Jordan Spieth was standing over a short birdie putt during the second round of the 2026 Travelers Championship when golf decided to be cruel again.

The putt stayed out. Not by a lot. But it stayed out, and Spieth walked away muttering, "This is a sick joke."

The popular golf account Skratch posted the clip on X. According to the on-screen graphic, Spieth was sitting in 65th place at one-over par. It also shows that only 5% of PGA Tour players make putts from that distance. Spieth was among the 95% who missed.

"Spieth is going through it," Skratch wrote.

That one missed putt, though, was not even the worst part of his week.

Coming into the Travelers, Jordan Spieth was ranked 57th on the PGA Tour in Strokes Gained: Putting. His putting rank is his worst since 2018, when he finished 123rd, a steep drop from his usual top-20 finishes.

He was 117th in Total Putting, 110th in makes from 4 to 8 feet, and 86th from inside 10 feet.

And on Wednesday morning at the Travelers pro-am, Jordan Spieth showed up with something nobody expected: a black L.A.B. Golf VZN.1i mallet putter.

For someone who spent the best years of his career with a Scotty Cameron 009 blade, and who had more recently been shifted to a T.P. Mills Trad II blade (since the 2025 WM Phoenix Open), this change was unexpected.

It did not go well. In the first round, Spieth was the sixth-worst putter in the entire field, losing 2.6 strokes to the field on the greens alone. He shot a one-over-par 71, ending his day eight shots behind first-round leader Eric Cole.

After the opening round, HITC's Charlie Walker wrote: "Spieth’s decision to stick with the blade putter is beyond explanation. There’s very little reason for him to be sticking with the same equipment when he’s been struggling so much with his putting."

When the Same Frustration Keeps Coming Back

This was not the first time Spieth has let the pressure burst during a tournament.

At the 2025 Players Championship, the 3x Major Champion was playing well from his return from wrist surgery before hitting his tee shot on the par-5 16th hole into the water during the third round. He made a double bogey and launched his club into the air.

Twelve months later, at TPC Sawgrass, he experienced something very similar. He hit trees, found impossible lies, and played what he himself called 'weird golf.' In his second round, he finished with a double bogey on the 9th hole.

“This place has gotten the best of me in the past, and I let it get the best of me a couple times this week already,” he admitted, per Golf.com.

He had seven birdies in that same round. He also hit three trees and even asked the gallery for help finding his golf ball.

At the 2026 Valspar Championship, Spieth bogeyed his closing hole in consecutive rounds. In round two, he trickled a nine-foot putt on 18.

"I don't think the stats show," Spieth said after finishing 2 under par. "I feel like the way I'm playing is I'm driving it, I think I'm driving it in the top 20, I think I'm striking it in the top 20, I think my short game's in the top 20, I think my putting's in the top 20.

"I've made some bad decisions or hit some wrong tee shots at the wrong time or missed contact that has cost me from having a chance to win three or four times and finishing where I finish," he added.

That much has not changed much now, either.

Read more at Club Golf!

Written by

Md Saife Fida

Edited by

Koushik Biswas