Jordan Spieth has been one of the first players on Tour to routinely talk about his “team” when discussing his results. He often deflects credit, spreading wins across his caddie, his coach, his support staff. A reporter at this week’s John Deere Classic press conference pointed that out, but then asked the obvious follow-up: at the end of the day, though, when you’re actually out there, it all falls on you. How does that feel?

“Well, golf — I mean, if you choose to do what I do for a living, you’re choosing to have the ball in your hands for the last shot from the get-go. That obviously can bring you — that risk can defeat you, and it can also bring you to the highest of highs in sport,” Spieth said at the John Deere Classic when media asked him how it feels to take on that challenge.

“We chose to be there. We choose to do this. If you want to do it at the highest level, you choose to have failure, heart break, and on the other side you get so much more reward from the good, and that risk is worth it to me.”

The team he credits so openly has two constants. Caddie Michael Greller has been alongside him since his amateur days, and coach Cameron McCormick has worked with him since he was 12. Both shape how Spieth prepares and thinks. However, this team can only help guide the 3-time major champion. As his coach, McCormick put it, he can only fulfill his role from the wing; the “cockpit” belongs to Spieth.

In fact, one incident that brought this to light occurred at the Charles Schwab Challenge 2022. The professional planned a shot and discussed it with his caddie, Greller, who said, “I just don’t see it, Jordan.” Spieth’s response was to tell him to put it on him, and he went ahead anyway.

And the pressure of that risk is multi-fold. Scottie Scheffler made a similar point differently ahead of the Travelers Championship, saying that the mental demand of being “on” in front of people for that long is why even someone like Tiger Woods can only handle a limited number of events, and that playing more than three weeks in a row is “extraordinarily difficult” for him personally.

But if/when the reward comes, it comes with full force. When McIlroy finally won the 2025 Masters after an 11-year wait, he fell to his knees and wept, saying he’d never felt a release like it and hadn’t realized how long he’d been holding onto it. The heartbreak is precisely what makes the reward feel like what it does, as Rory said earlier this year: “Good things come to those who wait. Just keep going”.