Jordan Spieth is only 22 and yet he's already achieved more on the PGA Tour than most professional golfers do in their career. Spieth, however, hasn't been himself to start of this season, a fact that was further exemplified during his mediocre first round at the Valspar Championship.
Spieth, who won the PGA Tour event last year, carded a 76 on Day 1 and now sits at five-over par. The good news is that the projected cut is two-over par right now, so he has a good shot to rebound and play through the weekend. He'll tee off at 12:57 p.m. ET with Bill Haas (E) and Henrik Stenson (E) on Friday.
Yesterday marked the third straight round Spieth shot over par. He finished one over during the final two rounds of last week's WGC-Cadillac Championship, which is certainly out of character for the ascending talent. But yesterday, Spieth caught some flak from a golf fan on Instagram and the two-time major winner wouldn't have any of it. Check out the post below, provided by Golf Channel's Nick Menta:
Jordan Spieth just called out an Instagram "troll" and the PGA Tour's Twitter account: https://t.co/RFuwDywhzG pic.twitter.com/EB6mX3zBar
— Nick Menta (@NickMentaGC) March 11, 2016
The user told Spieth that his "wedge game is total garbage," which didn't sit well with the world's No. 1 golfer. Spieth responded quickly, saying, "Couldn't be further from the truth troll. Go to research before hating."
The uncharacteristic response from the 22-year-old was, in a word, awesome. All too often sports fans sit on the internet and blindly criticize and lambaste players and teams because they, by and large, have nothing better to do. If Spieth's wedge game was "total garbage" then he probably wouldn't be the top golfer in the entire world. His wedges were off on Thursday (especially due to the gusting 15 mph winds), but a bad day for Spieth is a career day for the average, everyday golfer. As a result, he probably figured it was appropriate to give credit where credit is due and call "degoose23," the unnamed internet commenter who bashed him, a troll.
Now, Spieth has the chance to prove the trolls wrong during the second round of the Valspar Championship as he looks to avoid missing the cut for the second time this season.
Will MacKenzie just took the lead at five-under par, passing Keegan Bradley (-4), Ken Duke (-4), Scott Brown (-4) and Charles Howell III (-4). MacKenzie is four-under during today's round.
