Bryson DeChambau comes into this PGA Championship looking for his first major outside of the U.S. Open, but he has become a name to watch at every major since his move to LIV Golf.
Before golf’s long-drive champ jumped to the Saudi-backed tour in June 2022, DeChambeau had just two top 10 finishes in 22 major starts including his 2020 U.S. Open title at Winged Foot.
Since the move to LIV, however, DeChambeau has been a consistent force at the biggest events. He has six top 10s in 11 events during that time, including a victory at Pinehurst at the 2024 U.S. Open.
Part of that, of course, is that DeChambeau is in the prime of his career. However, he has also undergone a massive personality change during his time at LIV.
The 31-year-old used to be a ‘nerdy’ guy who optimized everything about his game to the nth degree — almost like a science-based gym rat in professional golf.
In the last few years, DeChambeau has become a fan favorite. He fires up crowds at every opportunity and is one of the more personable players in the sport. Golf fans follow him and chant his name wherever he goes.
That change could be the reason why he is able to play his best when it matters most.
“I think more than anything — I think what helped him was I think he has figured out — he’s grown as a human, it seems to me,” ESPN’s Scott Van Pelt said on a media call ahead of the PGA Championship. “Last year he came and sat down in the Butler Cabin with me on Thursday and Friday, and he’s been sort of this — he’s played very different characters in a movie. It’s almost like he’s been many different versions of himself.
“And when he sat and visited with me last year, I just remarked to a number of people, he just seems like a different guy. He seems more at ease with himself. I don’t know if it’s the Tour he plays, I don’t know if it’s just part of growing up, which is part of all of our lives, but he seemed comfortable, entirely comfortable with himself.”
DeChambeau thrives off of that fanfare at this point. At seemingly every major tournament, he has an electric moment with the crowd on the course.
At the 2024 Masters, his hole-out from the fairway on No. 18 lit the Augusta National patrons ablaze. In 2025, he closed his third round with an incredible birdie putt to move into the final pairing on Sunday.
The old DeChambeau may have just tipped his cap and strolled in to sign his card, but not this one. The California native roared and stampeded around the green, high-fiving just about everyone in sight.
DeChambeau rode that fuel from the fans to one of the iconic moments in golf history last June at Pinehurst, when he got up and down from a bunker about 50 yards short of the green to win the U.S. Open by one shot over Rory McIlroy.
That made him even more of a cult hero among golf fans everywhere.
“I think that changed him as much as anything,” Van Pelt said. “The adulation he received from the people at the U.S. Open I think is what opened his eyes to, wow, people really are on my side, and that’s what I noticed anyway. That seems to be as much as anything what I think has propelled him to where he is at the moment.”
Those fans will be cheering his name again at Quail Hollow, where he will be one of the favorites to lift the Wanamaker at a course that rewards big bombers off the tee.
DeChambeau is the best of the best at that, and he will have every chance to set the golf world on fire with another top-class performance at a major with everyone watching.
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