Breakfast Ball #84: Yes, It's Him Again

Well folks, we are almost there. This time next week we will have our 6 automatic qualifiers for the European Ryder Cup team.

The build up to the Ryder Cup begins in 2 weeks with a profile of the host course, Bethpage Black.

In This Week’s Newsletter:

Scottie Scheffler’s Domination Continues with Win at the BMW Championship

Scottie Scheffler is relentless. Every single week, regardless of what kind of test is presented to the field, he is in the mix and usually takes over the tournament around halfway through the third round. However, this win wasn’t a simple canter to the finish like most of his victories this season.

Bob MacIntyre began Sunday with a four-shot cushion over Scheffler, but that advantage evaporated very quickly in the Maryland heat. Over the first five holes, MacIntyre stumbled to three over par, fighting his driver and finding just a single fairway on the entire front nine. By the turn, Scheffler had seized the lead.

Yet the door never fully closed. Some of Scheffler’s old putting woes resurfaced on the back nine, keeping MacIntyre within striking distance. A missed four-footer on the 12th and another slip from three feet on the 14th left the lead at just one shot heading into the daunting par-3 17th.

The best way to get over putting struggles? Don’t putt at all. After going over the green, Scheffler made an incredible chip-in to push the lead to two and secure the win.

It was a tough Sunday for Bob MacIntyre, who finished +3 in his final round and could only manage one birdie all day. However, his form will be incredibly encouraging for European onlookers as we move toward the Ryder Cup next month.

Scheffler became the first player since Tiger Woods to win five times in consecutive seasons, and became the fourth player ever to win 12+ PGA Tour titles and 3+ majors in a two year span. The other three? Tiger Woods, Jack Nicklaus, and Arnold Palmer. Decent company.

A Scotsman makes a splash the US Amateur, while Marco Penge wins in Denmark and Rahm captures LIV individual title

When much of modern golf discourse revolves around purses and payouts, amateur golf still stands apart — a stage where the next generation competes not for money, but for pride and legacy. Last week’s U.S. Amateur at the Olympic Club in San Francisco provided exactly that, delivering drama and unforgettable storylines.

One of the best belonged to 20-year-old Niall Shiels Donegan. Born in Scotland but raised just 20 minutes from the Olympic Club, Donegan grew up steeped in both the traditions of links golf and the Silicon Valley energy where his mother worked as the BBC’s first technology correspondent in the area. Now playing collegiate golf at the University of North Carolina, Donegan needed a birdie on the final hole of stroke play simply to make it into a playoff, which he survived with a steady par to advance into match play.

From there, he became the tournament’s heartbeat. In the round of 64, 32, 16, and even the quarterfinals, Donegan trailed going into the 15th hole, only to summon miraculous comebacks again and again. Each escape felt improbable, yet he kept finding ways to win, his resilience matched only by the roar of the crowd. Surrounded by friends and family from the Bay Area, Donegan fed off the energy, producing some of the year’s most memorable post-round interviews (this was a particular highlight). Against the foggy backdrop of the Olympic Club’s rolling fairways, he became the local hero — wide-eyed, in disbelief, and utterly captivating.

In the semi finals, another incredible comeback seemed likely after Donegan came back from two down with two to play to level the match on the 18th hole. However, Jackson Herrington of Tennessee would not back down, and hit my shot of the week on the first playoff hole to make birdie and advance to the final match. Herrington lost in the final to 18-year-old Mason Howell from Georgia, the youngest winner in 17 years. He will be a pretty popular guy in Brookwood High School tomorrow.

Donegan will now look to make the Great Britain & Ireland Walker Cup team, which will take on the U.S. in Cypress Point in a few weeks.

Marco Penge won the Danish Golf Championship ahead of home favourite Rasmus Højgaard by one stroke. The win propelled Penge into second in the DP World Tour rankings, virtually guaranteeing him a PGA Tour card for 2026. The 27-year-old needed a birdie on the final hole to close out the tournament after Højgaard made an eagle, but calmly slotted away the 3-footer needed for victory.

This was Penge’s second victory of the year after barely retaining his tour card at the end of last season and serving a three month ban for gambling on events he was not participating in. He has incredible length off the tee, which should transfer well to the U.S. game, and has entered himself into conversations for the Ryder Cup team, although it will likely be too little too late.

Despite a playoff loss to Sebastian Muñoz in LIV’s final event of the season, Jon Rahm won the season-long LIV Golf individual title and the $18M bonus that comes with it. Rahm finished in the top 10 in all but one of LIV’s 13 events, but never managed to get over the line for a win. On the other hand, Joaquin Niemann, who finished the season in second, won five times but could not manage a result better than T16 in the other 8 events he participated in before this week. The season will finish next week after the team championship in Michigan.

Coming up this week on Tour

• The FedEx Cup playoffs conclude with the Tour Championship at East Lake Golf Club in Atlanta

• Nick Faldo hosts the British Masters at the Belfry on the DP World Tour

• LIV Golf’s season ends with the Team Championship in Michigan

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