The enormous yellow scoreboard above the 18th green at Royal Portrush perfectly illustrated the state of golf these days. Scottie Scheffler's name was at the top. No one else was close.

That's how it was at the Open Championship on Sunday, when the World No. 1 never gave anybody a chance, from the time his nine-iron settled a foot away to set up a birdie at the first hole until he tapped in for a three-under-par 68 to close out a four-shot victory at 17-under-par, well ahead of runner-up Harris English.

That's how it is in the sport, a level of dominance not seen since Tiger Woods.

"He is the bar that we're all trying to get to," Masters champion Rory McIlroy said. "In a historical context, you could argue that there's only maybe two or three players in the history of the game that have been on a run like the one that Scottie's been on here for the last 24 to 36 months. Incredibly impressive."

Scheffler not only won his second major of 2025 – and fourth in the last three seasons – he also captured the third leg of the Career Grand Slam, now missing only the U.S. Open.

The 29-year-old became the first player in more than a century to secure his first four major titles by at least three shots, and if not for his lone blunder from a bunker on the eighth hole while working with a seven-shot lead, he would have played bogey-free throughout the weekend.

"Being able to walk up 18 with the tournament in hand is a really tough thing to describe. It's a really cool feeling. I have a lot of gratitude towards being able to accomplish something like this," Scheffler said, the silver Claret Jug on the table next to him.

"It's taken a lot of work – not only a lot of work, but it takes a lot of patience," he added. "It's a high level of focus over 72 holes of a tournament. This was, I felt like, one of my best performances mentally."

McIlroy had referred to the outcome as "inevitable" when Scheffler built a four-shot lead going into the final round, and it was every bit of that.

The tap-in birdie on the first hole. A brilliant approach between two knobs to 7 feet for birdie on the fourth. A 15-foot birdie at five. Most telling was his biggest celebration, a powerful fist pump when he rolled in a 15-foot par putt on the sixth green.

It was reminiscent of when Woods saved his biggest fist pump for a par on the 16th hole during his historic 15-shot victory at Pebble Beach in the 2000 U.S. Open, when it was clear Woods was competing mainly against himself.

That's what it felt like until Scheffler's one wobble, a double bogey at eight after he needed two shots to get out of a fairway bunker.

That ended his streak of 32 consecutive holes without a bogey. The lead was down to four shots when Scottish Open winner Chris Gotterup birdied the ninth.

And then Scheffler birdied the next hole. He played the back nine with eight pars and a birdie because that's all he needed. No one could catch him.