THE PLAYERS CHAMPIONSHIP

March 14, 2025

J.J. Spaun

TPC Sawgrass

Quick Quotes

Q. How was Thursday, Friday for you? Assess your first two rounds for you.

J.J. SPAUN: Yeah, it was good. Are you asking me a question?

Q. Yeah. What went well out there?

J.J. SPAUN: Just kept the ball in front of me, didn't make a lot of mistakes. When I was out of position I was able to scrape a par or get up-and-down. So far relatively stress-free, and that's very unlikely for a Pete Dye track, let alone Sawgrass. So hopefully I can keep it up.

Q. It's been an especially solid start to the season. Anything you worked on in the off-season you feel like has paid off this year?

J.J. SPAUN: Nothing really. I started off, or I finished the season really good last year, and just kind of been keeping that momentum going forward into this year. I think a little bit of mindset change. Like this is my ninth year, kind of a change of perspective, I guess you could say, for golf in general and life. Maybe that's what it is. But, yeah, it's good to kind of ride this wave that I'm on right now.

Q. What's the change in perspective?

J.J. SPAUN: I don't know, I just have so many responsibilities with like my family and my kids and just wanting to be a dad and balancing life and family life. It's dawned on me that golf is just golf. You hear a lot of people say that when they first have children, and I didn't really think that. I was still like golf, golf, golf. But now that my oldest one is four and, you know, there's lots of emotion when I leave and when I come back. So it puts things in perspective on what really matters.

Q. Do you ever feel guilty being out here?

J.J. SPAUN: Yeah, totally.

Q. How do you deal with that?

J.J. SPAUN: Yeah, it's tough. I don't know how to deal with it. I try to talk to them as much as I can, FaceTime, but when you have a little one that's just always asking where you're at and how much they miss you and to come home, it's tough. My family fortunately knows that daddy's got a job and this is what I got to do. Hopefully it will pay off dividends in the end when things are all said and done, and we can kind of have a good time together.

Q. Do you have any help, your wife have any help?

J.J. SPAUN: Yeah, yeah, we have some nannies. We have some family that help us. But she's been holding down the fort at home kind of on her own a lot, for the last three weeks so far. I mean she said since the start of the season I've been home for one week, so that's kind of tough.

Q. You could be in the Navy and be on a ship for like seven months.

J.J. SPAUN: I tried that angle and it doesn't work. I tried. It doesn't work.

Q. As it relates to this course, do you find it better to kind of slowly move yourself around without mistakes or guys who make like nine birdies and two doubles who have firepower and get slowed by mistakes, but is firepower important here?

J.J. SPAUN: I don't know. I think there's definitely a positive to kind of being mistake free, but then when you kind of get thrown into the thick of it then you're not really expecting it. Whereas guys that make a double and then make a birdie and make an eagle and another double, I don't know. I like stress-free golf, so I would prefer to keep it that way if I can.

Q. Have you seen the forecast for the weekend?

J.J. SPAUN: Yeah.

Q. What do you think it will be like playing here with gusts up to 30?

J.J. SPAUN: Really hard. Really hard. We got it pretty bad last week at Bay Hill on Thursday, and I was one of the first couple groups off too, so it was like 50 degrees and 35-mile-an-hour gusts. I don't know. I feel like if I can get around that place, at least it kind of prepared me for what's to come this weekend.

Q. There's so much trouble here when it's gusting. Do you just do all you can and then hit and hope?

J.J. SPAUN: Yeah, just like conservative targets, aggressiveness to conservative targets. That's kind of what we've been trying to do. The motto this week is just playing smart aggressive.

Greens are good here, fairways are good. Proximity is not -- I mean, it always pays off to hit it close, but if you're hitting a lot of greens you're not going to make big numbers. I think come the weekend that is going to be the No. 1 task is fairways and greens.

Q. Aside from the mindset change, is there anything that you've developed specifically in your game recently that's been helping you out physically?

J.J. SPAUN: Yeah, I think I'm making a little bit more putts, like kind of mid-range putts. I've been putting a lot better. At least I feel like I am. I don't know if statistically I am.

But as long as I feel like I'm putting better than I have in the past, that kind of bleeds into everything. I think the putter's been a lot more stable as of recent months, and yeah, just ball striking has been solid too and just trying to maintain what I've been working on and rolling with that.

Q. You don't look at statistics at all?

J.J. SPAUN: Yeah, I will, but I know tee to green I'm pretty good and usually my putting's kind of on the rocks, but I don't know what I am at this year or this week.

Q. How long have you been in the LAB putter?

J.J. SPAUN: Since this year. I tried it at Sea Island actually. That was my first week. So I played one competitive tournament, I missed the cut, but it wasn't because of my putting. Then, yeah, I played with all winter long at home, played all the games at my course at Whisper Rock and just kind of was like, dove right in and said all right, let's go. Then had a shot at Sony and just, yeah, it's been nice. So it's been working out in my favor.

Q. Is that a tough adjustment? They're just so different than a regular putter.

J.J. SPAUN: Yeah, I think people expect to kind of pull it off the rack and start making everything. You kind of have to unlearn some of your tendencies. Almost in a way you got to get out of the way of the putter or the ball, whatever you want to say and just let it do its thing. There is no manipulation because it's like zero torque or whatever and it's important to get fit for the right lie angle and stuff, because it's lie-angle balanced and that's the whole science behind it. So, yeah, it's been really good for me lately and hopefully keeps doing what it's supposed to be doing.

Q. You're about to get the unprepared reporter question, but I don't recall you at Memphis last year.

J.J. SPAUN: Yeah.

Q. Where did you finish on the FedExCup? What was the fall like for you?

J.J. SPAUN: Last year?

Q. Yeah.

J.J. SPAUN: So I didn't make Memphis last year. So I finished 96th after the end of the fall. But I didn't make -- this was actually my first cut.

Q. The end of Wyndham or after the end of the fall?

J.J. SPAUN: It was actually like, yeah, I was like 95th after Wyndham. I finished third there to finish 95th. Then I played almost every fall event and had a couple top 10s maybe or maybe one top 10 and still finished like the 95th or 96th.

Q. Did that do anything for you, the fall, except for --

J.J. SPAUN: No.

Q. A couple thousand bucks here and there?

J.J. SPAUN: Yeah, some money and a nice trip to Japan. It was nice to secure my card relatively early in the fall. I mean, I didn't make a cut until THE PLAYERS last year, and I was in the first two Signature Events, and I was just not playing really well at all. So I didn't, I don't even think I made more than 15 points until Detroit, so I was in a bad spot.

Q. When you look at everything, what's happening going forward, is there any relief to have done what you did at Cognizant, PGA National?

J.J. SPAUN: Yeah.

Q. And playing well now, to kind of get ahead of things?

J.J. SPAUN: Yeah, I feel like that's kind of the mentality that I have this week. I feel really kind of freed up. Like I have nothing to lose. I'm in a great spot to make a run at top 50, top 30 by the end of the year. Just keep playing good golf and just try to feel like I got nothing to lose.