THE CJ CUP BYRON NELSON

May 1, 2024

Jordan Spieth

TPC Craig Ranch

Press Conference

THE MODERATOR: All right, we'd like to welcome Jordan Spieth to the interview room here at the CJ CUP Byron Nelson.

Jordan, making your 12th appearance at this event coming off runner-up finish in your last start here in 2022. Can you just let us know what it's like to be back.

JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, it's great. It was actually a big bummer to miss last year. I had been playing pretty well leading into it and had good success the times I played it here at Craig Ranch.

So I'm glad to be back this week. Got a heavy stretch of golf coming up, so looking forward to getting back out here at a familiar place with familiar faces. Obviously really enjoyed the support I've had over the years here. Hopefully going to be no different this year.

Weather permitting we should have some great crowds as the Byron Nelson always does, and I would love to get in the thick of things and feel that hometown support like I've been fortunate enough to do sometimes.

Q. Coming in with three Top 10s this season; first start since RBC Heritage. Just get some comments on the state of your game heading into this week.

JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, I think I kind of wanted to hit the reset button this last week and I took more days off than I usually do. Got a little burned out trying to find stuff. I wanted to take some time off, clear my mind, and then get back to it. I took an extra couple days than I normally do.

Kind of looking at this as kind of a restart. I haven't had the year I wanted to have after getting off to a pretty optimistic start in Hawai'i. I feel really good about the work I put in since the weekend into the few days this week, so I believe that I'm really close to some great things.

Sometimes that can be disguised right before it happens. I'm believing that has been the case and need a couple confidence-building rounds or whatever it may be, and feel like I go on a really nice run.

That's the plan.

And three Top 10s to this point wasn't really what I had planned. I would love to shoot up leaderboards and be a little more consistent and have chances to win golf tournaments.

Q. Just wondering how your wrist is feeling these days and if at this point where you are if you feel any worry about re-injuring it or is a lot of it managing it?

JORDAN SPIETH: It's a lot of managing it. I'm kind of doing a couple different things to help treat the symptoms that I experience and to not have some recurring problems that have happened.

And so I'm doing a lot of stuff off the course, therapy side, whether it's treating tendon to treating the nerve in general. You know, I think that that's helping.

I kind of maybe got a little bit away from it as I got into a heavier stretch of golf the last eight weeks so I had a couple instances that weren't good.

I don't plan on that happening going forward with what I'm doing off the course even though I will be playing a lot of golf.

Q. Taking a week off, does that noticeably help it as you progress through?

JORDAN SPIETH: I think I'd probably be advised to take more than one in order for it to really get helped, but it's one of those things like I'm not doing further damage is my understanding. It's just management until I can figure out exactly what maybe solves the problem going home.

Q. No Scottie this week. Getting ready to be a dad. Will is out with the back. You're carrying the Dallas banner again. Sort of a two-part question: How do you feel about that part of it, being back in the headline role? And also, does this feel like an opportunity to maybe get this tournament, which you've wanted to win so badly for the last 15 years or so?

JORDAN SPIETH: I think, you know, both guys wish they could play. Obviously Scottie is a little different reason. He doesn't want to be here over what he's doing, you know what I mean? I think he wishes he could be in two places at once.

For the tournament it's unlucky to have that be the case because they're both tremendous players and big names and local guys as you mentioned. I love competing against them.

I think it's a sidenote, because obviously Scottie has been the hardest guy to beat in the world for a while now. But I think in general, my approach to this week is it's very hard to win events on the PGA TOUR. I would love to win this event. It would mean more to me than most events.

I think that can be a good thing to think about it that way. I can get really fired up for it and it's a good opportunity to, like I mentioned earlier, to reset the season, too.

So I can look at it as a place I can maybe look at as successful season and say it wasn't what I wanted until the Byron Nelson, and then I used the tournament that's been so special to my heart to turn things around and go forward and start a nice run.

So, yeah, I think it would be incredible regardless if those two are in the field or not. It wouldn't mean -- if I won the tournament someday I wouldn't put an asterisk on those two not being in the field.

It's always cool to be back here and feel like you're one of the local guys.

Q. At your Masters pre-press conference you said you had a really good gauge of where your game is at. What did you find went wrong that week?

JORDAN SPIETH: I mean, two holes. Just two holes. And other than that, I could have had a bit of a chance.

I've shown that if I'm within ten on Sunday there is a chance. So I always that there. It was two holes where a little bit of -- I didn't quite have it tight enough in my game to maybe I made a little bit too aggressive of a decision around the greens.

A little combination of both. It was No. 1 in the first round and No. 15 of the first round. They were two different days.

Q. What are what were trying to find last week?

JORDAN SPIETH: It's a lot of those kind of 175-and-in scoring clubs I've been focusing a lot on. Getting a lot tighter with wedges to short irons and taking some off of -- taking 10, 15 off so that when you get a shot into a heavy wind you can go up two, three clubs and chip it and makes it a lot more consistent.

