2025 PGA Championship takeaways: Bryson DeChambeau banging along as mud balls irk struggling stars in Round 1

CHARLOTTE — There they stood in the middle of the fairway. The top two Americans in the game were easing into their first rounds of the 107th PGA Championship before, well, the mud hit the fan. It wasn’t the play of a native statesman near the top of the leaderboard nor how a major championship labeled as a three-horse race opened wide Thursday at Quail Hollow Club that was the topic of conversation. Rather, it was the organic matter itself.

There was nothing natural about the shots they hit. Both Scottie Scheffler and Xander Schauffele were befuddled (at best) when their second shots veered left and into the water at the onset of The Green Mile. Scheffler peered at his bagman, Ted Scott, with a fit of rage boiling under the surface, while Schauffele put his hand over his mouth, muttered some words and looked to his caddie as if the duo knew exactly what was going to happen.

“It’s one of those deals where it’s frustrating to hit the ball in the middle of the fairway and get mud on it and have no idea where it’s going to go,” Scheffler said. “I understand it’s part of the game, but there’s nothing more frustrating for a player. You spend your whole life trying to learn how to control a golf ball, and due to a rules decision, all of a sudden you have absolutely no control over where that golf ball goes.”

The discussion Thursday turned from the golf tournament itself to the conditions under which golf was taking place. This on a day with sunny skies and a freshening wind, mind you. Rather than discussing the golf played during one of the 16 most important rounds of the season, both sides of the “should they have played preferred lies?” argument were heard. Scheffler, Schauffele and Michael Kim were the most vocal, the latter nothing on social media that he had as many as five mud balls during his round.

Players are pampered; it’s an outside sport, let them face some adversity as luck is involved in tournament competition. This variable should not be introduced, it penalizes good shots; luck is part of the equation but not to this degree. Both sides were heard, and it’s now time to move on.

It should be mudders — those who thrive in difficult conditions — who should be the talking point, not the conditions themselves.

Thursday at Quail Hollow was a strange day in many ways, primarily on the leaderboard but also amid the general surroundings in which it developed. The vibes were off, as kids say. Roars were hard to come by around the golf course. Some of the stars looked as if they sleepwalked off the bus like members of an SEC football team about to take on a program that was paid to play the game. 

No matter how it looks, no matter how it feels, this major championship remains, and it will march on. It will crown a champion worthy of that Wanamaker Trophy. It will go down in the history books and be referenced in the future. It will produce drama as some of its competitors rise to the moment while others wilt. And it will persist.

After all, we are only 18 holes into the 2025 PGA Championship, and there’s a whole lot of golf still yet to be played. There’s also a whole lot of takeaways from Round 1.

The Tarheel

Wednesday morning, a pair of North Carolina products were meandering through the front nine at Quail Hollow. The sunglasses that were donned by Ben Griffin were impossible to miss, identifying the recent PGA Tour winner, but his playing partner remained a bit of a guessing game. It wound up being Ryan Gerard, who proved to be one of the top names on the leaderboard Thursday.

With his father walking inside the rope line watching his shots, there was a quiet confidence about Gerard. Still, not even this performance could have been imagined. The 25-year-old has played in only two major championship prior to this week, but as they say, the third time’s the charm.

Gerard played Quail Hollow in a manner reminiscent of how the course is set up. He was even par through his first six holes and caught fire in the middle of his round amid an influx of scoring opportunities. He’s cashed those chances, playing the stretch through No. 15 in 7-under fashion. A couple bogeys late may have made his dinner taste a little worse but not by much when you are in the comfortable confines of your home state. 

“It’s nice when everyone is cheering you on,” Gerard said. “But it is kind of cool. I’ve seen so many people that I know this week that I know is going to be here and just a lot of people that are wearing the light blue, UNC logo shirts and everything out there. It’s a big family of UNC Tar Heels where we all root for each other and support our own, and I’m appreciative of all.”

Scheffler’s subtle edge

It almost served as a kick in the behind. Scheffler’s start was fortunate as the world No. 1 found himself at 2 under through his first six holes thanks to a chip-in birdie on No. 12 and an eagle conversion from off the green on No. 15. He was admittedly without his best stuff, and when the star-studded group walked off the 16th green with not one or two but three double bogeys, he started to turn the corner.

Scheffler made par on the final two holes of The Green Mile and played his final nine holes in 2 under, highlighted by two circles on his scorecard in the final three holes. He finished in a flurry– as he so often does — thanks to a laser of a long iron into the difficult par-4 finisher on the front nine. Various points in his game lugged him along at various points in his round, but what remained throughout was what continues to serve as his greatest asset — his consistency between the ears.

“Like I said, I don’t make the rules. I deal with what the rules decisions are,” Scheffler said. “I could have let that bother me today when you got a mud ball and it cost me a couple shots. It cost me possibly two shots on one hole, and if I let that bother me, it could cost me five shots the rest of the round. But today, I was proud of how I stayed in there, didn’t let it get to me and was able to play some solid golf on a day in which I was a bit all over the place and still post a score.”

