Scottie Scheffler's rise to golf stardom: 'skinny teenager', reputation starting to have impact, Tiger-like intimidation

Laird initially came across Scheffler, now a multiple Masters champion after cementing his position as world No 1 with an impressive four-shot win at Augusta National last Sunday, when he was being coached by Randy Smith, who has been Scheffler’s long-time swing guru. Smith’s son, Blake, is the agent for both Laird and Scheffler and, through that connection, the Scot has since taken a keen interest in watching the 27-year-old American show exactly why he was tipped as a potential superstar more than a decade ago.

“I worked with Randy for maybe just over a year in 2012 into 2013,” Laird told The Scotsman. “I was struggling a little bit with my game in 2012 and I actually won the Valero Texas Open when Randy was my coach. I still see him out there on ranges and chat to him. The story I have from my spell with him is that one time I flew to Dallas to work with Randy and I went down there for a day or two. I was on the range at Royal Oaks, where he works and teaches.

“I was hitting balls and we were having a little break and there was a skinny teenager over on the other side of the range hitting balls. As we were chatting, Randy just casually pointed and said: ‘hey, see this kid over here, he’s really good’. I was like ‘oh, okay’ as you hear that a lot, but he then said ‘no, he’s really good!’,

“So I watched and he looked very casual, but here we are 12 years later and that, of course, was Scottie. He’s 27 now so would have been just 15 or 16 back then. I remember Randy saying he’d just gone through a growth spurt and struggled for a little bit before finally growing into his body. When you are talking about someone like Randy, who’s taught (former Open champion) Justin Leonard for years, he’s seen it all and I am pretty sure when he sees a 15 or 16-year-old, he knows the guys who are pretty good and the guys who are really good (laughing).”

Scheffler has now recorded three wins in his last four starts, having also triumphed in the Arnold Palmer Invitational and The Players in the build up to the season’s opening major. In the other of those events, he missed a five-footer on the last to force a play-off in the Texas Children’s Houston Open. “I think he’s finally getting to the stage where his reputation is starting to have an impact,” added Laird, a four-time PGA Tour winner. “It happened at The Players and it happened at The Masters. When he gets up there in the lead, guys start to make mistakes.

“I didn’t see much of The Masters as I was practising and busy with other things. But I watched the last seven holes on Sunday and, as he was walking down one of the holes, it was funny as my wife just casually said to me ‘he doesn’t have the intimidation or aura factor of Tiger’. I said ‘maybe not to the outside viewer but, trust me, the guys out there know he’s not going backwards, they know they need to go and beat him’. I then said that ‘I know if I was walking down any of those holes on Sunday with him, he’s not going to make any mistakes and I’m going to have to beat him’.

“I got what she was saying about how it might look to the outside audience about him not having that swagger or intimidation of Tiger. But he’s starting to get it with the players as they know he’s currently by far the best player. Collin Morikawa’s interview after the final round in The Masters was very honest as he said he’d made mistakes due to getting ‘greedy’ and pushing too early. He felt he had to push to catch him and that’s what used to happen with Tiger. Tiger’s name would pop up there and guys would just start making mistakes.

“The golf he is playing is just insane. I hate to say it but, if his swing wasn’t like it was and it was more like a Tiger technically perfect swing, people would be raving more about him. They get a little thrown off by his very calm personality and his feet moving all over the place in his swing. But, if you really look closely at what he does, it’s frightening how good he is playing. He’s won three of his last four, which includes Bay Hill, The Players and The Masters. And the week he finished second he was one shot back because he tried to tap in a one-and-a-half footer on the Friday and missed. I mean, it’s Tiger stuff – that’s what Tiger used to do.”

Laird, who was delighted to see Scheffler mention Blake Smith in his winner’s speech last Sunday as he has the same high opinion about him as an agent, went for dinners with Scheffler when he first came out on tour and are still connected. “Yeah, I know him well enough to chat away to him and not feel like I am disturbing him,” he said. “If we’re in the locker-room together, I’ll go up and chat to him and say ‘hi’, crack some jokes or talk about Blake or whatever.

“I always tell people this. Some guys can put on a great act for the camera if you are something or not. But he’s exactly how he appears. He’s such a good guy. He’s really down to earth. The money and the fame, that’s not changed him at all. He’s been so competitive as he is right now from a young age. He wants to be the best. Not because of all the stuff that comes with it. Just because he wants to win. He’s not changed and his wife, Meredith, is a sweetheart, too. He’s just a good guy who has a great team around him and it’s incredible the golf he’s playing right now.”