THE PLAYERS CHAMPIONSHIP

March 12, 2023

Jordan Spieth

TPC Sawgrass

Quick Quotes

Q. Not the friendly confines that they were yesterday, was it, out there.

JORDAN SPIETH: No, I think actually I was very surprised at how soft it was still. Doesn't necessarily make it like easier with the wind because then the scoring opportunities, you're worried about the ball ripping off the green, which I did and Denny did multiple times.

Yeah, it's a tough track. Top 25 for me out here feels like a win anywhere else. So I wanted to shoot -- I knew going in it was going to be a tough day, and I had my goal on 3-under and in 18 fairway.

So that was going to be -- I had plenty of opportunities. I hit a really bad wedge on 5 and I didn't get up-and-down on two par-5s greenside. So stuff that -- mistakes I don't typically make I made a few of them today that cost me a chance at that.

But playing well, got a couple more weeks here before I got ready for the Masters.

Q. Why do you say that, that at 25 -- what is it about this course that makes a top 25 feel so good?

JORDAN SPIETH: Just my history. I was kind of half kidding, but my history here isn't great.

Just don't play with a lot of discipline, and I didn't today. I thought I should have birdied 10 and 11, and so I get on 12, and instead of just bailing out right in the collection area and making birdie, I'm trying to hit a driver on the green and make the birdie easier, have a chance at eagle, and I hit one in the water. It's just like I just do that every single year here. I just don't have the discipline to accept -- like 11 I did everything right, there happened to not be any sand in the bunker I was in and sometimes that happens and so it bounced, and I end up making par where I think I make birdie so I'm thinking, man, I got to get that back. You get Sawgrassed sometimes. Actually every round everyone gets Sawgrassed to an extent where something quirky happens, and if you have the patience or you're just playing as good as Scottie is, then it goes well. But my aggressive nature and inability to accept sometimes not making birdie when I thought I was going to makes me make too many mistakes on a course that you can't get away with it.

Q. Scottie has chipped in on consecutive days from impossible positions, kind of like you. Is there something about the way he plays that reminds you of you around the greens with his imagination?

JORDAN SPIETH: He's got great hands. He's got every shot, and then at this point, once he won last year and obviously won the Masters, I feel like his -- when you're presented with those shots, if you don't feel like you have house money, you play them a certain way, but if you feel like it doesn't matter you're going to play the shot that could go closest even if it means disaster could happen, you still sit there and go for it and pull it off, similar to how Phil Mickelson played most of his rounds.

But I'm saying I can't use examples of Scottie before he won. I'm not saying he didn't play that way. I can go off myself and say that when I started to feel like a couple years out here and having some success, I started to just trust flop shots and stuff where instead of making sure you have a putt at it, you're like, no, I'm going to try and see this go in, and I feel like he's just playing like that. There's nothing to lose, everything to gain for him, and it's a really nice place to be where he's at. I've been there. It's a really fun time playing golf that way when the ball does find the cup like that too.

Q. (Indiscernible.)

JORDAN SPIETH: Well, kind of had a run where things were really going my way back kind of two years ago. I got kind of the right bounces a couple times last year. But as far as, I mean runs like that, you know, probably 2015 through 2017.

Q. Do you think they're more like once-in-a-lifetime runs?

JORDAN SPIETH: I mean, there's one guy that created a career out of a run and became the best ever. So not necessarily. But I think that -- and I honestly I hated when it was called a run for me, so I don't want to call it run for Scottie. He's playing really -- like even if he didn't have those two chip-ins, he's only leading by four.

It's also to win golf tournaments, you hole putts or you chip something in, and everyone does it during a week. But he's a guy who is going to be really exciting. Tee to green, he's as good as he's ever been right now. With some flair and some stuff around the greens and making some putts, he's a guy that's hard to beat.

I play against him a lot at home, and consistently he's shooting really low rounds. When I feel like I get the better of him, it's a boost of confidence right now because he's arguably the best player in the world right now. He and Jon and Rory have -- I guess you guys have all written about how that change has gone down, but it's easy to say right now that I consider him the best in the world in the current situation.

Q. How did you make that shift where you go from a place where you can sneak up on some people and win some tournaments to where everybody's expecting you to do well, and now he's surprised people ask him, but he can't do that anymore. How do you make that mental shift?

JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, I mean, there is a little bit of a shift of just managing expectations, but a lot of it comes down to blocking out the noise, and I think I could have done a better job of it. I feel like I didn't have a whole lot to draw on of people necessarily before me, and I probably could have reached out to some people to handle it better in certain situations. Maybe a tournament or two would have made a difference, but all in all, yeah, it's something that I'm not really sure where that is for him right now. It should be pretty high with what's been able to do over the last 14 months.

That golf is pretty incredible, given he lost in a couple playoffs, and I mean, his top 10s are off the charts. He's just playing that good. I think the team around him and the way he's wired, he's got -- he's extremely grounded. He's got really good parents, great family structure. Randy Smith's been around for a long time, his coach, and he's been with him forever. So I don't see it changing. He's in a good position to be able to continue to do this for awhile.

Q. Scottie and Teddy had a bet where he had to make 10 hole-outs in the year. He's already made -- today was number 11. Did Teddy make a really bad bet, or how impressive is already 11?

JORDAN SPIETH: I'll be honest, I think that Teddy made a very bad bet. I had it with Michael and we've had it at 15 or 16 before. So I think Teddy will probably reevaluate considering we're not even midway through March. So I don't know if Scottie -- it actually might be a good bet because it's already over and he'll make a new one and win the press.

Q. Outside the facts that you're standing here on Sunday, what do you take out of, what positives do you take out of the week?

JORDAN SPIETH: I continue to improve putting. I maintain ball striking. So I'm really happy about that. I lost five or six shots on three driver swings, so I just got to go back and improve on that.

But to answer your question on the positive side, I don't feel like I lost any ground from last week. I feel like if anything, things feel even better. I just caught a couple driver swings and a little bit of discipline that I had last week and I didn't have this week, so Tampa's a tough track as well and then Austin's a tough track. So they're very similar kind of style of golf courses still coming up, with Augusta being the outlier and Hilton Head being kind of back to last week and this week's style. So a lot of similar grasses and stuff like that, overseed, and so just try to continue to sharpen the axe a little bit.

I don't like losing by 12 plus shots. I felt like I was closer than that this week, and last week was only two. It's nice to feel like even on your weeks where you don't win, you're within a certain margin, so you're like, all right, I just need to improve a stroke a day somewhere, you know. Scottie's making it look a little more challenging right now. But if you throw him out, it really was about a stroke a day from having a chance.