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Three swipes from three feet revealed the magic that hasn’t been there wasn’t coming back, not this week at least. There was hope it might resurface at Royal Birkdale since this is where it burned brightest, where Jordan Spieth scaled the dunes into the unknown to steal a claret jug that he and fate had both tried to lose. But just because things used to be once doesn’t mean they will be again, which is why nostalgia is the worst kind of drug.
“Should be a really good opportunity this week,” Spieth said on Monday. “Yeah, I feel like I have a lot of great golf in front of me. I feel like I’m way more optimistic than I’ve been at a lot of different points in my career.”
Spieth had started 11 shots back after an opening 73, needing nothing worse than 68 to make it to Saturday. For five holes, he was building a case with two birdies and three pars. Then the sixth took one back, and the seventh took the rest—missed green, chip to three feet, three putts to finish it. In the space of two holes, he went from straddling the cut line to three shots outside it. “I feel better than my results have shown. Just a mix of reasons why, but a really good opportunity this week to believe that, trust that. The more difficult the venue, it requires me to really dial in mentally a little bit more, which I think is going to be a good thing.”
In April, we wondered if Spieth wasn’t going to get it right at Augusta, would he ever get it right again? Perhaps that was unfair. As Spieth himself pointed out this week, he’s only 32. Phil Mickelson didn’t win his first major until he was 34. Ben Hogan’s best golf came after 35. There’s runway left for a player who once looked incapable of anything but greatness to remember what that felt like.
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But the runway doesn’t erase ground already covered. This is the 15th straight major in which he will fail to post a top 10. He hasn’t truly contended since the 2021 Open. He’s made 16 cuts in 19 starts this year, proof he can still play, yet his best finish is a T-11. Somewhere between capable and formidable, nothing more.
“I have a really good gauge on when my game feels the way it should, and I’m producing the shots, like what that should yield. I’m not … I had to kind of sit back and be like, man, am I not as on as I think I am? And I had to take a look and dive into stats and stuff like that. Being realistic where you’re at can change your strategy, can change your expectations, and then a lot of times your mentality, so if you’re not scoring you could be more patient. I truly feel it’s more with just not having the results that I feel that my game is … like if I could call every shot, I feel like I’ve hit a lot of shots. I’ve called my shots a lot of times that have ended up in maybe less great spots than other times where I didn’t feel like I hit as good a shot and it ended up OK. That’s just golf, and you just stay with it and more consistent.”
Golf wants his conviction to come true, badly. Few carry Spieth’s gravitational pull. Because he’s likeable, charming, self-deprecating in a sport that too often isn’t. Because he finds trouble his peers wouldn’t survive, then escapes it anyway, over and over, in ways that prove what he’s doing isn’t luck. Because once your game is dipped in gold, that shine doesn’t wipe off. Not even when the game does.
And while even his most ardent defenders concede 2015 isn’t walking back through that door, there are still weeks, still places, where he can be great. Augusta National and the Open rota courses remain his last strongholds, terrain where imagination counts more than power, where his bravado and inventiveness and even his chaos can still, occasionally, look like witchcraft instead of a warning sign.
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“A lot of it’s just been in the majors. I struck it tee to green well enough to win all three majors this year and had three of my worst putting performances. The stroke felt fine; just didn’t go in. So I’ve been working really hard on, whether it’s practice or where I’m playing, how often I’m playing, to try to get the lid off. Stroking it well; they just need to fall.” There’s no need to declare the hope unfounded. One of the most beautiful things about sports is that we have no idea what happens next, that the story isn’t finished just because the recent chapters have been unkind. Anyone who claims they know how this ends is either a blowhard or blind to that beauty. It’s why we watch in the first place, why we keep watching even when the watching gets hard.
“Walking up the 18th and remembering what it was like to walk up that 18th hole nine years ago, putt to the pins that I putted to. Obviously, some of those holes coming in have changed. That was … maybe the best shot and the best putt I’ve ever hit don’t exist anymore.” But there are 10 months until the 2027 Masters. Until then, he and we are left anxious for a moment that, deep down, we fear will never come. Until then, nostalgia will have to do.
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