Scottie Scheffler and Justin Thomas return to PGA Tour action this week as they take on the Travelers Championship.
Scheffler won the Travelers Championship in 2024, defeating Tom Kim in a playoff at TPC River Highlands.
It represented one of seven wins of the season for Scheffler, who already has three wins to his name on the PGA Tour in 2025.
Having won the PGA Championship this year, Scheffler was impressed by J.J. Spaun at the US Open, with the latter claiming his first major win last week.
The pair have now been grouped together for the first two rounds of the Travelers Championship, the last Signature Event of the season.
Scottie Scheffler responds when asked if the Travelers Championship course is ‘too easy’
Before the action started, the world number one was tasked with discussing TPC River Highlands, having been asked if he thinks the course is too easy after ending on 22-under last year.
“Golf’s funny in that sense,” he said. “People, when they watch golf, it’s not like other sports where you want us to look like y’all when we play golf. It’s one of those funny things. You watch the NBA, and you’re like, I wish they couldn’t dunk. I wish they were scoring less. I wish their shooting percentage was lower on 3-pointers.
“If you watch tennis, you’re like, man, I wish the ball was going slower so they look like me out there playing tennis. It’s not like that.
“As much as some people want us to feel like them, professional golf is different than amateur golf. We get a lot of time to prepare to go out and play. The guys out here are really good at golf. If you stand here on the driving range and watch a range session, that ball doesn’t go offline very often.
“I think sometimes, especially in this day and age, people get way too caught up in the winning score being what is a proper test. I think a proper test is good shots being rewarded and bad shots being punished. I think this is one of the best golf courses for that.
“There’s opportunity out there, and there’s also punishment. You look at the closing stretch; 15, if you hit a good shot, you’ve got a birdie opportunity. If you try to bail out right, you’re going to be in a bunker short right of the green and have a 40-yard bunker shot, a hard shot. 16, if you hit a good shot, you’re going to have a good look at birdie.
“If you bail out and go long, it’s a tough chip down the hill. 17, you hit the fairway, you have a chance to hit in there close to the pin. If you hit it in the left rough, you probably can’t get to the green. That’s what we look for in golf courses, in terms of you want good shots to be rewarded and bad shots to be punished. It’s as simple as that.
“The winning score, I think people get way too caught up in. I’m not saying necessarily that even par is a bad winning score. Some weeks like the U.S. Open, you hit two great shots and you’re going to get rewarded with a par. That’s fine. That’s good too.
“Across the board, the way we get tested in professional golf is very good. We play different types of golf courses, different types of grass, we play different types of winning scores. We just see different tests, and I think not one is better than the other.
“The most frustrating thing for me when I play a golf tournament is when you see good shots not getting rewarded and bad shots not being punished properly. That’s all we look for. Do we care that 22-under wins this week? No.
“I played good last year, and if they somehow change it to 12-under by making the pins in silly spots and doing things to trick up the golf course, what we want is a fair test. I think having birdies at the end sometimes is a pretty exciting finish. That’s really all there is to it.”
Justin Thomas praises Scottie Scheffler’s comments before the Travelers Championship
It was an extremely detailed response from Scheffler, who dealt with the question very admirably and professionally.
And that is a view seemingly also shared by his fellow professional Thomas, who posted the answer on his Instagram story.
READ MORE: Justin Thomas sends message on social media immediately after J.J. Spaun wins the US Open
The American added the caption: “Very well said by Scottie Scheffler. I fall victim to this too… respect the low scores and appreciate them!”
Thomas hasn’t enjoyed the same level of success that Scheffler has so far this season, although he did manage to clinch the trophy at the RBC Heritage.
But unlike Scheffler at the US Open, who finished T7, Thomas failed to make the weekend at Oakmont Country Club.
He will now be desperate to put that right at TPC River Highlands, where he has been paired with Hideki Matsuyama for rounds one and two.
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