[Photo: Andrew Redington]
Event organisers feared their anchor wouldn’t hold. In the days before the inaugural Grayson Murray Classic late last year, the field began to fracture, professional players withdrawing their commitments one by one, citing the tour’s unrelenting schedule and bodies begging for mercy. The greater concern was Brooks Koepka, stranded at the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship at St Andrews, where weather delays had thrown his availability into serious question.
“It was our first time hosting the event, and you just don’t know what you’re going to get,” says Jeff Maness, president of the Grayson Murray Foundation. “Brooks was coming from overseas, and would have had as good a reason to skip as anybody.”
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About 9:30am, 30 minutes before his tee-time, Koepka stepped out of a black SUV at Raleigh Country Club. Behind him was an overnight odyssey – Scotland to Florida to North Carolina, the brief stopover in West Palm Beach to deliver his family home. “He was tired, but he said, ‘Whatever the family needs me to do, I’m here.'”
Much has been made of Brooks Koepka’s return to the PGA Tour this week. That it happened, how it unfolded, what it signals for a sport fractured by five seasons of civil war. What’s been largely ignored is the man at the centre of it, which tracks, because the relationship between golf and Koepka has always resisted easy analysis. His résumé commands respect and he played with swagger in a sport that worships decorum. Still, he struggled with the public’s affection, called golf his profession but not his passion, won with such crushing inevitability he drained suspense from the outcome. All of this shapes Koepka’s public persona, the version assembled from news conferences and televised rounds.
But as he tees off at Torrey Pines this week, it’s worth recounting a day witnessed beyond the cameras.
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While not necessarily close, Koepka and Grayson Murray maintained an easy rapport. Murray kept a rental in Jupiter, Florida, near Koepka’s place, and the two traded texts about ice hockey, their shared obsession. They played a practice round together at the 2024 PGA Championship, a week before Murray’s death at age 30.
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Maness carried that pairing in his mind as he organised last year’s tournament to honour Murray. The invitation went to Koepka with tempered expectations. Securing tour professionals and celebrities had proven far more difficult than Maness anticipated, commitments evaporating as quickly as they materialised. Koepka’s response arrived swiftly: Count me in, and he never wavered. And the moment he materialised at Raleigh Country Club, Maness says, “it changed the whole vibe.” Not just because a major champion had shown up, but because of what that presence signalled about Murray and the gravity of loss.
“There were other celebrities and pros there, but this was a five-time major winner,” Maness says. “We’re all there to honour Grayson and to continue his life through the foundation, but having Brooks there gave credibility to what we were trying to do.”
Tour players at pro-ams and celebrity events often operate on autopilot, their presence more contractual than genuine. But from the moment he stepped onto the grounds, Maness and others observed, he was fully present, spending unhurried time with the Murray family and an emotional support animal group central to the foundation’s mission. When the round began, Koepka drew a pairing with some of Grayson’s closest family friends, including Phil Hilldale. After the standard pleasantries, Hilldale mentioned his 15-year-old son Tyler was a fan. Koepka’s response was immediate: Pull him out of school. Bring him here. Let him ride in the cart.
Tyler arrived, and Koepka handed him the day. He let the kid test his putter, pressed him into makeshift caddie duty, gave him access to the player he’d only watched from a distance. It wasn’t performance. It was generosity that cost Koepka nothing except attention, which made it worth everything.
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Brooks Koepka spending time with Tyler Hilldale. [Photo: Courtesy Phil Hilldale]
“On TV he always looks intense and focused, but in real life he was really nice and relaxed, he talked to me the whole time,” Tyler says. “He answered all my questions and gave me some swing tips.”
“Brooks completely changed my perception of him. I did a full 180,” Phil adds. “The guy we see on in the ropes, so intense and focused, isn’t the one we played with that day. He was great, down-to-earth, present and chose to play from our tees so he could hang with us for the day.
“My biggest ‘a-ha’ moment came when he explained that during a competitive round, he’s 100 percent locked in on golf and struggles to engage with fans. But once he taps in that final putt, he relaxes and becomes more social and outgoing. That instantly made sense of his business-like TV persona, because in person, he was the complete opposite.”
After the round, Koepka lingered. He found the family and Maness, asking questions that couldn’t be answered with platitudes. How they were holding up, how the foundation was sustaining itself, where he could be useful. He shared his own stories about Grayson, his own processing of the loss. Before leaving, he told Maness something that carried weight beyond courtesy: Don’t hesitate. When the foundation needs something, call.
“I spent a lot of time with athletes. He is a genuine, driven person,” Maness says. “That’s what makes him the player he is, but he wouldn’t be there if he didn’t have character, too.” Maness also says that Koepka’s participation has already placed other players at the ready to help with the foundation going forward.
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In isolation, this registers as decency, a professional athlete showing up for a grieving family. Tour players dedicate themselves to charitable causes all the time. And nothing here erases or simplifies the conflicted feelings many fans harbour towards Koepka. But it does puncture the assumption that what we see during competition reveals the whole person. We judge athletes by their public performances and mistake that sliver for totality, forgetting that character often emerges in moments never televised or monetised.
There exists another Brooks Koepka, one inaccessible to broadcast cameras and post-round news conferences. We may never know him fully, but dismissing his existence flattens him into caricature. He gets a fresh start this week. Perhaps he’s earned a more complete appraisal from the rest of us.
