Scottie Scheffler could hit it better than almost anyone alive. Laser-like irons. Flawless tee shots. Fairways and greens on repeat. But in 2023, none of that mattered much if his putter refused to cooperate.
It wasn’t just a minor slump. It was the kind of stretch that messes with your head. “I don’t think I’m doing well,” he told a close friend during a dinner conversation — a raw, honest admission from a guy known for being rock-solid mentally.
That year, he ranked 145th in Strokes Gained: Putting. He lost strokes to the field nearly every round. Even after putting up one of the best ball-striking seasons in PGA Tour history — seventh-lowest adjusted scoring average ever — his putting was so shaky that it cost him the Tour Championship despite a ten-shot head start.
Something had to give.
The Turning Point: Admitting It Was Time for Help
On the flight home from East Lake, Scheffler turned to his agent and said what most pros don’t like to say out loud: “I want to see a putting coach.”
That was a big deal.
For 27 years, he’d only ever worked with one coach — Randy Smith. But now he was ready for fresh eyes. Enter Phil Kenyon.
Scheffler had been quietly watching Kenyon coach other players and liked what he saw. “I could tell he was open-minded,” Scheffler said. “And that’s the type of people I like to work with.”
Within three days, Kenyon was in Dallas, rolling putts with one of the best ball-strikers on the planet — a ball-striker who couldn’t buy a birdie.
What Changed? (It Wasn’t Just the Coach)
Kenyon didn’t promise quick fixes. He helped Scheffler make technical changes at the end of 2023, but the real magic happened in early 2024. Less mechanical thinking, more instinct. Less “how do I stroke it?” and more “just let it go.”
Then came the gear shift.
At the 2024 Arnold Palmer Invitational, Scheffler put his longtime blade putter back in the bag and went with something completely different — a TaylorMade Spider mallet. That switch dropped his putts per round from 29.2 to 28.1 almost immediately.
It might sound like a small change. But if you’ve ever switched from blade to mallet, you know it feels like learning how to write with your other hand — until it works.
A New Grip for a New Season
In December 2024, Scheffler took another leap: the claw grip.
He tested it at the Hero World Challenge and liked what he felt. “You can practice and practice and do all the stuff at home,” he explained, “but there’s just something different about being in competition.”
That claw grip gave him even more control — and maybe more importantly, confidence. It’s one thing to tinker on the practice green. It’s another to do it when there’s a jacket on the line.
Bay Hill and Augusta: The Payoff
Then came the breakthrough.
At Bay Hill, during the Arnold Palmer Invitational, Scheffler didn’t miss a single putt inside 15 feet on the weekend. Not one. He holed all 16 of his looks inside 10 feet in the final round. No bogeys. Just a clean, clinical 66 — the best score of the day.
Suddenly, he wasn’t just “that guy who stripes it.” He was dangerous.
At the 2024 Masters, he went from last in the field in putting the previous year to second overall. He used just 109 putts over four rounds — one fewer than when he won in 2022.
Even Rory McIlroy took notice: “We knew if he started to hole putts, then this sort of stuff would happen.”
Wyndham Clark put it more bluntly: “It would be borderline unfair if he starts putting really good.”
From Achilles Heel to Legit Weapon
The data backs it up. Scheffler climbed from 162nd in putting stats in 2023 to 77th in 2024. He led the tour in putting average. He one-putted 42% of the time.
The difference? He stopped trying to be perfect and just let it roll.
Sure, he still has off days. At the 2025 Waste Management Phoenix Open, he lost 0.19 strokes on the greens and made just one putt over ten feet in the second round. But those bad putting days don’t define him anymore — they’re just normal fluctuations.
Scheffler said it best: “Part of the problem is just trying too hard… It’s not like I’ve been a bad putter my whole career. I’ve just gone through a stretch where it’s been tough.”
And that’s what makes this turnaround so relatable — especially if you’ve stood over a short putt knowing full well what’s about to happen, and hating it anyway.
Scheffler didn’t wait for things to magically fix themselves. He got help, switched his setup, adjusted his grip, and gave himself space to feel uncomfortable while figuring it out.
So, if your own putting’s been a horror show lately? Maybe it’s time to take a page from Scheffler’s playbook — and finally give that mallet putter in the pro shop a second look.