
Kevin Cunningham
March 20, 2025
Xander Schauffele is desperate to do a great job at the 2025 Valspar Championship.
Julio Aguilar/Getty Images
If you’ve heard any interviews with Xander Schauffele this season, you’ve probably noticed that he could be hard if his game doesn’t meet his lofty expectations. However, based on his recent call in the media, his self-assessment is well justified.
This has to do with the improvements in the game.
Schauffele struggles with injury
After participating in the Sentinels game at the season opening ceremony in early January, Schauffele missed the next two months while dealing with a rib injury.
He returned to the action in early March at Arnold Palmer’s invitational, where he revealed that sometimes he suffered so much from his injuries that he would hardly lie in bed and would not cringe.
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But his results since his return are much lower than his 2024 standard. He finished the T40 at Bay Hill and ranked 72nd in the Players Championship last week.
In a year, he won two majors and temporarily reached the world second place, and Schauffele’s frustration with underperforming was obvious.
Schauffele’s Tough Self-Assessment
But during a pre-tour press conference held at this week’s Valspar Championship on Wednesday, Schauffele explained that harsh self-assessment is not negative. Instead, they play a crucial role in pursuing his world challenge forms.
“I think in the assessment, you might try as hard as you can,” he said. “When I was playing there, my expectations were not on the roof.
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But he also admitted that returning from such a huge amount of time was much harder than he expected, especially giving him what he expected of himself.
“I don’t think it’s going to be tricky,” Schauffele said. “Maybe I’m a little impatient, for me there’s been two weeks of playing golf, almost zero golf. I played the sentinels and then before that was Zozo, so it’s not just six weeks, it feels not just six weeks, but it feels like I haven’t had a while, I’ve had a while. I have expectations, and I think my expectations and through good shots are better.
His actions are proof. Schauffele revealed that he had no intention of playing Valspar at first, but he signed at the last minute because he “needed more reps” to help change his game.
“It’s a process, I’m determined to play better. I set up a premium bar after last year, and after that season, I expected myself a lot and I still do it now, even if it doesn’t really look that way.”
Schauffele’s Master Training
Now that he is already a major champion twice, Schauffele’s focus is understandable, targeting the masters who started at Augusta National on April 10. And he is worried about his current game performance in the No. 1 major this year.
“I need to play better golf. I think the Masters are demanding, the Augusta Nation is demanding, you think you’d rather play well than not go to,” Schauffele said Wednesday. “It’s every big tournament. So there are only a few people who can name my head, have played 12 games and won some ’ems, and I’m not ’ems. So I can save it later in my career.”
Although Schauffele’s end didn’t hit snuff, he still maintained his positive record in most of the successive layoffs, even though he felt he was “cramming into the test … more than just Takin the The The The The The The The The The The The The The The The The.”
Whether Schauffele is important to him, Schauffele explained that layoffs are essential as it provides him with two rounds in each game to solve his struggles.
“I think that’s my personal goal, too, for me, as many tournament rounds as possible, is important to me, so the layoffs can allow me to have two extra games on the weekend, not rusty, and only compete on Thursday, Friday, Friday, Friday,” Schauffele noted. “So sure, I’m playing both times and when I’m there, it’s definitely something in my head.”
And, since he and his team have not decided whether he should start again before the Masters, Schauffele needs to play each round on the Valspar Championship Cunt.
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Kevin Cunningham
Golf.comEdit
As a senior management producer at Golf.com, Cunningham editor, writes and writes stories on Golf.com and manages the brand’s e-news, reaching over 1.4 million subscribers per month. He was a two-time intern and he also helped Golf.com buzz outside of the groundbreaking stories and service content of our journalists and writers, and worked with the tech team to develop new products and innovative ways to convey engaging websites to our audience.
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