For years, athletes embracing conspiracy theories has been almost its own genre of sports entertainment. Flat Earth debates, UFO discussions and moon-landing skepticism have all found their way into locker rooms and podcast studios. Now, Bryson DeChambeau has added his own twist to the tradition.
The two-time major champion raised eyebrows this week during an appearance on “The Katie Miller Pod” when he questioned the authenticity of the footage from the 1969 Apollo 11 moon landing. DeChambeau stopped short of denying the landing itself, saying he believes astronauts made it to the moon largely because Elon Musk has publicly supported it.
“Look, Elon [Musk] says we’ve definitely gone [to the moon]. So I tend to go that route, because he’s the man that knows quite a bit about all that,” DeChambeau said in the interview.
But the visuals? Those, apparently, remain up for debate in his mind.
“I don’t think the footage is real,” DeChambeau said. “But I think we did go to the moon.”
The comments arrived during an unusually turbulent stretch for one of golf’s most polarizing stars. DeChambeau has missed the cut at the Masters and PGA Championship, while the future of LIV Golf reportedly remains uncertain beyond 2026.
Instead of offering clarity about his career plans, DeChambeau spent part of the interview discussing UFOs, “inter-dimensional beings” and moon-landing footage.
In fairness to DeChambeau, he’s hardly the first athlete to wander into fringe territory.
Kyrie Irving famously ignited headlines in 2017 after publicly endorsing Flat Earth theories before later apologizing. Steph Curry jokingly questioned the moon landing on a podcast before walking it back after NASA invited him to visit a lunar lab. For what it is worth, NASA has long confirmed the moon landing as historical fact, with lunar orbiters photographing Apollo landing sites, astronaut tracks and equipment still left on the moon from the missions.
Draymond Green, Sammy Watkins and Darius Slay have all flirted with similar theories publicly.
For DeChambeau, though, the timing makes the comments impossible to separate from the uncertainty surrounding his career. Once viewed as the face of LIV Golf’s future, he suddenly feels like a star caught between worlds: part golfer, part internet personality, part philosopher.
And now, apparently, part moon-landing skeptic, too.