LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Unbelievable.
Crazy.
Confused.
News of Scottie Scheffler’s arrest, along with news of an unrelated fatal accident that shortly preceded it, was at the top of minds of fans entering Valhalla Golf Club for the PGA Championship on Thursday morning. For some, they were near the scene where, a few hours earlier, a vendor had been killed after being struck by a shuttle bus, and where, shortly afterward, Scheffler was detained by Louisville police after he had tried to enter the course, was stopped by an officer and continued driving, causing injury, according to an incident report. He is to face four charges.
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Fans talked to by a GOLF.com reporter, minutes after Scheffler returned to Valhalla for his second round, were both aware of what had happened, and processing it. They were all asked the same question.
“You wake up this morning, try to get out here, you look at ESPN, you see social media, what’s the reaction?”
“It’s unbelievable,” said Steve, from Kansas City, Mo. “Are you kidding me? No. 1 player in the world and he’s in handcuffs?”
“Makes you really wonder what happened, you know?” said his friend, Dennis, also from Kansas City. “What precipitated that dust-up, whatever it was.”
“Crazy,” said Dale, another friend. “Crazy.”
Behind them was Paul, who said he was a lawyer from Michigan.
“You wake up this morning, try to get out here, you look at ESPN, you see social media, what’s the reaction?”
“Well, obviously there’s the tragedy and what’s happened is very sad,” Paul said. “Then there’s the story on Scheffler, which is tough for Scottie.”
“You probably walked right past it. He’s here now. He’s on the range. But …”
“Yeah, I don’t know the circumstances, but it seems to me that the whole situation was someone didn’t know any better. I’m an attorney. I think cooler heads could have prevailed.”
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Toward the fan entrance from the street in front of Valhalla were Lee and Caryn from St. Paul.
“You wake up this morning, try to get out here, you look at ESPN, you see social media, what’s the reaction?”
“Yeah, first we felt terrible,” Lee said. “I mean, prayers to the family who lost a loved one. Had to be traumatic for anyone who witnessed that so certainly prayers to them. And Scottie, that one just seemed hard to believe. I guess a little bit more information coming out now makes sense, but it just seemed, initially anyways, kind of an overreaction. But we’re happy to hear that he was on his way to the course and I think he’s here now.”
On the walk into the fan gate were Sean and Adam from Louisville.
“You wake up this morning, try to get out here, you look at ESPN, you see social media, what’s the reaction?”
“So it was — I’ve never seen anything quite like it at a golf event,” Sean said. “But I guess there’s been resolution — he’s going to play today.”
“Came in about a half-hour ago and he’s on the range.”
“That is incredible,” Sean said. “So my prediction is either he’s going to tank today, or he’s going to have the best round ever. Nothing in between.”
On the course, near the 15th hole, Keenan and Derrick from Kentucky, are just walking in.
“You wake up this morning, try to get out here, you look at ESPN, you see social media, what’s the reaction?”
“I’m still processing it,” Keenan said. “I haven’t really fully processed it. I just heard it 15, 20 minutes ago. So Derek, you’re surprised. I mean, I’m definitely surprised. Super sad. Super unfortunate.”
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“Is that something you guys wake up to, see the alert.”
“No, I actually heard from our driver,” Keenan said. “I guess I hadn’t looked at my phone.”
“Just an Uber driver?”
“Yeah, it was one of my friends who dropped us off,” Keenan said. “And he’s like, you hear about Scottie? What? I was up for like three hours. I guess I didn’t check my phone. And yeah, heard about it and still processing it. Crazy, very unfortunate are my initial thoughts.”
To the left of the 13th hole, Chris and Emma from Columbus, Ohio, are planning their day. They’re here to see Rickie Fowler — Chris is wearing an orange Puma hat — and Viktor Hovland.
“You wake up this morning, try to get out here, you look at ESPN, you see social media, what’s the reaction?”
“We saw it on the way,” Emma said.
“We got a notification that it had been delayed so we were very curious, what is going on?” Chris said. “And then when we saw it was delayed, we stopped at breakfast. And while we were eating breakfast, we saw the ESPN story about it.”
“What was the reaction to that?”
“Well, we first heard it was delayed, we’re like, something went terribly wrong,” Chris said. “We couldn’t believe nobody knew who Scottie Scheffler was.”
“Anybody near the golf course,” Emma said, “should know who he is.”
“The ESPN reporter who was there was telling …”
“This is Scottie Scheffler,” Emma said.
“Very crazy.”
