Koepka Says Rivalry With DeChambeau Good For Growing Golf

By PETE IACOBELLI, Associated Press

RIDGELAND, South Carolina — Brooks Koepka insists his ongoing rivalry with fellow major champion Bryson DeChambeau is good for golf.

Koepka, at the inaugural Palmetto Championship, his first event since a video interview outtake at the PGA Championship, showed the four-time major champ rolling his eyes as DeChambeau walked behind him.

The clip was not supposed to be shown, yet it was posted on social media and picked up more than 10 million views before it was removed.

To Koepka, the video put the attention squarely on golf for a social media-savvy generation essential for the game’s growth.

“I get the traditionalists who don’t agree with it. I understand that, but I think to grow the game you’ve got to reach out to the younger generation,” he said. “I don’t want to say that’s what this is, but it’s reaching out to a whole bunch of people. It’s getting golf in front of people. I think it’s good for the game.”

And it didn’t end at the PGA Championship.

After DeChambeau heard heckles of “Brooksie” at the Memorial and a few fans were removed from the Muirfield Village site, Koepka put up a promo video offering free beer from his sponsor to those ejected.

DeChambeau, like Koepka, thought a “good, jesting rivalry is good for the game of golf.”

Koepka, ranked eighth in the world, explained that he felt DeChambeau was being loud as he walked past the interview site at the Ocean Course.

DeChambeau didn’t talk directly to Koepka as he strode past. “He was saying something about how he hit a perfect shot and it shouldn’t have been there,” Koepka recalled. “It was just very, very loud.”

“I just lost train of thought,” he continued, “which I think was pretty obvious.”

When asked if tour officials have talked to him about the feud, Koepka said he regularly speaks with the PGA TOUR about everything happening in golf.