Rough start may not be that rough

Well, Rory McIlroy made an early double bogey like he did at the Masters, so he may well be in major championship form. Hitting only four fairways and getting quite lucky at some stages — mainly the par-5 15th — McIlroy fired an opening 74, which makes for his fourth-worst round at Quail Hollow in his career, which includes four wins at this course. As for his 6 on the par-4 16th, that was McIlroy’s first double bogey in Charlotte across nearly a decade and a half.

McIlroy began last month’s Masters seven strokes off the pace set by Justin Rose, and he begins this PGA Championship 10 strokes off the pace set by Jhonattan Vegas. While parallels can be drawn, those opening efforts were hardly the same as he was mainly sharp at Augusta National (and he was mainly loose at Quail Hollow).

The good news? Despite hitting his driver poorly, despite hitting his irons loose, despite missing short putts and despite struggling around the green at times, McIlroy was only one stroke worse than the field average. He is only five strokes behind the betting favorite (Scheffler), and he gets to look him in the eyes Friday as they again share a second-round tee time.

Playing Captain(s)?

How’s this for a cool nugget? The only time that both sitting Ryder Cup captains were among the top 10 at the conclusion of a major championship round during a Ryder Cup year was at the 1937 Open (Walter Hagen, Charles Whitcombe). Now Hagen and Whitcombe have company because Keegan Bradley played his way into contention, but even more surprisingly, so did former world No. 1 Luke Donald.

Donald not only shot 4 under — his lowest first round in a major since 2004 — he did so without a dropping a shot, which made him the only man in this field to not put a square on his scorecard Thursday. While Bradley is still considered a top-20 player in the world and has been surrounded by thoughts of possibly serving as a playing captain, Donald has geared up for his second stint as the lead man for the Europeans. Coincidentally, it was Donald was who the head man among the Europeans on this leaderboard.

“I’m just going to [send him a text message], I’ll give [Luke Donald] a little shit,” Bradley said. “I’ll tell him how happy I am for him to play like that, and to come out — you know, I don’t know when the last time he played in a major was. Well, he played here last year. But to come out here and shoot 4-under on the first day on this course is impressive.”

Banging along

Bryson DeChambeau was the most popular selection to win this tournament by a wide margin, and early on, it didn’t look great. Still, Bryson hung tough as he so often does on this stage. Fighting some distance control issues with his irons in the first portion of his round, the U.S. Open champion turned in 1 over and leaned on his putter on the back nine.

DeChambeau rolled in a couple birdies from that 10 to 15 foot range — which he was 64% in his last eight rounds at Quail Hollow entering the week — before dialing in the correct number on the difficult par-3 17th. Giving away his near ace with a bogey on the final hole, which happened to the best of them, DeChambeau danced into the clubhouse at even par and in the same position where he entered the week — right Scheffler on the odds board.

Leaderboard gravity

For the second time since 1994, there are no players inside the top 10 of the leaderboard at the end of a round who are ranked inside the top 10 of the Official World Golf Rankings. It’s an eclectic bunch, an island of misfit toys, a smorgasbord filled with flavors from just about every corner of the globe. A United Nations convention has broken out.

Will it last? There may not be a name on the first page of the leaderboard that draws fear into the eyes of the competitors, but there are more than plenty not too far behind. Scheffler, Viktor Hovland, Jon Rahm, Collin Morikawa, Ludvig Åberg and DeChambeau are all at even par or better. They all remain in the picture to hoist the Wanamaker Trophy.

The Green Mile

There was plenty of rain and there were plenty of opinions, but there’s no use in denying Quail Hollow showed its teeth Thursday. The golf course played to an average of just about 2 over, and that was largely due to a handful of holes including the infamous Green Mile. The three-hole ending stretch yielded just 29 birdies against 194 bogeys and 27 double bogeys or worse. No. 16 played as the most difficult hole on the golf course and the par-3 17th was not far behind.

The Cake Zone

One last note on the Mud Ball Mahem (TM) that took place Thursday was Schauffele’s description of the conditions moving forward. Referring to the way in which the fairways will dry, the defending champion labeled it as a “perfect cake zone” more conducive for — let’s just call them — unlucky breaks.

“The mud balls are going to get worse. That wasn’t your question, but they’re going to get worse as the plays dries up,” Schauffele said. “They’re going to get in that perfect cake zone to where it’s kind of muddy underneath and then picking up mud on the way through. I mean, you just keep — I don’t know, maybe it hit it a little bit lower off the tee, but then unfortunately the problem with hitting it low off the tee is the ball doesn’t carry or roll anywhere, so then you sacrifice distance. It’s a bit of a crapshoot. A lot of the same. If I can keep hitting the driver in the fairway, I’ll be fine.”