Xander Schauffele ‘itching’ to get back to unique PGA Tour season

The PGA Tour will be different once play resumes in June, but four-time champion Xander Schauffele just wants to get back to playing

Xander Schauffele is just 26 and in his fourth year on the PGA Tour, but even the most seasoned professional has no experience with what he and the rest of the tour is going through right now.

Seven weeks ago, Schauffele and 143 of the top players in the world gathered at TPC Sawgrass for the first round of the Players Championship. He shot two-under that day and finished the round in a tie for 37th, seven shots behind leader Hideki Matsuyama. Everything seemed like it was just a normal PGA Tour event.

But it soon became clear that it was not. With the COVID-19 pandemic raging across the United States and the world, the PGA Tour canceled the remainder of the tournament after 18 holes. Schauffele and his fellow pros haven’t played since as the entire sports world has been put on pause.

The tour has announced that a revised schedule will begin on June 11 with the Charles Schwab Challenge at Colonial in Fort Worth, Texas. Three of the four majors have been pushed back to either the late summer or fall, with the Open Championship being canceled altogether.

Schauffele, taking part alongside his father Stefan in a live Q&A hosted by Hyland on Sunday afternoon from his home in San Diego, says he shares in the desire of all the other players in getting back on the course.

“We’re all just itching to get out and play,” he said. “I don’t think it really matters when the major is as long as we’re able to play it. Colonial is going to feel like a major, even without spectators. I’m assuming it’s going to be a very strong field since all of us just want to get out and play and practice and just get back to normal life.”

The tour that Schauffele, a four-time champion and runner-up at the Masters last year, left in March will look dramatically different once play resumes in June. Players may not be able to take the flagstick out of the hole while putting. They might not be able to rake bunkers in an effort to prevent caddies from touching the same surface. And, perhaps most importantly, the first few tournaments will take place without spectators. It’s a situation Schauffele believes will impact some players more than others.

“If you’re the likes of Tiger Woods, his birdie may be more special than someone else’s birdie on any given hole. So I can see how that would be a hurting factor,” he said. “If you’re sort of a quiet guy like me who just goes about his own business, you know, I love playing golf, just not for the money or anything. I’ve been itching…to get out there. It doesn’t really matter who’s around. I think with certain tournaments it might feel very different, but for the most part, I think the first few months we’re just going to be excited about playing.”

One of the tournaments that would be most impacted is the Ryder Cup, currently scheduled to begin Sept. 25—just five days after the U.S. Open under the new schedule—at Whistling Straits in Wisconsin. The U.S.A. vs. Europe event usually attracts the most boisterous crowd of the year. Rory McIlroy, a veteran of five Ryder Cups, has said “having a Ryder Cup without fans is not a Ryder Cup.” European captain Padraig Harrington was also initially opposed to the idea of a spectator-less tournament before backtracking and saying they might have to “take one for the team.”

Schauffele, currently in fifth in the American Ryder Cup standings and a good bet to be part of Captain Steve Stricker’s team for the first time, agrees that the majesty and mystique of the tournament would be diminished without fans in attendance. “Man, I just feel like it would be strange. I’ve seen interviews with guys saying we shouldn’t be playing it if there’s no fans. Pretty much everyone I saw, they’ve been on several Ryder Cup teams and they’re saying they just wouldn’t want to do it without fans, so I’ll probably have to side with them just based on their experience,” he said.

The pandemic isn’t just affecting players’ ability to compete in tournaments; it’s also preventing them from preparing. Schauffele hasn’t been able to get his entire team together for two months. His life-long coach, though, happens to be his father, to whom the job falls of getting Xander ready both physically and, more importantly, mentally for the restart.

“I see my role…more on the mental side,” Stefan Schauffele said. “I’m trying to make sure he doesn’t get too antsy to get out there. It’s the uncertainty. We talk about the most important mental element, it would probably have to be self-belief. Knowing that you’ve got it, that confidence that you walk out there with. That is one of the things that will suffer when you don’t know how you will perform for two months. And then you have to walk out there and compete against the other guys.”

The pandemic has upturned what was a steady routine for Schauffele and other pros: practice, play, and repeat, week after week. By the time they’re able to get back to the life they’re familiar with, it will be three months since they’ve had a chance to do that. But, if Schauffele is any indication, once they get a club back in their hands, an uncertain world will suddenly feel normal again.