Bryson DeChambeau did not play well in the first round of The Open Championship at Royal St. George’s on Thursday, and the long hitter says his driver was a big reason for that.
After he shot a 1-over 71 in the opening round, DeChambeau bluntly told reporters that the current driver he is using “sucks.”
"The driver SUCKS"
No holding back from @b_dechambeau on his golf today at #TheOpen pic.twitter.com/T39wWG17wb
— The Open (@TheOpen) July 15, 2021
“If I can hit it down the middle of the fairway, that’s great. But, again, with the driver right now, the driver sucks,” DeChambeau said. “It’s not a good face for me and we’re still trying to figure out how to make it good on the mishits.”
Cobra is DeChambeau’s club sponsor. He uses a custom Cobra Radspeed driver that is 46 inches long and has a 5-degree loft. Most drivers that are available in stores have a loft of 8.5 degrees or greater.
Golfweek’s David Dusek reached out to Cobra tour operations manager Ben Schomin about DeChembeau’s remarks, and Schomin did not mince words. He said everybody at Cobra is working extremely hard to make DeChambeau happy and that it is “really painful when he says something that stupid.”
Schomin added that DeChambeau has “never really been happy, ever” and that his incredibly high swing speed magnifies his mishits. He also said DeChambeau knows how hard everyone at Cobra works for him and compared the US Open champion to a child.
“It’s like an 8-year-old that gets mad at you,” he said. “They might fly off the handle and say, ‘I hate you.’ But then you go. ‘Whoa, no you don’t.’ … He didn’t really mean to say it that harshly. He knows how much everyone bends over backwards for him, but it’s still not cool.”
You can understand why Cobra executives would be unhappy with DeChambeau’s criticism. They pay him millions of dollars in endorsement money, and it’s a terrible look to have one of their biggest partners trashing their product on a huge stage. Of course, we know at least one person who is hardly surprised that DeChambeau handled it that way.
