Jordan Spieth said his wrist tendon popped out on final hole at last year’s British Open

PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. – While playing a round back home in Dallas last Thursday, Jordan Spieth and Scottie Scheffler realized they were doing physical therapy for their various injuries in the same building.

“We didn't know we were there at the same time that morning until we got out there and I asked who he did it with,” said Spieth, speaking on Wednesday during his pre-tournament press conference at the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, of their hand surgeons.

Scheffler, who injured himself on Christmas and required hand surgery, isn't the only one set to make his 2025 PGA Tour debut on Thursday. Spieth is making his first start since August at the FedEx St. Jude Championship after undergoing surgery on his left wrist to repair a ruptured tendon sheath. Spieth had been nursing the injury since May 2023, recording just three top-10 finishes, a career low, and tumbling to No. 77 in the Official World Golf Ranking.

Speaking at a Q&A with Jim Nantz on Wednesday night, Spieth recounted the moment when his tendon popped out on the final hole at last year’s final round of the British Open and he knew he needed to get his wrist fixed.

“I got it back in before I hit my tee shot, and that’s when I thought maybe that’s the last straw. Maybe we should probably do something about this,” he said. “I don’t really feel like playing like this anymore.”

Spieth had surgery three days after being eliminated from the FedEx Cup Playoffs in August. He said he had a cast up to his mid bicep. He began gripping a putter after about week 8 post-surgery, then began chipping and said around week 11 he started hitting Nerf balls to work on his mechanics.

“A real ball, if I hit more than 40, 50 yards hurt pretty bad on impact,” he said. “Then at around week 12, which is what my surgeon thought it would be of the recovery time, there was a stretch there between like 11 and a half and 12 and a half where I could start to hit on a ball count and I would hit one, say a 6-iron thin off the heel and it hurt real bad.”

He was still on a ball count until about December.

“Then one day the thin heel one just didn't hurt anymore. I hit it and I was like that should be the exact same as it was yesterday and it just didn't hurt,” he said.

Spieth said he considered returning a few weeks ago at The American Express but opted to take the advice of some fellow competitors as well as friends in tennis and baseball who advised him that no one has ever come back too late from a surgery.

“So I kind of took that to heart,” Spieth said. “As much as I wanted to just start getting out there, I'm glad that I've waited till here.”

Where will Jordan Spieth play after AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am?

Short-term, Spieth said he expects to play the next two weeks at the WM Phoenix Open and the Genesis Invitational (which suggests he will get a sponsor invite to the signature event) so if he can get through that stretch feeling as good if not better than he started, he’d count that as a big win. Then he’d like to work his way into contention at least once before the Masters. His lofty goal for this season? Making the U.S. Ryder Cup team.

“I don't think I need to change a whole lot,” he said, noting that getting healthy was critical and all he needs is to gain some confidence in the tweaks he made to his swing. “I was able to work on some things in the swing kind of in a way that I hadn't worked on them since I was 13 years old, where I had this time, this wet concrete to try to mold some things, get out of some bad habits.”

During that downtime, Spieth also took time to plot out what he’d like to accomplish in this next phase of his career.

“I got 10 years of hopefully similar schedules and set some goals for some wins and some contending in majors and stuff like that,” he said.

Spieth, who won the 2017 AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am, is winless since the 2022 RBC Heritage, but he’s not stressing about getting back to the winner’s circle right away.

“I wouldn't be surprised if I'm in the top 10 entering Sunday here, but I wouldn't be surprised if I'm not,” he said.

What matters most is that he says he’s healthy again and that will give him a shot to reach some of his loftiest goals.

“It's all systems go now and I'm excited to be back,” he said.

This article originally appeared on Golfweek: Jordan Spieth explains wrist injury ahead of 2025 Pebble Beach Pro-Am