For Scottie Scheffler, Little Goes Right in Short Scottish Open Stay

The world's No. 1 player fired a pair of over-par rounds while attempting to better understand the ways of links golf in advance of next week's British Open.

NORTH BERWICK, Scotland — Scotland, known for its haggis and shortbread, can have a mean disposition when it comes to the county's pasttime. And the first two days of the Scottish Open showed how nasty it can get as The Renaissance Club's links showed little hospitality to Scottie Scheffler, who missed the cut for only the second time this year.

The only other missed cut for Scheffler, the world No. 1 since winning the WGC-Match Play Championship in late March, came at the PGA Championship.

He now head to St. Andrews and next week's British Open still trying to solve the links golf puzzle.

"Definitely learned a lot," Scheffler said of his brief two rounds. "I had some trouble kind of going into the greens, playing the bounce and judging stuff like that. I thought it was going to be firm when it was a little soft, and when I thought it was soft, it was a little firm. Got on the wrong side of things more often than not this week."

Going into next week, Scheffler believes if he can clear up a few things with the putter, he’ll be ready to go.

Scheffler doesn’t like missing the cut, in fact he hates it, and even with the prospect of seeing the Old Course for the first time a little earlier than expected, its still not worth missing the cut.

“Well, today I actually played fine," he said of his 73-72 – 145, 5-over-par performance. "I got a couple of really bad breaks on the front nine. Outside of that, I played fine today. Yesterday was the day where I played just absolutely horrendous. Going into next week, I feel like I'm still in a pretty good spot. A couple things to work on, but I feel like I'm in a good spot.”

Scheffler is not the only one driving over the Forth Bridge from East Lothian to Fife early.

In a field that included 14 of the top 15 in the world — Rory McIlroy was the only absentee — seven missed the cut. The seven included Scheffler, reigning British Open champion Colin Morikawa, PGA champion Justin Thomas, Viktor Hovland, Will Zalatoris, Hideki Matsuyama and Billy Horschel.

One thing Scheffler got right this week was being on the right side of the draw. In his last two majors, the Masters champion was on the wrong side — missing the cut at the PGA and tying for second at the U.S. Open. 

“Sometimes you're on the right side of the draw and sometimes you're on the wrong one and this week I just kind of got on the wrong end of things," he said. "And without holing any really long putts, it's not easy to make birdies when the wind is blowing 25 miles an hour going out today. Yesterday was just a day like 'What are you doing out here Dude?'”