Magic or not, it's hard to look away when Jordan Spieth plays at Muirfield Village

USA Today

2 days ago

Magic or not, it's hard to look away when Jordan Spieth plays at Muirfield Village
Everyone wants Jordan Spieth to win the Memorial Tournament.
Well, OK, tournament leader Scottie Scheffler and the other 56 players at Muirfield Village would prefer they come out on top, instead of the 31-year-old Texan. But a lot of golf fans are rooting for Spieth, who a decade ago was the darling of the PGA Tour. And many of them desperately want him to return to glory, if the shouts of Spieeeth echoing across the course are any indication.
Unfortunately for them, and him, the past decade has been more gory than glory. Spieth's relative dry spell – two wins since 2017 – has been a downer for a PGA Tour in need of more marketable personalities. The tour tries to polish its stars, but few match what Spieth can bring to the table; an everyman personality combined with a golf game featuring a mesmerizing mix of erratic and effective. Except today it's mostly just erratic.
Exhibit A: Spieth began the Memorial's third round four shots behind co-leaders Ben Griffin and Nick Taylor, then put together a front nine resembling something a muni league low-handicapper would turn in: Birdie, bogey, par, birdie, bogey, par, birdie, bogey, birdie.
'I mean, it didn't feel like a roller coaster,' he said after finishing with an even-par 72 that coulda, shoulda been two or three strokes lower. At one point, Spieth led at 5 under before a bogey-bogey finish at No. 17 and 18 dropped him five shots behind Scheffler, and he sounded uncertain if it would be possible to catch the No. 1 ranked player in the world.
'The bummer for me is Scottie is (8 under) and you can't count on him shooting even par tomorrow, so it would take something special,' he said.
There was a time – it feels so long ago – when Spieth routinely did something special.
From 2015, when he won five times, including the Masters and U.S. Open, through his 2017 British Open triumph, the young player nicknamed 'Boy Wonder' hoisted 10 trophies. That three of those pieces of designer hardware came courtesy of majors only solidified him as one of the best players in golf. Beyond that, outside of Tiger Woods, whose starpower was beginning to fade due to age and injury, Spieth easily was the most popular.
A combination of boyish innocence, which seemed more genuine than manufactured, and his constant jabbering – both with himself and caddie Michael Greller – made Spieth relatable to a golfing populace who, like him, muttered after poor shots and talked to the golf ball like it had ears.
Jordan Spieth once was what Scottie Scheffler is today
Another way to put it, Spieth resembled what Scheffler is today: a threat to win every time he tees it up. Scheffler has won 15 tour events, including three majors, in just over three years, and is primed to defend his title at the Memorial. The noticeable difference between the two players is that Scheffler avoids conducting entertaining self-help sessions for public consumption on the golf course.
Typical of Spieth's vocal pyrotechnics, as he approached his ball on the 11th hole, having pushed his drive into the right rough, he sounded offended that the ball had sunk deep into the grass.
'This is worse than the last hole,' he said, a disgusted chuckle lightening the scene. 'How is that possible? Are you kidding me?'
It's not just what Spieth says that makes him likeable, but how he says it, with a mix of shock and awe that makes him sound more stunned and baffled than wimpy and whiny.
Spieth sees any comparison with Scheffler differently, at least where the golf swing is concerned.
'I'm not going to sit here and say that I've ever had the kind of ball striking or consistency that (Scheffler) has had,' he said. 'Certainly, all of us have had weeks or months or half a year or whatever where we feel that kind of control.'
But Scheffler is different.
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'What impresses me the most is that his clubface control is elite,' Spieth said. "It's maybe the best there's ever been as far as clubface control, so his consistency is ridiculous."
When Spieth began making serious news on tour in 2014, his peers marveled at his long putting the same way he marvels at Scheffler's consistency. For about a year it seemed Spieth made more long putts than he missed. In 2015, he was deadly accurate from 15 to 25 feet, with a 27.2 make percentage. He made the most putts on tour from that range and led the tour in one-putt percentage (.443) and putts per green in regulation (1.69).
Long putts not falling like they once did
It wasn't a mirage, but his uncanny accuracy from long distance made fans think he was better with the blade than he was. Especially on shorter putts, he is not exactly boss of the moss. Since 2013, his average ranking on putts of 8 feet is 84th, from 7 feet 108th, from 6 feet 60th, from 5 feet 106th, from 4 feet 101st and from 3 feet 88th.
When his long-putt accuracy dipped, which was bound to happen, because going 27% from 15 to 25 feet only happens in miniature golf, his scoring cooled. And has yet to reheat.
Yet Spieth remains among the most popular players on tour, because while his game is not what it once was, his on-course behavior and up-and-down execution from one shot to the next reminds fans that golf is hard. It beats you up. And it's OK to show the bruises.
Sports columnist Rob Oller can be reached at [e-mail] and on X.com at@rollerCD. Read his columns from theBuckeyes' national championship season in "Scarlet Reign," a hardcover coffee-table collector's book from The Dispatch. Details at OhioState.Champs.com