Matthew Wolff saw what his Smash GC captain Brooks Koepka had to say about his work ethic and attitude, and he responded with a lengthy statement to Sports Illustrated on Friday.
“I read the SI interview with our Captain Brooks Koepka and it was beyond disappointing to me. When I chose to join his Team in 2023, I did so with much optimism about my new home as part of Team Smash and equally as important the chance to be around and learn from a player of Brooks’s stature. Like everyone who has ever played the game at the highest level, I have had competitive moments in the past that I feel I have let myself down and even others in our new team environment. This has been quite difficult for me. My challenges on and off the golf course with my mental health has been well documented. I deal with those challenges every day.”
“However, while my 2023 season has not been all I had hoped for to this point, I have made positive strides in managing my life and feel Ike my game is turning for the positive. To hear through the media that our team leader has given up on me is heartbreaking. It’s not what a team member looks to hear from its leader, and I think we all know these comments should have been handled much differently. But I’m moving forward and won’t ever give up on myself. While on course results may not appear now to be positive indicators, I’m trying to win an even BIGGER game with my life.
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“Finally, I trust Brooks wants what is best for our team. But it’s hard to imagine his comments in his recent SI interview in any way line up with those priorities. This will be my last comment on this matter. I’m heading out today to the Centurion Club trying to help our team win this week. I appreciate everyone’s continued support and your respect for my privacy.”
Koepka told SI earlier this week before the LIV Golf London event at the Centurion Golf Club in Hertfordshire, England, that he had “basically given up” on Wolff and that the 24-year-old former winner on the PGA Tour was wasting his talent.
“I mean, when you quit on your round, you give up and stuff like that, that’s not competing,” Koepka said. “I’m not a big fan of that. You don’t work hard. It’s very tough. It’s very tough to have even like a team dynamic when you’ve got one guy that won’t work, one guy is not going to give any effort, he’s going to quit on the course, break clubs, gets down, bad body language, it’s very tough. I’ve basically given up on him—a lot of talent, but I mean the talent’s wasted.”
Wolff joined Koepka’s team before this season and was a player that many teams had their eye on after LIV’s debut eight-event season in 2022. The 2019 3M Open winner finished T-7, T-10, T-5 to start the season, but has since been on the bottom half of the leaderboard with finishes of T-44, T-41, T-30, WD and 44th (friendly reminder that LIV events only have 48 players).
Wolff withdrew before the final round of LIV’s event near Washington, D.C. back in May and was subsequently scraped from Smash GC’s social media accounts. So far this season Wolff has earned $2,951,667 over eight events and currently ranks higher in LIV’s standings (28) compared to Koepka’s brother, Chase (45).
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