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Image Courtesy: IMAGO
Imago
Image Courtesy: IMAGO
Nine days ago, Viktor Hovland questioned Brooks Koepka’s frictionless return to the PGA Tour, wondering aloud what precedent the decision sets for future defectors. Now at TPC Scottsdale, Koepka faced another politically loaded question during his WM Phoenix Open press conference—and deployed the same deflection template he established at Farmers Insurance Open. The pattern is becoming visible.
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A reporter asked Koepka directly about the optics of the moment: the defending Phoenix Open champion, Thomas Detry, was currently leading a tournament in Riyadh while the PGA Tour event unfolded without him. Does that amplify the divide between tours, the reporter wondered, or is it something Koepka simply tunes out week-to-week? Koepka’s response carried the precision of rehearsal. Acknowledge the question. Refuse the substance. Pivot to personal focus. Invoke Scottie Scheffler. Close with self-deprecation.
“I’m just focused on myself. I’m focused on how I can go play the best golf over the next four days. I’m not focused on anybody else,” Koepka said. “I think—it’s a very boring answer, but it’s true. I can only do what I can do. If I do that, the best, I mean, I think Scottie is a perfect example of that right now.”
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LAS VEGAS, NV – OCTOBER 08: Brooks Koepka walks off the ninth hole green after completing his second round of the Shriners Childrens Open on October 8, 2021 at TPC Summerlin in Las Vegas, NV. Photo by Matthew Bolt/Icon Sportswire GOLF: OCT 08 PGA, Golf Herren – Shriners Children s Open Icon21100810653
The Scheffler invocation wasn’t accidental. The world No. 1 has become golf’s default reference point for blocking out noise, and Koepka knows it. Citing Scheffler transforms a non-answer into something that sounds almost principled—a redirection wrapped in competitive wisdom rather than political evasion. You can’t argue with results, and Scheffler has more of them than anyone right now.
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At the Farmers Insurance Open, Koepka told reporters he didn’t want to discuss tour politics. Nine days later, the strategy remains unchanged. The “boring but true” line functions as a rhetorical door closing behind him, a phrase designed to make follow-up questions feel redundant before they’re even asked.
Scottie Scheffler himself addressed returning LIV players at the same Phoenix Open press conference, offering his own measured take on Koepka and Patrick Reed rejoining the tour. His reasoning centered on competition rather than politics. He wants the best players teeing it up together, and he framed their return as “another step towards us just being able to play golf again.”
The contrast reveals something about how players navigate this moment. Scheffler, untouched by the LIV controversy, can afford to speak freely about welcoming returning players. Koepka, who spent three years on the Saudi-backed circuit before applying for reinstatement under the Returning Member Program, cannot. Every word carries weight when you’re the one who left and came back.
The reporter’s question, though, wasn’t hypothetical. And that’s what made it land.
Thomas Detry’s WM Phoenix Open absence crystallizes the PGA Tour–LIV Divide
Detry won the 2025 WM Phoenix Open at 24-under par, finishing seven strokes clear of Michael Kim and Daniel Berger in one of the most dominant performances the tournament had seen in years. He joined LIV Golf in January 2026, and now finds himself competing in Riyadh during the same week he should have been defending his title at TPC Scottsdale.
The symbolism writes itself. A defending champion halfway around the world while his tournament proceeds without him—that’s the tour divide made concrete, stripped of abstraction and talking points. Detry’s absence doesn’t require commentary. It simply exists as evidence.
Koepka didn’t take the bait. He kept his focus narrow and his answers narrower, treating the political dimension as something that belonged to someone else’s press conference. Whether that strategy holds through the season remains uncertain. Hovland has already expressed skepticism about returning players facing minimal consequences. Hideki Matsuyama has wondered publicly why the tour didn’t communicate its reinstatement plans to players beforehand.
The scrutiny isn’t going away. But for now, at TPC Scottsdale, Koepka has his template. Boring but true.