With the stuff that -- you know, when I've been making mistakes it makes those shots really hard, so I've been leaning into a lot of work on scoring clubs.

Q. Just because you were a part of the process on the policy board, what was your take on how the roll-out was for the player equity program, and have you heard any reaction from players?

JORDAN SPIETH: I had a couple players call me and say, wow, I didn't know -- they were excited about what their grants -- I don't know what their grants were. They were excited it was more than they thought it was.

I had conversations all the way back to even maybe just into the new year with some guys who missed out on it that would've made it other years. So I heard both sides.

As far as the roll-out, I believe that it was made very clear to everybody that if anyone was confused in what it meant, how was it coming, and the roll-out specifically, there was PGA TOUR officials every week that could sit down and explain any time anybody wanted to.

I thought that was a good idea. I think it's very confusing. It still is confusing for us players on when it's vested, what's the best idea for taxes, you know, stuff that we don't -- we all have people for that. That's not what any of us our do and it's fairly complicated.

Your question was about the rolling out, I've not heard people upset with the process as much as maybe just in general the idea of if they missed out on it, and there were obviously guys excited about it, too.

Q. With all of the Dallas sports teams thriving right now, how are you planning on watching them tonight? All three are going on. How do you think they're going to play out?

JORDAN SPIETH: Well, Mavs are 6:30, I think, right? Stars are 6:30, and the other one is 8:30 or 9:00. To have a game at 6:30 is unusual and very nice, so I think I'll catch that one.

I'm planning on having to get up in the 4s tomorrow, so it's in my best interest to not watch the late game.

Q. Is there any player on any team, whether it's the Stars, Mavs, Rangers that you haven't gotten to play golf with that you would like to?

JORDAN SPIETH: Stars, Rangers, or Mavs, I think the easy answer a Luka, but I don't know if he cares to play at all.

But I think the most underrated player in all of this is maybe Miro Heiskanen. He's unbelievable, and I kind of like he the way he goes about his work. He's one the best defensemen in all of hockey, and still underrated and pivotal to their run. That was a big two games they went to Vegas and they won.

It's a fun time of the year when teams are doing well. Rangers started back up, and you get reminded of them winning the World Series. Every time you watch the game you're seeing the trophy next to the guys when they're introducing them and stuff.

It's a cool time. And then once this is all done you start getting excited for the Cowboys again. That could be a mixed bag.

Q. Just curious your thoughts or feelings when you watch a guy like Scottie on a heater, Brooks a couple years ago on a heater, knowing you have been there and probably still feel like you have that in your game?

JORDAN SPIETH: Yeah, it's a very good question because I have known Scottie since he was really, really young. Not that I wasn't, but he was really, really young.

I think he's a better person than he is a player, and having known somebody and seen them come up and obviously went to University of Texas, I'm nothing but extremely excited and happy for him. It's well deserved and all that.

And then on the flip side, like it's kind of the first time I've ever looked at somebody younger than me and I've driven inspiration. Like I am inspired by what he is doing. It makes me want to go out and get better, and that's always been someone that's older than me. Kind of the first time I felt that way about somebody that's younger.

Because I play a decent amount of rounds with him here in town. I'm constantly seeing it and trying to beat him at home, and when he's playing better than I am, it sucks. I don't enjoy it when I'm side by side because there were however many years of our life it wasn't that way.

It's flipped and I feel like I've got plenty of runway to be able to get it back. It's inspiring at the same time to try make that happen. I have nothing in my way of being able to make that happen but my own self. I've got enough. I believe in my ceiling, and I believe my ceiling is as high as anybody's. I have to get each part of my game up towards its ceiling.

I have a couple areas that are about at it right now and a couple areas that need to get there. If they do, then I feel like we could go on runs together I guess. (Smiling.)

Q. With May being mental health month, at this point in your career some of things you learned or tactics you employed to stay strong through good times and adversity as well?

JORDAN SPIETH: I think a lot of things I struggled with that have certainly affected me mentally is a lot of comparisons. Being stuck in comparison mode or life and death, golf is like and death, and not separating it from real life and letting results dictate who you are.

It's hard not to especially when you have so much success early in your career and not only are you compared to the outside world to that person, but I have a hard time wondering why I can't do that every week, too.

Good Podcasts, good reading. Starting to reach out to maybe work with some people -- and I have in the past -- on figuring that out.

So I feel like last couple years I've been a lot better mentally than I was at other points in my career, and I think it's just kind of a rare position to be in. There is not a lot of the experience to draw on, but there are people who do a good job talking about it and having kind of different ways, whether it's the way you think, the way you approach it, breathing stuff you can do. Different tactics on how to manage it and bringing you down to reality and say, this is what I do and not who I am.

It's hard to separate that a lot of times, but I feel like I do a lot better job of that now than I used to.