DUNROBIN, Ont. — Mac Boucher laughs as he knocks a putt about four feet past his intended target during a practice round Tuesday on a brilliant July morning just outside Ottawa.
“Oh,” he says, “great pace on that one.”
Boucher shakes hands with his three partners, exchanges phone numbers and bounds up the stairs toward the clubhouse at Eagle Creek Golf Club, the host of this week’s Commissionaires Ottawa Open. The tournament is part of the PGA Tour Americas schedule (essentially the equivalent of double-A baseball, as golfers on this tour are aiming to climb upwards to the Korn Ferry Tour and then the PGA Tour) and represents the first of two events on the circuit Boucher in which has been given a sponsor exemptions this year.
The reason he’s here, however, is less for his golfing ability — although he was a pro at one point and is still very, very good — and more for the fantastic following he’s drummed up on social media. Boucher (it rhymes with “voucher”) boasts more than 600,000 followers on Instagram alone, with another 30,000 subscribers on YouTube.
He owns Canada’s most-followed golf account, with his most popular Instagram video hitting 22 million views.
But this year he’s doing his best to go from Instagram to inside the ropes — with some serious opportunities for competition to come.
“I love competitive golf. I don’t consider myself a social-media golfer. I still see myself as a guy who loves to play and complete and do these things,” Boucher tells Sportsnet. “I’m not an influencer. I’m being myself. At the end of the day, if I influence people that’s great. I’m a creative guy who loves golf, who showcases it in a unique way.”
Boucher, 35, started playing golf seriously at 17 after he began suffering from intense headaches while competing in almost every other sport. Doctors found a cyst in his brain but instead of having surgery (the cyst was benign), he decided to pick up a sport that was much more low impact: golf. He ended up trying golf at schools in both Georgia and Michigan, but instead skipped out to Australia to play before returning to Canada in 2015, where he got his card for what was then known as the PGA Tour Canada.
Boucher’s professional career came to an end a year later when he had wrist surgery. He began working for various golf clubs and with coaches in the Greater Toronto Area, having grown up in Uxbridge, Ont.
In 2021, Boucher went to Dubai during the COVID-19 lockdowns. That’s when his Instagram account really exploded. The first video that went viral was of a wild left-to-right shot that had 50 yards of spin and lipped out from about 200 yards away.
The rest is history, as Boucher posts basically two videos per day of him playing holes, traveling or hitting fun shots. A video of Boucher from Monday in Ottawa of him playing the front nine of Eagle Creek amassed 300,000 views in 36 hours.
Boucher is based on the west coast of Canada and is on the road upwards of 300 days per year. He’s got multi-year brand deals with TaylorMade, Primo Golf Apparel, adidas and BMW (you may have seen him in a recent television commercial). After years of Boucher tagging them — and being a long-time fan — he managed to score his “dream” brand collaboration with Tim Hortons this summer.
His popularity is so high these days that most other deals are inbound to him, as Boucher is open, kind and self-deprecating. The uniqueness of his golf ability is also wildly impressive. He tries shots that even some of the world’s best golfers wouldn’t dare. Boucher is also an introvert, he says, which helps in his line of work — he doesn’t feel like he has to be ‘on’ all the time, which causes plenty of other creators to burn out.
“I’ve created a brand that’s just myself. People have created brands that maybe aren’t them, it’s a persona or whatever. People who know me, I’m the exact same. I had the same quirks. I’m still kind of awkward,” Boucher says with a smile. “If you have something that’s unique or can come across as entertaining or hold value, then people are going to watch.”
Boucher has parlayed his online success to real-world opportunities beyond just seeing the world and pressing record. He was offered an opportunity to play an event on the Asian Tour last year where he admitted he was “pretty disappointed” after firing a 10-over 80 in the opening round and claiming that, well, “pro golf is hard.”
He was invited by the PGA Tour to play in the first Creator Classic last year at the Tour Championship — before the real PGA Tour event that same week — that pitted golf content creators against each other. He fared better there. This year, however, he’s back in the field alongside real pros fighting for real jobs.
Scott Pritchard, who is the vice president for tournament business at the PGA Tour Americas, says one of the key metrics the circuit tracks is the strength of its fields. They are seeing an increase of 28 per cent in strength of field (via the Official World Golf Rankings) year-over-year and while you may not know the names of the golfers in these fields right now, you certainly will soon. J.J. Spaun, who won the U.S. Open at Oakmont this year, played the Tour in 2013. Ditto Nick Taylor, Taylor Pendrith, Tony Finau and Netflix darling Joel Dahmen.
“I still have to pinch myself. I tried so hard to get myself into positions like this to play tournaments like this when I was playing professionally. It was such a challenge and such a struggle. I have tons of respect for people who pursue any professional sport,” Boucher says.
Boucher, who also received an exemption into the Times Colonist Victoria Open in September, does have an internal battle on whether he’s “taking a spot” from a deserving pro who is chasing his dream. He was, after all, one of these guys less than a decade ago.
“I look at the big picture. If I can draw more attention to this event and more eyes and more sponsors that maybe want to boost a purse, I know my job. My job is not to come out here and win this tournament. My job is to do my absolute best, stay out of the way, and do as much as I can to show the talent on this tour,” he explains.
Before the event in Victoria, however, Boucher will be part of another gigantic pinch-me opportunity. Barstool Sports is putting on the Internet Invitational at Big Cedar Lodge in Missouri — with “at least” $1 million up for grabs for the winner — in August. Boucher laughs because they haven’t been informed of the format yet, but it will be a handicapped event since one of the golfers on the roster, for example, is Wesley Bryan. Bryan has won on the PGA Tour before, but he and brother George have also amassed more than 635,000 subscribers on YouTube.
Another creator in that field is Grant Horvat, who recently made headlines for declining an invitation to the PGA Tour’s Barracuda Championship last week. Horvat boasts more than 1.4 million subscribers on YouTube and nearly 1 million on Instagram with videos that often feature some of the biggest names in golf including Phil Mickelson, Scottie Scheffler and even Tiger Woods.
Horvat declined the sponsor invite because he was told he wasn’t allowed to film content during the round. His post on X, formerly Twitter, has more than 8.5 million views and plenty of debate in the comments. Boucher says he sees both sides. The PGA Tour has policies in place for a reason, and Horvat would not benefit from it personally or for his own brand without filming his own stuff, so he had every right to say ‘no.’
“But from my position,” Boucher says, “I grew up as a golfer and if I was getting a sponsor exemption into a PGA Tour event and they tell me I can’t film, I’m like, fine sign me up. I would never pass that opportunity up.”
Boucher has gained plenty of special opportunities to this point and he shows no sign of slowing down — as long as his body will let him. He suffered from a serious thumb injury recently and hasn’t had the opportunity to have surgery (a multi-month recovery is just not possible with the demands of his job) and there’s the obvious wear-and-tear of 300 days of travel.
But while he knows tournament golf is awfully different — and awfully challenging — all of this, the golf and the travel and the competition, was what he’s always wanted.
“I just love it,” Boucher says, “and I don’t think I’ll ever lose that.”
