Jordan Spieth opened the Valero Texas Open with a 5-under 67 and sat among the many high 5 on the leaderboard. He put himself in a terrific place by way of 18 holes, hoping that might proceed over the weekend. Spieth has not received a PGA Tour occasion since 2022, when he received the RBC Heritage in Hilton Head the week after The Masters.
However Friday’s second spherical set Spieth again a bit. He struggled across the greens, because it all added as much as a 1-over 73. He’s now 4-under for the championship and was 4 strokes again of Keith Mitchell when he walked off the golf course. Mitchell had a day tee time, in order that margin will probably enhance by day’s finish.
But, Spieth’s struggles on Friday are nothing new. Exterior of a 6-under 65 on Friday on the WM Phoenix Open, Spieth has posted just one sub-70 rating through the second spherical this season. His second spherical scoring common is 70.17, which is sweet for 97th on the PGA Tour. He already has two top-10s to his identify this season, and is forty fourth on tour in complete strokes gained, so his total play far outweighs the scores he posted on Friday.
Spieth is aware of that too.
“I’ve bought to get higher at closing these rounds out on Fridays,” Spieth stated on Friday.
“I had the identical drawback occur in Tampa. It’s not like a development or something, they only have been random issues every day, and this one occurred to be misjudging chips, which is generally a specialty of mine. I’m just a bit — just a little, you already know, how do you’re feeling whenever you’re on a foul run of playing cards and like, man, on the final gap I’m like absolutely that is going to leap just a little bit and run after which that one spins. Like I simply by no means would have guessed it will spin. Misjudging them stinks.”
Spieth bogied two of his remaining three holes on Friday and missed a six-footer for birdie on the par-5 eighth gap in between. His chip on the ninth gap stopped 13 ft wanting the opening, and he couldn’t save his par.
“These final three holes [includes a] reachable par-5 off the tee field, and [I had] a reasonably good quantity on the final, realizing that the lead’s going to be someplace round 10, possibly 9, 10 underneath, I actually felt like I wanted to get to 7 to have an opportunity,” Spieth added.
“That’s actually extremely irritating as a result of it’s like these are — they’re proper there.”
Spieth misplaced a stroke across the greens on Friday, rating one hundred and first among the many area in that metric. Contemplating he has among the best brief video games on this planet, that’s an eye-opening statistic. However on the identical time, that’s golf. Stuff like that occurs, even for three-time main winners.
But, Spieth is aware of the golf course inside and outside. He received the 2021 Valero Texas Open and has additionally completed among the many top-10 at TPC San Antonio on three different events, together with final 12 months.
“It’s not like I come right here and I’m like, ‘Oh, yeah, this seems to be straightforward for some motive.’ It’s a tough golf course with a premium on placing the ball within the fairway. With the tough so low, a few of these again pin,s it’s nearly higher to be on this tough since you land in the course of the inexperienced and it runs up. The instances that I’ve truly been within the tough, I’ve truly hit higher strategy pictures in a bizarre method. Having stated that, I’d nonetheless take 14 fairways tomorrow,” Spieth stated.
“The opposite factor is you’ve bought to play within the wind, you’ve bought to flight the ball some, you’ve bought to throw some within the air, you’ve bought to only be just a little artistic within the top that you just hit pictures, generally the curve. It’s usually simply the Texas wind, and the instances I performed nicely right here I drove it — you already know, I’d been driving it nicely.”
To date this week, he has hit 18-of-28 fairways. He has putted nicely too, however as he alluded to, he didn’t end his second spherical on a excessive observe.
That may probably come again to hang-out him this weekend, as Spieth should make a transfer up the leaderboard if he needs to return to the winner’s circle once more.
Jack Milko is a golf workers author for SB Nation’s Taking part in By way of. Observe him on X @jack_milko.