In 2-minute, emotional interview, pro shares the tough side of golf

NORTH BERWICK, Scotland — The scoring room at the Genesis Scottish Open sits on the front side of the clubhouse at Renaissance Club. It has multiple sets of doors — one to enter and submit your score for the day, and another on the opposite side: a shortcut to the flash area. 

What is the flash area? Flash is short for flash interviews — aka where members of the media are waiting for a few minutes of your time. Only a handful of players use those second doors this week. Most often it’s the players performing best. The Ludvig Åberg types. The 24-year-old Swede used his flash time Friday to talk about his 12-under lead and his high school teammates. Or players like Collin Morikawa, who used his flash time to share why he feels awfully comfortable swinging left-handed. But situated right next to the television cameras and radio mics of the flash area is another, less-heralded entity: the Green Room. The Green Room and its golden chair. 

Fans of the DP World Tour are aware by now that in 2024 the tour has pushed its players to share their truest selves in the Green Room, a studio located right outside the scoring area, following a round. At times, it comes after a difficult round, a missed cut, perhaps 10 minutes after a finishing double bogey. Players are left to their own devices in that room, sitting in that golden chair and staring into a camera. The door is shut behind them. 

The questions are simple, and mostly therapeutic, but the entire platform seems to pull something out of pros we may not normally get otherwise. That should tell us something. The most simple questions can often deliver the most telling answers. Our most recent example came Friday, when Matt Wallace was brought in to the Green Room. 

“Oh, dear,” Wallace said as he plopped down to get comfortable. 

A bit notorious for being an emotional player (and person, as he acknowledged!), Wallace played the final two holes of his tournament bogey-bogey. He had needed to play them one under to make the weekend, but a bad tee ball on the 8th set him up for failure. He promptly three-putted from 7 feet on No. 9. 

“Is this your first time here?” went the first question, delivered by a computer-generated voiceover. 

“First time,” Wallace said. “Pretty terrible, straight after signing my card. Didn’t realize it was this quick that they come in here. Yeah, I’m pretty gutted.”

It was a weird finish to the action Friday. For much of the afternoon, it appeared the cut line would be at four under, but due to some late bogeys by the afternoon wave, the cut line moved to three under, ensuring a number of players two more rounds in what amounts to a big tournament on the DPWT season. It being a co-sanctioned event, there’s an important lot of FedEx Cup and Race to Dubai points on offer. Wallace had shot 68 in the first round but played his way out of the weekend with a second-round 72. 

“What would you like to get off your chest?” went the second question. 

“I’m trying to change my attitude toward the game a little bit, by being a bit more positive about it,” Wallace said, wiping his brow. “I just lack a load of self confidence at the moment.”

He paused for a beat and an exhale. 

“Yeah, it’s hard.” 

It is hard. The field of 156 was playing for top 60 and ties. Sam Stevens, who was surprised to make the cut on the number, found himself cheery as ever late Friday night, playing some extra golf at North Berwick, the golf course down the street. That’s what happens on the other side of the cut. Life is good. For Wallace, in that moment, life couldn’t have felt good. 

“Do you want to talk about how you’re feeling?” went the third Green Room question. “What’s going through your mind?”

“I’m just not where I want to be, you know, in the game” Wallace replied, with a noticeable crack in his voice. “You can’t force it, ya know. You gotta — you gotta roll with the punches and that’s what I’m doing at the moment. So, just working hard every day. Just how it is. The game doesn’t owe you anything, you know. I don’t like to get emotional about it but I’m quite an emotional person, as everyone knows. So yeah, it’s hard.” 

Wallace has had a decent season by most measures. He’s ranked 112th in the FedEx Cup, so a solid finish or two the rest of the fall should secure his PGA Tour card for next year. He finished tied for 17th at the Valspar Championship in March, tied for fourth at the CJ Cup in May, and then followed it with a T20 at the Myrtle Beach Classic a week later. But like all pros, Wallace holds himself to a higher standard than that. And a pro golfer’s existence is almost entirely about reaching for a standard they’ve met once, or meet rarely — always constantly reaching to match what they believe they can achieve, fully aware they won’t often get there. When they crest past age 30 — Wallace is 34 — those thoughts tend to hit even harder. You hear it when Wallace talks about where he wants to be “you know, in the game.” That can mean a lot of things — only he knows. It could be contending for majors, contending for regular events, reaching the top 50 in the FedEx Cup for guaranteed entry to the Signature Events, even some other figurative platform that we wouldn’t understand. Count that among the follow-up questions I’d ask. What do you mean ‘place in the game?’ We’ll have to wait another time for that answer.

“Thank you for opening up to us,” the Green Room voice said, beginning to close the interview. “Is there anything else you’d like to share?”

“No, no, no. I’m grand,” Wallace said. “Everyone knows I’m an emotional person. I try the best I can. Some people don’t like the approach that I have. But I’m always just trying to improve myself and be the best I can. To everyone out there who supports me — we’ll be back, ya know. We’ll get there. So, yeah — thank you.”

And for anyone who might jump on the Wallace bandwagon as a result of that message, he’ll be teeing it up for even more points and money next week at the Open Championship.