PEBBLE BEACH — It’s quite strange how success—especially the life-changing kind—can sometimes lead to doubts. It isn’t doubts about ability but stability. It isn’t doubts about who you are but who you are supposed to be.
Somewhere in that murky fog walks J.J. Spaun. He is the reigning U.S. Open champion, but he is not exactly sure what that is supposed to mean. It’s not his identity. Or is it? The trophy he won last June at Oakmont Country Club sits on the mantle in his living room, “so I can look at it every day,” he said. The prize represents a massive triumph in his chosen sport. It tells him just how good he has become as a professional golfer.
But it doesn’t tell him how to handle all that goes with it.
Spaun opened the AT&T Pebble Beach Pro-Am Thursday with a two-under 70 on a picture postcard day at Pebble Beach Golf Links. He overcame a double bogey on the short opening par-4 and battled his game during a round when scoring was ideal and an avalanche of birdies tumbled easily for most of the 80-man field at Pebble and nearby Spyglass Hill.
Despite his middling start, which left him tied for 51st place, Spaun was summoned to an interview with Sky Sports. He is the U.S. Open champion, after all. What perplexes him is the niggling question of just how a U.S. Open champion is supposed to carry around his newfound renown.
“It’s tough to figure out,” Spaun 35, told Golf Digest. “In a perfect world I want to say that I can go with the mindset of having nothing to lose and nothing to really to prove. But given the territory I’m in now, there’s a lot of expectations. Not only external, but internally as well. And I’ve already felt issues with that.
“Even starting the year, I feel like I’m the highest ranked player or one of the highest ranked players in every field. And it’s like, ‘You need to be playing good; you need to be contending.’ And if I don’t, it’s like the pressure just builds up and it’s hard to kind of be nice to myself when that doesn’t happen.”
Ben Jared
It’s one thing to win the U.S. Open, and it’s another to win at storied Oakmont. It’s still another when you sew up your country’s national championship with an improbable 65-foot birdie putt in the gloaming on the final green, a highlight reel moment that will play in his head forever as well as on television for decades to come.
“It’s incredible because you see moments like that in golf history and you just never really imagined yourself having a moment like that,” said the Los Angeles native. “And to even hear that from people, that it was the most iconic golf moment they’ve ever witnessed, that they’ll never forget it for the rest of their life. I’m like, ‘Geez, I definitely won’t forget, but people who just watched it won’t forget?’ It’s pretty crazy.
“Obviously, it’s so fun to hear it and hear it through other people’s perspective and yeah, it’s a great thing that I accomplished and achieved and I’m just constantly reminded of it. And I think when I do hear that, I need to realize that I am capable of something really great. Every time I hear it, it never gets old. But in a way I am still processing it. And it’s a lot.”
Spaun enjoyed a magical season in 2025, finishing runner-up three times in addition to his second career win on the PGA Tour. He earned more than $13 million, played for the U.S. in the Ryder Cup and was invited in December to the exclusive 20-man field at the Hero World Challenge hosted by Tiger Woods. He finished the year ranked sixth in the world after starting in January at 115th.
Even with the U.S. Open victory, Spaun was able to keep his head down and feel like he was still flying under the radar, even if he wasn’t. But he felt his life changing, and it has changed, and early in this new season he sometimes doesn’t recognize the golfer inside the champion.
Normalcy is underrated.
So the T-40 he posted at the Sony Open in Hawaii and the missed cut at the Farmers Insurance Open near San Diego are weighing on him. Last week, he was supposed to compete in the WM Phoenix Open, but a virus he contracted at Torrey Pines resulted in a bout of vertigo that made him to withdraw. Pebble Beach, which hosts the U.S. Open again in 2027, represents a chance to get in four rounds and get his feet back under him. In several ways.
Patrick Smith
The good news is that his feet have never left the ground. That’s a start.
“I just need to get back to playing my game and not caring about result and just working hard,” Spaun, now No. 7 in the world, said. “And I think the toughest thing this year will be mentally having acceptance with whatever happens. And try not to hang my head too much on the expectations. I mean, I’ve never been in this position before. Last year was just a crazy ride that I was rolling with, and I felt like I couldn’t be stopped, but we’ll see how it goes. It’s my third event, so we’ll see what this week brings.”
When the late Payne Stewart won his first major championship at the 1989 PGA Championship, he admitted that he struggled with the enormity of it. He tried to be a different player, to measure up to the accomplishment. It took him a few years to figure out that being himself was enough.
Spaun can relate. He marvels at Scottie Scheffler and Rory McIlroy, players who have learned to build success on top of success. What’s fascinating is that he understands that he is not Scheffler or McIlroy or anyone in that galaxy. Not that he isn’t good enough. Of that he has no doubt. But it simply isn’t who he is. And that’s OK.
He’s streaky. But his best can beat anybody. Of that he has no doubt.
“I think that’s the hardest thing, that you think you’ve got to do the right things or change things and perform at the top all the time,” he said. “I’ve never really been that consistent in with contending like that at huge events. I don’t want to think it was like an outlier year, but I just built off so much momentum and I think the inner belief and the self-belief that I developed was what kind of kept me going. I just need to keep that there for this year.”
J.J. Spaun is the U.S. Open champion. He doesn’t need belief for that. He just needs to embrace it.
This article was originally published on golfdigest.com
