OAKMONT, Pa. – J.J. Spaun once dreamed of being a professional skateboarder.
No wonder he’s embraced this U.S. Open grind.
With Oakmont Country Club already wiping out some of the world’s top players by lunchtime Thursday, Spaun kept his first round on the rails better than anyone. His 4-under 66 didn’t just match the opening-round low in nine previous championships at Oakmont, but he recorded only the eighth bogey-free professional round at Henry C. Fownes’ beautiful behemoth and became the first player to tame Oakmont to the tune of 31 or better on his first nine holes of the week.
“You want to say, like, thank you to everyone that’s telling you, good playing,” Spaun said, “but you end up saying it 50 times in one hole.”
How does one explain Spaun’s execution?
His 26 putts are a start, with Spaun considering Thursday’s performance on the greens one of his best of the year. “It felt like one of those days where you couldn’t really miss anything that was a reasonable putt to make,” Spaun added.
He also gained over a shot both off the tee and on approach.
And though he missed six greens, he was a perfect 6 for 6 scrambling, including at the par-5 fourth hole, his 13th hole of the day, where he drove it into the side of one of 13 church pews and later converted an 8-footer after splashing out of the sand. His last up-and-down par was clutch as well, hooping a par putt from 17 feet after finding the right greenside bunker, some 30 yards short of the flag, at the par-3 sixth.
“You’re obviously going to have to grind when you’re out of position, and I did that really well today,” Spaun said. “… That’s kind of the key to this tournament and this venue is just not losing your steam, not losing your focus, and converting those momentum-saving putts.”
Perhaps it’s no coincidence that Spaun began working with a new short-game instructor this week in Josh Gregory. While Spaun entered the week No. 12 on the PGA Tour in strokes gained tee to green, he was No. 120 around the green, his only negative of the four strokes-gained stats.
With Oakmont’s juicy, 5-inch rough producing a high variance of lies, Gregory worked with Spaun on not only judging lies better but how to set up and release the club for each lie.
“He’s got great hands,” Gregory said. “He just needed a little guidance.”
Just three shots into Thursday’s opening round, Spaun chipped in for birdie, and Spaun’s caddie, Mark Carens, told his player, “Nice chip, Josh.”
Also contributing to Spaun’s best of what is now 27 career major rounds was something he didn’t fix. Following just his second missed cut of the season at the Memorial, Spaun went down what he called a “rabbit hole” with his golf swing.
In layman’s terms, Spaun’s club position at the top was “a little too down the line” when he prefers the club pointing slightly left of the target to help him hit a cut. Spaun stressed for two days as he tried to manufacture a more laid-off position at the top, but it just wasn’t feeling natural.
“I was like, I feel uncomfortable playing at home with this; how am I going to do this at the Open?” Spaun explained. “I kind of just forgot about it and tried to just use more of, we call it, through-side feel, meaning through the ball. That can kind of get you where you want to be based off of where you’re trying to hit it and stuff like that. We just figured just keep up with the rotation in my upper body to kind of keep the club out in front of me.”
Spaun’s one-shot lead after the morning wave is far better than his career-best major position after 18 holes – a T-16 during the 2022 Masters. He was one of just five players to break par on Thursday morning, and he bested the field average by over nine strokes.
Xander Schauffele and Ludvig Åberg, who each posted 72, can’t say that.
Neither can Bryson DeChambeau (73) or Rory McIlroy (74).
It was after Spaun’s playoff loss to McIlroy at The Players earlier this year that the 34-year-old veteran, who enters this week at a career-best 25th in the world rankings, talked about how he finally feels comfortable with the ball proverbially in his hand at the end of tournaments. He broke through for his first PGA Tour win a few years ago and has posted three top-3 finishes this year alone.
As a skater boy, Spaun admits he never had the guts to do anything big.
My, how times have changed.
