Phil Mickelson certainly has no problem these days offering up his opinion on—well, anything. But we'll go ahead and stick to golf here and pinpoint one particular "hot take" he had back in March regarding Scottie Scheffler.
For those who may have missed it, when Joaquín Niemann earned his second LIV Golf victory of the year with a five-shot win in Singapore, Mickelson opined that the Chilean was the best player on the planet, which naturally raised plenty of eyebrows, including those of 2008 Masters champ and CBS Sports broadcaster Trevor Immelman, who quickly chimed in on the matter.
But Mickelson didn't stop there, as he quickly followed up by predicting that Scheffler, who won nine times in 2024 and has been the No. 1 player in the Official World Golf Ranking since May 2023, would not earn a victory in 2025—or at least until the Ryder Cup, that is.
Here’s a hot take
— Phil Mickelson (@PhilMickelson) March 16, 2025
Does Scottie win in 2025 before the Ryder Cup?
I don’t think so.
That's bold enough in itself to say the U.S. will win the Ryder Cup, but that's not why we're here.
Now, at the time Mickelson was making his prediction, Scheffler, who missed the first month of the PGA Tour season after undergoing hand surgery following an accident at his home on Christmas Day, was finishing up just his fifth start of the year, which resulted in a T20 at The Players Championship.
Prior to that, Scottie had tied for ninth at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, tied for 25th at the WM Phoenix Open, tied for third at The Genesis Invitational, and tied for 11th at the Arnold Palmer Invitational.
For most players, that's a pretty solid start to a season. But with Scheffler having earned the aforementioned nine victories a season ago and clearly not playing his best golf at the time, Phil went ahead and offered up his opinion, which he's certainly entitled to.
It just didn't age very well, did it? But at least Mickelson was a good sport about it.
Phil Mickelson laughed at just how wrong his Scottie Scheffler prediction was
Scheffler, of course, just made ridiculously easy work of TPC Craig Ranch, not only winning the CJ Cup Byron Nelson by eight shots but also tying—or at least somewhat tying, anyway—the record for the lowest 72-hole score on the PGA Tour in the last 40-plus years.
Hilariously, Immelman made sure to remind Phil of his remarks. And to his credit, Mickelson owned up to his mistake, laughed it off, and congratulated Scheffler on a "great performance."
So I might of been off on that one 😂😂
— Phil Mickelson (@PhilMickelson) May 4, 2025
Congrats to Scottie on a great performance 👍👍
It's a good thing Lefty can laugh at that, as he likely wasn't laughing about finishing 50th out of 54 players at LIV Golf Korea on Sunday. But we'll leave that alone for now.