Wyndham Clark on the 18th hole on the final day of the U.S. Open.
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Jordan Spieth knows by now, of course, he’s playing this week in Silvis, Illinois.
But if he needed confirmation, he believes the sights and sounds could also tell him where he was.
“When you are in the Midwest, you know you’re in the Midwest,” Spieth said.
“It’s always felt that way here.”
The thought came up Tuesday, a couple of days before the PGA Tour’s John Deere Classic, but no, Spieth wasn’t speaking on behalf of the local chamber of commerce. Crowd behavior, after a string of recent incidents, has become a renewed subject in pro golf. Last September, fans turned hostile toward the European team at the Ryder Cup on Long Island, N.Y. In March, fans shouted toward Englishman Matt Fitzpatrick as he battled American Cameron Young at the Players Championship — then did so again a month later as Fitzpatrick played with American Scottie Scheffler at the RBC Heritage in South Carolina.
The issue then furthered two weeks ago at the U.S. Open at Shinnecock Hills Golf Club on Long Island, though this time, the distaste was directed at an American, Wyndham Clark. In the time since, theories have been talked about as to why, and Tuesday, Spieth said he thinks one activity may be at fault — and that it may need “to be tackled here soon.”
Gambling.
He then got specific. Entering the final round, Clark had led by six shots before winning.
“I don’t know how much of, say, the Wyndham scenario,” Spieth said, “was the fact that it was enticing to bet the field verse Wyndham on Sunday in a legalized betting state, and you could have had people out there that are essentially, you know, have $100 to $10,000, depending on who it is, on the field versus somebody else.
“In golf it’s tricky because you could actually impact the outcome if you wanted to. It may not last very long, but you could impact a shot if you wanted to. I don’t know of another sport that you could impact as a fan like you can golf. So I don’t know how much that’s having to do with it, if it’s different than it used to be.”
Notably, Spieth is a spokesman for FanDuel, a sportsbook, and the PGA Tour promotes betting on its website and broadcasts. Spieth also said he’s played with players who were not treated well as far back as “10, 15 years ago” — and it was just over eight years ago when the federal ban on sports gambling was struck down by the Supreme Court, making it easier for bets to be placed. The PGA Tour also has fan-betting protocols in place. In March, GOLF.com’s Sean Zak reported that the PGA Tour had recently issued new guidelines to its players on how to report gambling-related harassment, and that the tour has started training its volunteers to stand in the middle of a crowd to better identify potential issues.
“You have to understand that we’re not immune to it,” Andy Levinson, SVP of Tournament Administration at the Tour, told GOLF.com. “We’re not immune to the potential for corruption, we’re not immune to bad actors, all that. That exists and that threat is always gonna be there. So the first and foremost thing is, everything we do in this space is integrity first.”
As to why Clark was booed, other thoughts have also been raised. After he won the Open, Clark said “some of it’s self-deserved; I kind of brought it on myself” — which was seemingly a reference to several incidents, among them being Clark smashing a locker at Oakmont Country club following a missed cut at last year’s U.S. Open. This year, Clark was also playing the final round with Scheffler, who was going for the career grand slam on his birthday and Father’s Day. In his press conference afterward, Scheffler also said New Yorkers are “tough people.”
“I think sometimes it can get a little too much when, you know, balls are kind of going off greens and you start hearing cheers,” Scheffler said. “That felt a bit much to me. But at the end of the day, I can’t control fan behavior. Being in the arena is not for everybody. You know, there’s been crowds that have been for me in my career; there’s been crowds that have been significantly against me in my career. …
“Being in the arena is not for everybody, and I think it shows a lot about Wyndham, how he handled not only this golf course but I think the crowd today as well and is a well-deserving champion.”
On Tuesday, Spieth also said the dislike toward Fitzpatrick at the Players and the RBC may have stemmed from last year’s Ryder Cup. “Maybe a lingering effect from that with an American versus European,” he said. “You know, Cam Young, Fitzpatrick, the Players. I’m trying to single them out for you, but I wasn’t a part of either one of them.”
But in most cases over the past five years, he said, poor fan behavior has come from bets.
Nick Piastowski is a Senior Editor at Golf.com and Golf Magazine. In his role, he is responsible for editing, writing and developing stories across the golf space. And when he’s not writing about ways to hit the golf ball farther and straighter, the Milwaukee native is probably playing the game, hitting the ball left, right and short, and drinking a cold beer to wash away his score. You can reach out to him about any of these topics — his stories, his game or his beers — at nick.piastowski@golf.com.
