Brandel Chamblee thinks he knows the problem Bryson DeChambeau has at Augusta National which Jordan Spieth does not suffer with

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One of the most interesting questions heading into The Masters will inevitably be how exactly will LIV Golf’s biggest names fare at Augusta National, with Bryson DeChambeau looking to lead the contingent this week.

Bryson DeChambeau‘s performance at the 2024 Masters was a sign of what was to come from the Crushers GC captain. Although he was not in contention towards the end of Sunday’s round, he showed signs that he had figured Augusta National out.

DeChambeau led after the first two rounds at The Masters. And it gave him the momentum to go on and finish second at the PGA Championship before winning the US Open.

But DeChambeau has not always had success at the first major of the year. The 2024 event saw his first ever top 10 at The Masters, while his previous best result had come in 2016 when he was an amateur. So he will be looking to prove that he has now developed a game which can compete amongst the Georgia pines.

The problem Bryson DeChambeau could have at The Masters

However, it seems that not everyone is convinced that DeChambeau’s skillset is the one best suited to Augusta.

Speaking on the Fore Play Podcast, Brandel Chamblee was discussing the importance of a world class approach game when he noted why someone like Jordan Spieth should find the going a lot easier than DeChambeau.

“It’s approach play, more specific than just approach play, it’s 175 to 200 yards approach play, well 150 to 200 yard approach play. The window is that specific here, you get more of those shots here than just about any other golf course. It’s also being able to cut it off a hook lie for a right-handed golfer,” he said.

“So, you’ve got that at one, you’ve got it on the second shot on two, you’ve got it on three, you’ve got it a little bit on seven, you’ve got it on eight, you’ve got it on nine, you’ve got it on 10, you’ve got it on 13, you’ve got it a little bit on 15, you got it on 18, you’ve got a little bit on 17. So you go through and that’s a lot of shots, and these are key shots. If you swing in to out and you’ve got a hook lie, the club runs into the ground and it shuts it down, so you get a lower ball flight with less spin, and those tend to end up long and left.

“If you cut it like Jordan Spieth, the most perfect golf swing to play around here, and Scottie Scheffler has the almost identical swing – [Spieth] has the same sort of shot shape, but now he’s more bowed wrist, and he’s trying to get out of that, and for a bit of this year, he’s a little less bowed at the top and not quite as much right-side bend at impact, but he’s got the same sort of release, that chicken-wing release, that Jack Nicklaus had, that Scottie Scheffler has, they’re on top of it, a little bit over the top, and they’re picking it, they’re swinging, so if you’ve got that slope and the ball’s above your feet, they’re swinging across the slope from high to low, not into the slope from low to high. If you’re swinging into the slope, in to out, and this is Bryson’s problem in my estimation, they’re swinging in from low to out, you’re more likely to run into the ground versus pick it.

“This is a picker’s paradise, and it’s a digger’s dungeon. If you’re a digger, you’re going to have a lot of low left shots coming into these greens, which means you finish above the hole more often. And if I put the hole location in the middle of a clock face, and let’s say we’re both 15 feet from the hole, but you’re at 11 o’clock and I’m at 5 o’clock, if we’re the same putter, I’m going to out putt you 20 percent of the time. You make more from 5 o’clock up the hill breaking to the left than you make from 11 o’clock going down the hill breaking to the right.”

The gap between Scottie Scheffler and Bryson DeChambeau at the 2024 Masters

Ultimately, Scottie Scheffler won the 2024 Masters at something of a canter. Most of his challengers fell away in the early stages of the back nine in the final round, and the event became something of a procession.

DeChambeau was unable to find that next gear at the crucial moment. His final birdie of the day came on the fifth hole on Sunday.

But some of the numbers from last year’s event paint an interesting picture when it comes to the gap between DeChambeau and Scheffler. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the LIV star gained more shots off the tee than the world number one.

However, that was the only area where DeChambeau had the advantage. And there was more than two shots difference between the pair around the green.

It is interesting that the gap on strokes gained approach is probably not as large as you would expect it to be. But clearly, Scheffler more than made up for that.

What will give DeChambeau hope is that Scheffler is not going into this year’s Masters with anything like the same momentum. And while he has not been pulling up any trees on LIV this season, it was a similar story last year – with his most recent victory in the league coming back in 2023.

It would certainly not be a surprise to see the gap between the two close this time around.