The Players Championship
Players 2025: ‘This is the dumbest tree I’ve ever seen’: PGA Tour pros react to TPC Sawgrass' controversial new feature
Only in golf can trees be considered controversial. Part of that is because we’re petty and love to bicker. Part of that is because the margins of our sport are so slim, that even an innocent sapling can have a massive impact on how a hole is played. The ever-mischievous Pete Dye understood this, tormenting golfers for years with an infamous oak tree looming over TPC Sawgrass' 6th tee box. In 2014, the oak died of natural causes, granting players a decade-long reprieve, but in 2025, as part of a course-wide revitalization project, the tree has returned and, with it, players’ grumblings.
This week, the sadistic content minds at the PGA Tour captured the reactions of players as they arrived at the 6th hole during their practice rounds, and, needless to say, not everybody was thrilled about the new flora they found awaiting them.
Most players handled the pesky oak better than the Twitter nerds, who turned the tree into some sort of golf Rorschach test, but not everyone was a fan.
“This is impossible for me to hit my 7-wood,” Keith Mitchell said.
“Golf’s too easy, so you might as well make it tougher,” Collin Morikawa quipped.
“That’s a bit aggressive,” Scottie Scheffler mumbled.
But no one loathed the new obstacle quite like Matthew Fitzpatrick, who called it “the dumbest tree I’ve ever seen,” and asked, “whose brilliant idea was it to bring this tree back? If someone could remove it, that would be great.”
Despite Fitzy’s mixed feelings about the tree, he still managed to hit a sensational stinger, 65-degree beanie and all.
He wasn’t the only one, either. In fact, the tree produced a rainbow of incredible trajs from the likes of Min Woo Lee, Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy, who all navigated the new hazard with style.
Say what you want about the tree (go ahead, it doesn’t have feelings), but if it produces fireworks like this all weekend long, then perhaps Pete Dye was on to something after all …