Smylie Kaufman has claimed that the season Jordan Spieth is having almost makes absolutely no sense, with one part of his game actually better than it ever has been.
Golf fans probably would not have believed you had they been told back in 2017 that Jordan Spieth would reach the final major of 2024 still awaiting his fourth title. It appeared that the Texan was a certainty to become one of the all-time greats, particularly when he won the first two majors of 2015.
However, the 30-year-old has been unable to kick on since then. Since winning The Open Championship in 2017, Spieth has won just twice on the PGA Tour, and he has not won since 2022. He has not automatically qualified for a Ryder Cup since 2018.
Spieth has missed five cuts this season, and not finished inside the top 25 since the Valero Texas Open back in April. So, many will be wondering whether we are going to see him get back to his very best in the years to come.
Jordan Spieth’s season almost makes no sense
As it turns out, one aspect of Spieth’s game has potentially never been better, with Smylie Kaufman telling Subpar that it is almost baffling how he has performed this season.
“It’s funny, right, because if you go and look at the stats, you get confused because if you supplanted his driving ability this year in any other year, he’s winning, maybe not in a Scottie Scheffler-dominant year, but he’s at least finishing top five a couple of different times, he’s in contention, has a chance on the back nine on Sunday,” he said.
“This year, it’s just been a total opposite of what his career has been. He’s always been able to lean on his wedge game, his short game and his iron game really, just his ability to shape shots and be comfortable shaping it both ways.
“His putting was good to start the year, but his putting lately has really tailed off and now he’s got an iron and wedge game that is just mediocre by his standards and an inconsistent putter inside of 10 feet lately, so I don’t know.
“I keep wanting to believe that one week it’s all going to come together. But when you have so many things that are slightly off, it seems like he pushes a little bit too much on some days to try and make something happen instead of just letting the tournament come to him and let his game come to him, which we all are guilty when we’re playing on the PGA Tour to try and reach those expectations, because you want your work ethic to match your results.
“He’s been working his tail off, he’s never driven it better, and he’s never driven it further and he’s probably just having a season which doesn’t make any sense by the metrics and by his standards.”
Invincibility has now disappeared from Spieth’s game
According to the PGA Tour’s website, Spieth is 16th on tour this season for strokes gained off the tee, while he is 110th for strokes gained with approaches, and 80th for strokes gained with the putter.
There was a time when you thought Spieth was never going to miss a putt, and it really seemed that he had that sense of invincibility that the game had seen from the likes of Rory McIlroy and Tiger Woods before that.
Woods famously, could be extremely erratic with the driver, but always seemed to find a way to create birdie opportunities from the most outrageous places – and Spieth had that potential too.
He has been dealing with injury in recent years, and it does seem that he is struggling to adapt. But there is undoubtedly a major question mark over whether he will ever win another major when, seven years ago, it seemed that the only debate was over whether he could rival Woods’ tally.
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