Scottie Scheffler’s frustrating PGA Tour season continued on day two of the 3M Open on Friday.
Scheffler got off to a great start at the 3M Open on Thursday, firing a round of six-under par 65.
The world number one then got to nine-under par for the tournament midway through his second round at TPC Twin Cities.
Scheffler added the 3M Open to his schedule this season in order to avoid a three-week layoff between the end of The Open Championship and the start of the PGA Tour playoffs.
However, Scottie Scheffler ran into trouble on his back nine on Friday at the 3M Open, and he ended up finishing at seven-under for the tournament, seven shots adrift of the leader, Michael Kim.
Scheffler‘s performance through two rounds at the 3M Open has been symbolic of his 2026 PGA Tour season as a whole in many ways.
He made far too many sloppy errors on Friday and allowed numerous birdie chances to pass him by.
While it’s hard to pinpoint exactly why he has failed to win multiple times this season, there have definitely been slight changes in his approach, if you look hard enough.
In fact his second round in Blaine, Minnesota, offered up a potential reason as to why he hasn’t quite lived up to expectations in 2026.
Scottie Scheffler hasn’t been at his best on the PGA Tour in 2026
First of all, it’s very important to highlight that Scheffler has still been the best and most consistent player on the PGA Tour this season.
He has recorded one win and 10 top-5 finishes in 16 starts and is inside the top 14 in every key statistical category.
Most players on the PGA Tour aside from a select few would give anything for a season like that.
In fact, he has putted better in 2026 than ever before, and he leads the stroke average category by quite some margin.
The only reason he has received any kind of criticism at all is because golf fans and analysts are comparing his 2026 season to what he produced in 2024 and 2025.
He won seven times in 2024 and added a further six titles to his tally in 2025. That win-rate was always going to be unsustainable.
Considering his impressive stats and results, analysts have struggled to pinpoint exactly what has been wrong with Scheffler this week.
Why has he failed to win more than once? Nobody seems to have a definitive answer to that question.
However, after his second round at the 3M Open, we might just know exactly why Scheffler hasn’t been at his brilliant best over the past five or six months.
The 30-year-old world number one was bogey-free through 31 holes of the tournament until disaster struck on the 14th hole.
Why Scottie Scheffler has struggled in 2026 becomes clear at the 3M Open
Scheffler made a double bogey six on the 14th after finding the water with his approach shot from the middle of the fairway.
Of course, anyone can make a double bogey at any given moment.
However, it was the way that Scheffler succumbed to the double bogey on the 14th that offered us real insight into his struggles right now.
The man from Dallas, Texas, has forged an exceptional career for himself with a diligent and conservative approach to the game.
One of Scheffler’s strongest attributes is his ability to aim at the middle of greens, rather than take on dangerous flags.
However, all of that discipline went out of the window on the 14th hole, when he took on the flag tucked close to the water on the left-hand side of the green.
The line he took allowed him no room for error, and it was a sign that he was forcing things.
The same thing happened on the 17th when he went pin-chasing on the par-three. The 30-year-old missed the green on the short side and made a bogey after leaving himself an almost impossible up and down.
Scheffler is quite clearly desperate to record his second win of the year and, as a result, he is taking shots on that he wouldn’t usually attempt.
If Scottie Scheffler had won a few times already in 2026, there is no chance that he would have taken on those flags on the 14th and 17th holes at the 3M Open.
Ironically, he would be much closer to the lead heading into the weekend if he had taken a more conservative approach.
It is now time for the four-time major champion to take a step back and let his next win come to him, rather than forcing the issue.
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