All narratives point to strong Spieth at PGA
Action Network’s golf expert makes his top picks for this weekend’s PGA Championship at Southern Hills.
Outright winner
Jordan Spieth (20/1): On Saturday evening, after the third round of the AT&T Byron Nelson, I hosted the SiriusXM PGA Tour Radio postgame show with Craig Stadler. Among the pearls of wisdom from Stads, he offered this when Spieth was trailing by a stroke through 54 holes: “When he isn’t confident, he really doesn’t play well, but when he’s confident, he plays really well.”
Now, I know that might sound like the type of analyst-speak we always hear, just a cliché-riddled take that could apply to anyone. But the reality is, he’s absolutely right — and this applies more to Spieth than any other player in the game today.
You can see it written across his face. When Spieth can’t figure it out inside the ropes, his entire demeanor changes. He appears stressed out. He talks things out with caddie Michael Greller more. It doesn’t take a former Masters champion to understand that in these situations, he’s not fully confident in his abilities.
When he is confident, though, Spieth just carries himself differently. He looks as if he expects every iron shot to go in the hole — and if it doesn’t, then he truly believes he’ll just make the ensuing chip or putt. It’s almost as if he knows a little secret and is trying to keep it to himself, but doesn’t quite own a good enough poker face.
Following a final-round 67 that left him in solo second place, Spieth said: “I’m striking it better, consistently. I feel like I’ve got every shot.” Even if you can’t read body language, you can understand the confidence behind such words. That is not the rhetoric of someone who’s still trying to dig it out of the dirt and find his game.
And if you’re not buying into the karma narrative or the confidence narrative, then try the statistical narrative. In his last two starts, Spieth owns a win and a runner-up, while leading the field in Strokes Gained: Tee-to-Green.
There’s literally no reason not to like him this week.
No player has ever made this one his final leg of the career slam. We have every reason to believe that Spieth could be the first this week.
Top-five finish
Rory McIlroy (+300): Look, I have no idea whether McIlroy will post another one of his patented “backdoor” top-five finishes or will take the more traditional “front-door” route, but I do expect him to be right there in the mix at the end of this one.
(For those who haven’t read my take on McIlroy and “backdoor top fives” in previous weeks, I think it’s one of the silliest narratives around. Players are supposed to play their best in the final round when it matters the most. I’d rather have money on a guy who does that and “backdoors” his way into strong finishes than the alternative, which I suppose is a guy who chokes away a lead at the end and claims what I suppose should be called a “front-door top five” instead.)
He proved at both the Masters and the Wells Fargo that when his game is clicking, it still might be better than anyone else’s best stuff. The problem, of course, is that he’s been going through these brief periods during tournament weeks when he doesn’t have anything close to his best stuff. If he can get off to a hot start at this one, watch out.
I really think McIlroy could win one of these by a half-dozen strokes at some point. Even if he doesn’t, though, nobody knows how to play his best golf late in the week like him, so expect another leaderboard-rising round on Sunday.
Go to actionnetwork.com for more of Jason Sobel’s PGA Championship selections.