Scottie Scheffler won the Memorial Tournament on Sunday for the second consecutive year, and Jack Nicklaus made some brutally honest comments about other players in the field while praising the No. 1 golfer in the world.
Nicklaus, who founded the Memorial Tournament at Muirfield Village Golf Club in Dublin, Ohio, spoke with the media on Sunday shortly after Scheffler’s win. The 18-time major champion essentially came out and said what everyone who watched his tournament was thinking, which is that none of the players who were near the top of the leaderboard had a chance to get the best of Scheffler.
Nicklaus said the other golfers in contention during the final round were “nice players” but not in Scheffler’s league.
“Great players are ones who rise to the occasion and ones who know how to play coming down the stretch at important events,” Nicklaus said. “Looking at the leaderboard today, he didn’t have … Ben Griffin’s a nice player. Sepp Straka’s a nice player. Nick Taylor’s a nice player. Those are all the guys who were there, basically, coming down the stretch. (Scheffler) knows that those guys are not in his league.
“If he had somebody else at the top, Xander (Schauffele) or somebody like him, he might have said, ‘Well that might be a little tougher, I might have to do something.’ He didn’t have to.”
"Ben Griffin's a nice player, Sepp Straka is a nice player, Nick Taylor is a nice player … [Scottie Scheffler] knows those guys are not in his league."
— GOLF.com (@GOLF_com) June 2, 2025
Jack Nicklaus did not hold back. pic.twitter.com/jgZbeNJU74
Everything Nicklaus said was accurate, even if it sounded harsh. Scheffler probably would have felt a lot more pressure had it been Schauffele, Rory McIlroy, Jordan Spieth or another experienced winner breathing down his neck.
McIlroy, of course, chose not to play in the Memorial. Nicklaus also had some very candid remarks about that, so the 85-year-old was definitely in an honest mood while hosting his annual tournament.
