Jordan Spieth has been playing golf for a month without any pain and plans to return from wrist surgery at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, ending his longest stretch without competition and taking some time off. View it as an opportunity to realign.
“I’ve had some really bad habits for a long time,” Spieth said in a phone interview Friday. “Whether it’s something that would have happened anyway or anything on my wrist that prevents me from getting into certain positions, I don’t have that problem now.
“Having to take three months off forces you to come back and be wet concrete.”
His first wrist injury occurred in May 2023, when the extensor carpi ulnaris tendon (ECU) popped out of its sheath. He decided to undergo surgery in Colorado on Aug. 21 to reconstruct the sheath.
Spieth said it took him nearly 12 weeks before he could hit the ball, and then another month before he played the first round.
“I wouldn’t call this a swing change,” he said. “These were just resets of some of the things I did that were in my DNA and that were super beneficial and I grew out of it for some reason.”
“I hit the practice field covered in snow for the first time,” Spies said on his way to practice at Trinity Forest in Dallas before heading to the Cotton Bowl for the Texas-Ohio State football playoff semifinals.
The rest of the game is hitting shots from rough spots in the rough or awkward positions in the bunkers. But he said he was relieved when he no longer felt pain from the club in certain positions or from the club hitting the turf.
“One day I hit a shot that was supposed to do damage, but it didn’t,” he said.
He’s considering playing in the California desert next week. Instead, his return — more than five months after his last race — will be at Pebble Beach. This year coincides with AT&T’s 40th anniversary as the title sponsor, and it is also the longest-running sponsor of the event. Spieth has had a corporate relationship with AT&T since 2014.
Now it’s a matter of returning to golf’s elite ranks.
Spieth chased the calendar Grand Slam in 2015, when he reached world No. 1, and won three Grand Slams before turning 24. , he has missed the Tour Championship in seven years the past four times.
“I guess I’m trying to look at the big picture,” he said. “I didn’t want to put too much pressure on the warm-up. I just wanted to get back into a rhythm. This was the longest I’ve ever had between rounds so far.”
His plan is to play three weeks in a row — the equivalent of about 18 rounds — and assess how his wrist feels before returning to a regular schedule in preparation for the Masters.
His world ranking dropped from 43rd to 70th after surgery and he failed to advance to the first round of the PGA Tour playoffs. This means he will need a sponsor exemption to attend signing events, which is unlikely to be an issue given his star power.
Spies first rose to fame in 2013 at the age of 20, when he went from not having a PGA Tour card to playing in the Presidents Cup in the space of six months. Even last year, when he only appeared in one game, he still ranked fifth in player impact programs.
Now he’s entering his 13th season — “I prefer to say I’m 31,” Spieth said — and has seen enough to realize that the PGA Tour is deeper than ever. Stronger, and it’s now rare to see huge success in retirement.
Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson and Henrik Stenson are the only players 40 or older to win a major in the past 10 years.
His immediate goal is to win the PGA Championship to complete the career major and Players Championship. “If you win all five tournaments, I feel like you’ve conquered golf,” he said.
But his return – this reset he mentioned – is about getting back to playing at a high level.
“I think the biggest goal for me is, I want to feel like I step on the tee, and I know I’m one of the best golfers in the world — when I step on the tee, I have no idea. No doubt,” he said. “I want things to work out for me to feel consistent enough to believe in it day in and day out. It’s about being able to run in the top 10, top 15 every week.
“I know what that feels like. That’s what I want to get back.”
