Charles Barkley chipped in, but he wasn’t the most relevant golfer of the week
Most weeks, televised golf looks like an unusual sport.
Shots fly high, stop fast and bend in ways the rest of us can only dream of imitating. We may play by the same rules, but we don’t get anywhere near the same results.
From time to time, however, the universe opens up, parallel worlds collide and the game broadcast in our homes becomes almost … visible.
This weekend was one of those times.
Across the Atlantic, World No. 1 Scottie Scheffler averaged a fatality at the Genesis Scottish Open to miss the mark for the first time in 78 appearances. At the Evian Championship in France, meanwhile, Nelly Korda posted handicap numbers – she took 64 of them over two days – to complete a rare rest weekend. Finally, on the shores of Lake Tahoe, Charles Barkley, the world’s most famous bad golfer, returned to his old ways, piling up bogeys before drilling a miserable hole for par with a club behind a stripped chip.
Talk about kindred spirits.
But the most relatable story of the week was not Scheffler’s, Korda’s or Sir Charles’s.
It belonged to Aaron Wise.
Not because he played badly. The opposite, in fact. Wise got it right, entering Sunday’s final match against Lucas Glover at the ISCO tournament in Louisville and fighting to the end, losing the playoff by one shot.
However, it was not a near miss. It’s everything that came before it: the openness and perspective of a player who has spent the last few years facing challenges that had nothing to do with his skating.
What would it mean to him, he was asked late Saturday afternoon, if he could return to the winner’s circle for the first time in more than eight years?
“I feel like I’m a long way from there but it would mean the world,” said Wise. “That’s the dream when I was going through what I was going through. That’s the ultimate goal and the dream. There were a lot of times I didn’t know if I could play here again, to get that amazing opportunity.”
What a long and difficult journey it has been.
After winning the NCAA individual title in 2016, Wise turned pro and wasted little time making good on his promise. He captured the 2018 Byron Nelson in just his 26th PGA Tour start, earned Rookie of the Year honors that season and climbed to No. 33 in the Official World Golf Ranking.
Then the route changed.
Days before the 2023 Masters, Wise announced that he was withdrawing from Augusta National to focus on his mental health, admitting that the sport had become an incredible mental strain. He made a handful of starts over the next two seasons as he retired from the competition full-time and focused on performing well.
His return was slow.
This week marked only his eighth PGA Tour start of the 2026 season, and his second of the year. But the encouraging signs extended beyond the leaderboard.
On his return, Wise spoke of a journey that took longer than he expected. He noted that there was a point where competition became “dangerous,” where he no longer knew himself or enjoyed playing. The passage of time, along with the help of people he met during breaks, allowed him to develop healthy ways to manage the stresses that come with playing for a living.
The job, he said, helped him regain something he had lost: the simple enjoyment of the game.
“I’m looking at tomorrow morning as anything happens, it will be a learning experience,” said Wise on Saturday. “I will continue my process, do what I have been doing and look after the future is over and the chips fall where they did and try to learn from them for the future.”
On Sunday, Wise stepped onto the first tee of the HCC Championship Course with the same caddy he’s relied on for most of the season: his wife, Reagan.
“It’s just a consolation for me,” he said before the round. “Someone I feel I can trust and I enjoy spending my time there.”
Sunday did as golf usually does. There have been mistakes, recoveries and opportunities. Wise hung around all afternoon, needing a birdie one last time to make the playoff which was eventually won by Steven Fisk, who held Taylor Penrith on the third extra hole.
Wise came out tied for third. Not a victory, but a victory of another kind.
In a week when other great golfers are doing good to the rest of us with errant irons, three-putts, small chips and club-tosses, Wise has emerged as a familiar figure: a golfer on the course riding with a close friend, grappling with common human questions, trying to do his best but also understanding that there is more to the game.
