For most pros, missing a cut stings—but for Chase Koepka, the real victory is simply being able to hold a golf club again. Just fifteen months ago, a debilitating shoulder injury left him struggling to squeeze his left hand, casting doubt on his career and fueling quiet thoughts of walking away. Fast forward to early 2025: he’s back in action, grinding through mini-tour returns and Monday qualifiers, driven by a fierce comeback spirit—and the unwavering support of the one person most acquainted with injury rehab: his older brother, five-time major champion Brooks Koepka. Koepka owed his brother when he was going through a debilitating shoulder injury, which almost sidelined his career, with dark thoughts like giving up on golf looming in his mind.

It was back in April 2023 when his shoulder first began to bother him while he was competing in Singapore on the LIV Tour. At the time, Koepka didn’t pay much attention to the seriousness of this injury, calling it “a torn nerve or whatever.” He went on to play eight more events that year. As expected, the injury worsened, causing shooting pain from his neck down to his arm.

“…The amount of pain that I was going through every day, it didn’t seem like, until I got my surgery, that there was a light at the end of the tunnel,” he recently told Golfweek.

This was Koepka’s first season with LIV, and his performance was not exactly gold standard. He had one top-25 finish and a string of results near the relegation zone. With a spree of such underwhelming performances, the American was relegated from LIV Golf, which forced him to take some time off from the sport and undergo surgery in 2024. It was during this that he thought he would not be coming back.

“I obviously had come off a really tough year, and you know, I just really just didn’t want my career to end like that.”

And he didn’t because he had a good support system, and a big part of getting through those months was the support of his older brother, Brooks Koepka. The 5-time major champion didn’t let his brother sink into a negative mindset.

“In that time, [Brooks] was just trying to stay positive, in good spirits until I had my surgery, but once I was kind of getting ready to have my surgery, he was like, ‘You just got to work your tail off,’” Koepka shared.

This wasn’t just an empty motivation. Brooks himself had been through multiple injuries throughout his career, and he turned out to be a firsthand archive of knowledge on which Koepka leaned. Brooks had only 5 words for his brother: “Bust your butt in rehab.”

So, that’s what Koepka did. He busted his butt in rehab for four long months — relearning how to grip objects, regaining the ability. “I had to learn how to hold stuff in my hand again and be able to squeeze with my left hand.”

And as they say, hard work pays off: By early 2025, Brooks was back on the circuit. First the Asian Tour, then the International Series India, where he finished T8 amidst elites like Bryson DeChambeau and Joaquin Niemann. And just two weeks ago, he was chasing Monday qualifiers for the Korn Ferry Tour, where he won one of two KFT, firing a 7-under 65, which earned him a spot at the Pinnacle Bank Championship in Omaha.

The first call he got after qualifying was obviously from Lefty. “Usually, I have to call him to get in touch with him, but he called me and just told me congrats,” Chase added.

Their bond, forged on childhood courts and fairways, runs deeper than golf. As WPTV recounts, the Koepka brothers grew up competing for everything, “Him and I, we would just go battle it out all day every day, whether it was for a Coke or something like that,” Chase said.

Chase’s plan now is to keep playing well enough to earn his way back onto bigger stages, with Q-School for the DP World Tour in his sights later this year. But whether he wins or not, he’s already proven he can fight his way back — with a little help from the guy who’s been there before.

Brooks Koepka’s career-threatening injury

Brooks Koepka’s career has not been short on struggles, and some of that comes from fighting through injuries that could’ve ended lesser players’ runs. The most infamous incident dates back to late 2017, when a partially torn tendon in his left wrist made him sit for roughly 15 weeks. On the surface, it looked like a straightforward injury, but that wasn’t the case. The ligaments that hold the tendon in place had deteriorated significantly. Brooks had to spend two months in a soft cast, went 91 days without touching a club, and had to rebuild his game from scratch, just like Chase Koepka is doing right now.

But this wasn’t the sole incident. A few years later, in 2020, a torn patellar tendon in his left knee presented another off-syllabus test to him. The damage kept worsening, ultimately affecting his hip with a torn labrum.

“There was a period of about two months where I questioned whether I was ever going to be the same, whether I was even going to be somewhat remotely the same golfer that I ever was,” he told Sky Sports in 2021.

By the time Northern Trust rolled around, Brooks had no choice but to shut down the season early. This injury was significant as it hampered his swing and overall form well into 2021, forcing him to change his training techniques. Needless to say, this indeed helped, as Brooks finished T2 at the 2021 PGA Championship, then went on to win the tournament two years later.

Brooks’s resilience through those injuries set the blueprint for how to come back stronger, something he’s now passing on to his brother Chase, as he is fighting for his return.