Scheffler and Schauffele – two golfers expected to slay the 2025 season. But, health had other plans since 2024 Xmas. While Scottie tags his as a silly accident (which it kind of was?), the latter follows a different thought process. He said, “I feel like I haven’t entered my prime yet, but I feel older, no doubt.” Cool, cool, cool. Making us smile before shaking up our confidence. The expectation from then World No. 2 skyrocketed, but the unfortunate injury struggle has haunted the golfer’s most anticipated season. After starting the 2025 schedule with The Sentry, he was placed at T30. Then, he withdrew from the event, citing a rib injury.

Then, it was time for a comeback. After missing many events, he ended unsatisfactorily with a T40 placement at the Arnold Palmer Invitational. For The PLAYERS Championship, he just made it through the cut and ended up in 72nd place. Until now, he could only get 6 below-par rounds, while the remaining six were sub-par, even having the highest score of 81.

With the bad finishes, the worry for his Masters appearance continues. Recently, during the press conference of the Valspar Championship, the golfer was asked about his injury and performance. “There’s also no rehab starts in golf, right? You can’t go down to the minor leagues and work it out.” Schauffele has only featured at the main events, including two signature events. The golfer answered with a blunt truth. He said, “Yeah, I mean, based on how I played I think I would have gotten my bu– kicked over there, too. So it’s fine. Sometimes you just got to, you show up and see what you got and I’ve been doing that.” Well, the pro has relied on just participating. In the last two events, the best score for the round was 69, which would have been the average if we compared 2024’s Schauffele performance.

When asked if this was his last start before the Masters, he said that people around would prefer it to be so. Admitting he needs to knock off the rust, he knows that Augusta demands sharp form, and he’d rather ride momentum than wing it—leaving marathon schedules to the rare few who can run hot all year. Lately, he’s even been a bit too harsh on his form this season. Until now, only McIlroy has won two events out of the four he participated in. But notably, the performance of Schauffele as compared to any other winner has been below average.

The sub-par finish is a concern that might be reduced with participation. But the problem is a lot bigger as the golfer addressed it after his performance at The PLAYERS Championship.

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Xander Schauffele addresses the issue of scoring

After winning two majors in a single year, Xander Schauffele was in contention for the PGA Tour Player of the Year award. But with his current form, it would be tough to even see him near the title. The golfer could achieve the best finish of T30, which was before the injury. Now, T40. But, Schauffele knows what is affecting his performance and how to work on it.

After the performance at the Players, he was asked, “What’s keeping you from scoring?” On that, he said, “Everything….Not hitting it close enough, to duffing chips, to missing every fairway, to hitting fairways to missing greens. It’s pretty gross, to be completely honest. So if I can eke out this cut, that would be nice. But the game feels pretty bad.” The two-time major winner in his last appearance could only achieve a driving accuracy of 46.4%, with 55% green in regulation. His injury-free GIR was 84.7% with a driving accuracy of 53%.

Though he called out the health barrier, there’s another comeback on the way. Not to add pressure or anything, but he just might get the accuracy back.  Will he be able to make a comeback with the adverse weather conditions at the Valspar Championship? What are your predictions on his performance? Share with us in the comments below.