Spieth relaxed chasing history at Quail Hollow

CHARLOTTE, N.C.» Jordan Spieth already has shown a remarkable sense of the moment.

He earned his PGA Tour card by holing a bunker shot on the 18th hole and winning a playoff. In the final round before the Presidents Cup selections, he shot 62 while playing with Phil Mickelson, who told U.S. captain Fred Couples, “Dude, you’ve got to pick this guy.” And right when it looked as though Spieth might throw away another major, he nearly made an ace and followed that with an eagle on his way to winning the British Open.

That was his third major, and it brought Spieth, newly 24, to the grandest moment of all.

No one has ever won the career Grand Slam at a younger age. No one has ever completed it at the PGA Championship. Spieth has never appeared more relaxed. “There will be pressure,” he said. “This is a major championship. This is one of the four pivotal weeks of the year that we focus on. So there will certainly be pressure. I’m simply stating there won’t be added expectations or pressure. It’s not a burning desire to have to be the youngest to do something, and that would be the only reason there would be added expectations.”

Spieth doesn’t see his greatest challenge as the history at stake. He considers it the Quail Hollow Club course that he has played only one time, and the strongest field in golf that features a few major champions who are desperate to make sure the year doesn’t end without them adding another major.

Rory McIlroy comes to mind.

So do Dustin Johnson and Jason Day. McIlroy is a slight favorite, mainly because he has won two times at Quail Hollow — one year with a 62, the other with a 61 — and has finished out of the top 10 just one time in his seven appearances.

“If you’re matched up on Sunday ... you obviously want to be able to play against somebody like Rory who has four major championships and is one of the top couple most accomplished players in this field,” Spieth said. “But he is one to fear in that position because of what he’s capable of doing and how he’s going to do it.”

Fear is not a word Spieth uses often. This week at the PGA Championship is more about being free from the burden of trying to win a major this year. He says he hasn’t felt this way since the 2015 U.S. Open at Chambers Bay, right after he won the Masters for his first major.

“Almost like I’ve accomplished something so great this year that anything else that happens, I can accept,” he said. “That takes that pressure, that expectation away.”

Spieth figures he has two decades or more playing the PGA Championship if he doesn’t complete the slam this week. Only five other players have won all four modern majors — Gene Sarazen, Ben Hogan, Gary Player, Jack Nicklaus and Tiger Woods.

Then again, none of the five went more than three years before adding the final leg to the Grand Slam. Arnold Palmer and Tom Watson spent their careers chasing it.

“The more years you go on playing PGAs, and if I don’t win one in the next 10 years, then maybe there’s added pressure,” Spieth said. “And hopefully, we don’t have to have this conversation in 10 years.”