Spieth Crunches The Numbers For 2014

Jordan Spieth made his way into the Northwestern Mutual World Challenge media center Tuesday as a replacement for Brandt Snedeker in the 18-man field, and yet arguably one of the biggest draws for the event.

As Steve DiMeglio notes, "Spieth remains grounded and brags as often as he has four-putt, knowing last year at this time he was taking his finals at the University of Texas."

At 19, Spieth hasn't been on the tour long enough to treat these sessions as agony, or, more likely, he's just solid enough of an individual that he doesn't treat these sitdowns with us scribblers as something akin to a dental office visit.

Spieth revealed some wonky, Inside-the-Beltway stuff about his preparation for next year, which prompted me to ask some follow-up questions. Considering that Spieth is not as analytical as some players, it seems even the naturals have to take the wealth of information provided by Shotlink to look at their games once the season is over.

From the press conference, and worth remembering heading into the 2014 season:

Q. Jordan, you mentioned the majors and knowing that you have your schedule set now.  We've seen the last few years guys now go to the venue the week before.  Some people like to play the week before.  Now that you have this mapped out, what is your philosophy going to be in preparing for the majors?

JORDAN SPIETH:  Yeah, throughout last year, I had never played -- before last year I had never played more than two weeks in a row.  Last year I saw what it was like to play four in a row a couple of different stretches.  It's amazing my best golf was always played the second, third or fourth week in a row.  Even more so, the third and fourth week in a row is when I was hitting the ball best and making the best decisions.  I would have never known that before this year.  So, yeah, I will be planning my schedule to definitely be playing and peaking at those tournaments which looks like it would be playing in a week or two or both of them prior to the majors.

Q. You mentioned you sat down and looked at stats with your instructor, what kind of -- what stats interest you to look at?  What are the things that stood out for you?

JORDAN SPIETH:  Yeah, overall, I was extremely happy with the all-around stat, whatever that is called, encompassing all of them.  Two major things, well, one, putting.  My putting the second half of the year strokes gained versus the first half of the year was significantly different getting used to the greens and I putted a lot better.

But the two things that I really need to focus on this year are my long-iron play, and I just need to hit some more pitches around the greens.  Par-5s, I would get around the green in two and even in smart places.  That 20- to 40-yard range, pitching the ball, it just wasn't getting it close enough.  So luckily that's something that is based on how many reps you hit and just getting the feel of the grass each week.  So I think if I had the same kind of routine and put a little extra time into those two departments, I'd just improve from last year.