For the first time since his threesome began its Thursday on the back nine of TPC Sawgrass, Jordan Spieth had earned the honors. Just in time to be the first to launch to the infamous island green at No. 17.
So much water. So little green.
Were he the type susceptible to flashbacks, this was when the world’s No. 2-ranked player would have begun screaming something from Harvey Penick’s Little Red Book while clawing at his eyes with his gloved hand and tearing at his under-seeded hairline with his other.
Instead, he hit a wedge to 23 feet.
Jordan Spieth — remember him, current chapter president of the Rae’s Creek Dive Club? — made his return to competition golf after a rather memorable parting at April’s Masters.
That his first round back was at the Players Championship on a course with enough water to float the Sixth Fleet was interesting. It was 32 days ago that Spieth’s chance to defend his Masters title died when he washed two balls on another wet little par 3. Twice he went into the gentle creek guarding the 12th at Augusta National on the way to a quadruple bogey 7 and an uncomfortable ceremony in which he kept having to help Danny Willett into his new green jacket.
In shooting an unremarkable 72, on a day when breaking par was the norm, Spieth applied the smallest Band-Aid in the box to the old wound.
He looked like a guy who hadn’t played in a month. Putts kept roaring past the hole as if they had a bus to catch. He briefly appeared to be channeling his otherworldly 2015 with three consecutive birdies on his 11th, 12th and 13th holes of the day, only to immediately retreat with consecutive bogeys.
Spieth even finished second in the Masters Redemption Flight of the Players Championship — Ernie Els, he of the six-putt on his first hole at Augusta this year — shot a nifty little 66 and in the process took seven fewer putts than the normally dead-eyed Spieth (24 to 31).
The company he kept didn’t help either. While he bobbed about at level par, fellow threesome member Jason Day shot a course record-tying 63 and zip-lined to the top of the leaderboard.
But at least it wasn’t the wet stuff that got Spieth this time.
The culprits Thursday were sand and sod. He reserved his worst for his final hole of the day, the par-5 9th. Playing his third shot from the back bunker, Spieth found himself playing his fourth shot from the bank off that same obstacle. One more ugly gouge and three putts from 20 feet, and Spieth had himself a closing double bogey.
Now, Spieth accomplished much during his time away. He took a Bahamas vacation with some of the other Tour frat boys. Worked his way through the Fortune 500 on a series of corporate gigs. Did a little light lifting and spent enough time on the range to keep his Puritan guilt at bay.
As he said earlier this week, “After a month off, it felt like a bit of an offseason, so it’s almost like a new year starting this week.”
One thing he obviously didn’t work on was verbalizing his struggles. That is a part of the package is really suffering of late.
So, he was asked, what happened on that last hole?
“I hit it seven times,” he said.
“I hit two fantastic shots and then not really sure after that,” he added, wrapping up a four-question post-round news conference.
Overall, Spieth was reading from the “it’s-just-good-to-be-back” script.
“I really only had had two bad swings today,” he said afterward. “I’m hitting the ball great, which is what I’ve really been working on the past couple weeks, trying to get more consistent and better ball-striking.
“I’m hitting it great, just distance control and my speed control with the putter (were off), which are things that sometimes take a round or two to get back.”
In the pre-tournament presser Wednesday, Spieth pretty much tried to bury the last of the Masters’ bitter dregs.
“I have put it behind me,” he said. “I’m not sure how it’ll feel if I work into contention again. I imagine (bad) thoughts won’t come up because it was just one bad hole with bad timing on my miss.”
Shooting even par on his first post-Masters-apocalypse round left Spieth tied for 83rd. He may have to wait a bit longer to test himself beneath the heat lamp of contention.
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