The main event in golf no longer includes Tiger Woods, who has been consigned to the undercard, even with the attention he’ll command at Augusta National this week.The stage now belongs to Rory McIlroy and Jordan Spieth, the latter producing further evidence at the Shell Houston Open that he belongs there.
Spieth did not win; he tied for second, losing to J.B. Holmes in a playoff that also included Johnson Wagner. But it continued a roll — our word, not his — that began with his victory in the Australian Open at the end of November and is now entering its fourth month with no indication that it will stop any time soon.
McIlroy was among those Spieth defeated in Australia by shooting a final-round 63. He then won the Hero World Challenge by 10 shots in December and in his last three PGA Tour starts has finished first, second and tied for second.
“That round of golf [in Australia] has done more for me than I could have imagined at the time,” Spieth said. “Since then, it’s been called a run. People ask me, ‘is this a run that you’re on?’ I don’t really like that. I don’t really like calling it that because that would mean that normal would be anything less than where I’m at and I expect myself to be playing like this.”