Sahith Theegala is looking to get back on track.
In 2024, he finished third in the seasonlong FedEx Cup standings and was a top-15 player in the world. But injuries took their toll on the 27-year-old in 2025 and he fell to No. 67 in the world after zero top 10s in 18 starts.
He withdrew from the Truist Championship and PGA Championship to rest his ailments and then took nearly two months off between the Memorial Tournament at the end of May until July’s British Open.
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So when and how did the injuries start?
“It was my oblique in February,” he told PGATour.com. “The whole West Coast Swing, I felt great … but I had a TGL match right before Bay Hill, and you just get so amped up in those TGL matches, and I didn’t swing a club for 13 days. I hit a couple of drives like 183 mph ball speed. It’s something I never hit in a tournament, and one of the last drives I felt a little pop in my oblique, and I knew right away. I think there’s video of me like clutching and pressing it in. I knew right away it was not just a little—well, I didn’t know for sure, but it didn’t feel like it was just a little something.”
The injury worsened, but doctors told him, “You can keep playing, this is a pain thing.” So he continued to tee it up and make tweaks to his swing due to the oblique, but that sparked another issue.
“I was starting to hike my left shoulder up, really pinching my neck in, really getting more side bend,” Theegala said, “and that caused me to jack up my neck in Philadelphia [during the Truist Championship] on Wednesday. And I don’t even know what actually happened with my neck. It was fine. I think I pinched a nerve and then it shot into my shoulder, so that was the reason I withdrew from Philadelphia.
“The PGA Championship, actually, by Wednesday my neck was feeling O.K., and if I had no oblique issue I would have played, but my first swing, I tried to hit a ball off the first tee, and I literally felt like I re-tore my whole oblique. It was really bad, so that was when I knew I was gonna take these three weeks off, and then start working out again. I tried to play the Memorial Tournament and the first shot I hit out of the rough, immediate pain. I’m like, ‘All right, now I’m actually done.’ The docs, you know, were pretty adamant about two, four, six weeks, something in that area, but with my neck thing and my oblique thing, I was just like, ‘I’m just gonna take a few months off.’”
The PGA Tour winner returned at the year’s final major. He was fully healthy by then, but didn’t have his full strength back after his lull from competing. He missed the cut at the British Open and also failed to secure a weekend tee time in his final two starts of the season.
However, with a new season on the horizon, Theegala is starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel.
“The last couple weeks after [the] Wyndham Championship, I’ve really been hitting the gym hard and gained my weight back,” he said, “and honestly, I feel stronger than I did even last year, so it’s gonna be fun, feeling good.”
