the all-time conversation.

Peak versus peak, however, is a different story.

But what I think it comes down to is that feeling you get when you watch him. When there’s a big moment, when there’s a shot that needs to be hit, there’s no question in your mind that Scheffler is going to pull it off. Even his chip shot on Sunday, a little part of you had to be thinking that it was going in, right?

That feeling is what made us fall in love with Tiger, and it’s the same thing that’s starting the whole thing over again with Scottie.