MEMPHIS — He was watching the TPC Southwind putting green, where Bryson DeChambeau was the only golfer using a ruler as part of his warmup. He followed DeChambeau to the chipping area and then to the driving range, where the crowd gasped each time DeChambeau violently whipped his driver around and hit the ball into the distance, perhaps even beyond the fence nobody else can reach.
And he was there as the gallery swelled around DeChambeau for a 12:30 p.m. tee time Saturday during the third round of the World Golf Championships-FedEx St. Jude Invitational, their phones out to record the longest hitter in the sport.
Heath McGee, 26, had no plans to drive three hours from his home in Cabot, Arkansas, to Memphis this week until DeChambeau made a last-minute commitment. He’s strictly here to follow around the most polarizing golfer on the PGA Tour, and he’s not alone. Nobody in Memphis is drawing a bigger crowd right now than him.
“The media is saying everybody hates him,” McGee said. “That’s not what it looks like out here.”
This is a pro wrestling town, after all, and perhaps this is just the latest example of Memphis showing its appreciation for a good heel. But DeChambeau, 27, is driving the conversation in golf at large, which is just as important as the 350-yard drives that turned him into a spectacle over the past year.
With Tiger Woods out indefinitely, that means he’s the PGA Tour’s most important figure at the moment.
Be it his ignorant stance on the COVID-19 vaccine, or fellow pro golfers chastising him on social media for not yelling “Fore!” on his errant drives, or his made-for-TV feud with Brooks Koepka, or all the gadgets and fancy technological words he brings with him to the course, he is a magnet for attention.
So should golf purists and his fellow colleagues and even his own sponsors really be giving him such a hard time? He’s the only story in golf that consistently breaks through to the mainstream, and that has been an issue for the PGA Tour whenever Woods isn’t playing.
And maybe, because he has been stamped as the bad guy by some, that’s actually adding to his popularity, however divisive he might be.
But it’s bizarre that some golf fans want to stamp him out, almost like a fan of an indie rock band not wanting that group to hit it big. Not every athlete is meant to be a role model.
DeChambeau is keeping his sport relevant as the success of former “next big things” like Jordan Spieth and Rory McIlroy wanes, and Koepka battles through an injured knee that has killed some of his on-course momentum. When did that stop being enough?
In some ways, DeChambeau has become to golf what Donald Trump was initially to politics. He approaches the game so differently, and too often puts his foot in his mouth, that there is no middle ground. But there are plenty of people who support him, who don’t care what he says about vaccines and are emboldened by what other players say about him.
We just hear more often from those who can’t stand him.
“It’s crazy how he can be the most loved and the most hated at the same time,” said Greg Keown, who came to Memphis from Bowling Green, Kentucky, just to watch DeChambeau play. “Even the people who don’t like him want to watch him.”
Bryson DeChambeau reacts to a putt on the third green during the second round of the Open Championship golf tournament. (Photo: Peter van den Berg-USA TODAY Sports)
“I think the Tour needs him,” said Heather Huffman, a WGC-FedEx St. Jude volunteer at TPC Southwind’s No. 3.
“You’ve got to have a villain or an anti-hero,” added Terry Nemec, who followed DeChambeau with his 16-year-old son, Gerrit, a junior on the Brighton High School golf team.
Gerrit was one of several young spectators Saturday wearing a version of DeChambeau’s old-school driving cap that elicits memories of Payne Stewart, but also gives DeChambeau a signature look.
Grown men were wearing them, too, including friends Jordan Volner and John Ross. They followed Koepka on Saturday morning before DeChambeau teed off, hoping that DeChambeau’s nemesis would notice them.
“We’re here to intimidate Koepka,” said Ross, who went on to explain in layman’s terms why they prefer DeChambeau to any other golfer on Tour. “He hits the (crap) out of the ball. That’s relatable.”
He’s also among the top 10 golfers in the world, a major championship winner and will be in contention to win again heading into Sunday’s final round of the WGC-FedEx St. Jude Invitational.
And McGee will be with him again, mostly because of fandom but also because of what happened Thursday, as the hoopla surrounding DeChambeau’s vaccine comments simmered and he avoided reporters.
While following DeChambeau, McGee’s wife met the owner of the house near TPC Southwind in which DeChambeau is staying this week. McGee said they were with DeChambeau for two hours, just a couple of strangers/fans hanging out with golf’s biggest draw. He then took out his phone and showed off a picture of the two of them.
But as he began to discuss what they discussed, he looked up. DeChambeau had hit another booming tee shot and the gallery that dwarfs all the other galleries this week was beginning to move.
“I need to go,” McGee said. “I’m falling behind.”
You can reach Commercial Appeal columnist Mark Giannotto via email at mgiannotto@gannett.com and follow him on Twitter: @mgiannotto
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