TPC Sawgrass has a way to put together your annual leaderboard. Common names such as Scottie Scheffler, Rory McIlroy, Collin Morikawa, Justin Thomas usually have real estate. But so are the long shots and dark horses, which are proof of the incredible volatility this course offers.
One of those underdogs is JJ Spaun. He shot the first lead in the third round on Saturday with a 10-under par. He also plays in a penultimate pairing with McIlroy, so the Northern Irish is probably the most popular player in the sport named Tiger Woods, so he sets up a considerable dichotomy.
But Spaun is someone everyone has to take root this weekend. He's the perfect underdog who can change his life for the better with victory on Sunday.
The Los Angeles native, Spawn played jointly at San Diego State University. Mountain West Conference Player of the Year honors in 2012. He then went on to the PGA Tour Canada and Corn Ferry Tours as a professional, earning a PGA Tour membership in 2017. After starting his 147 career start, Spaun won his first PGA Tour at the Valero Texas Open five years later. But he hasn't won since.
Therefore, he had to grind his way through practice range and spent countless hours every day maintaining his PGA Tour card for another year. This includes many practice rounds. Many of them come with NBC Sports cart by rum.
All that effort left Spaun just before the playoffs of the FedEx Cup a year ago. However, he continued his solid fall, highlighted by the T-6 at the Japan Zozo Championships. He then divided the stretch into some amazing months of the first few months of 2025. This included three top 15. He also had a great opportunity to finish off the runner-up in Cognizant Classic and win the Sony Open in Hawaii. However, a par 3 bogey on the 17th, when he hit a poor bunker shot, kept him on a shot from the playoffs that Nick Taylor won. It's been a brutal blow ever since he took the lead of 54 holes. His second career PGA Tour title will have to wait.
However, his relative success and strong play so far in 2025 are at a cost.
After posting a 4-under 68 on TPC Sawgrass on Friday, Spaun committed a crime about himself, leaving the golf course. Not because he did something wrong or ran away on a lucky break, but because he is a man of the family at heart. This week marks his ninth event of the year. This means he is on the road frequently. This is the challenging reality that 34-year-old Spaun struggles to grasp it.
“It's stiff. I don't know how to deal with it,” Spawn said Friday.
“I try to talk to them as much as I can, FaceTime, but when there's a little thing that's constantly asking where you are and how much you'll miss you and go home, it's difficult. My family is lucky enough to know that Dad has a job. This is what I have to do. Hopefully, it will ultimately be said and pay off the dividends when it's done, and we can have a good time together.”
Luckily, for the Melody, she has the help of a nanny and a supportive large family. However, her husband has only been home for a week this season. This is a testament to the challenging life of being an expert on the intermediate PGA Tour.
He was a lot last year, but played in 28 events, none of them were four major championships. Spaun rose 32 times the previous year. This included missed cuts at the PGA Championship at Oak Hill.
“I have so many responsibilities with my family and my children, I just want to be a dad and balance my life with my family life,” Spaun said.
“I hear a lot of people say that when they first have kids, I didn't really think about it. I still liked golf, golf, golf, golf, but my oldest ones are four, and there are a lot of emotions you know, when I leave and when I come back. So, it puts things in perspective about what's really important.”
Despite the challenge of being on the road frequently, he knows there is great support from his home. A solid family helped him in 2025 despite Spaun earning more frequent flyer miles than he counts.
And that's why you should root Spaun for the rest of this championship.
A victory at TPC Sawgrass will go a long way for him and his family. Not only does he bring home a $4.5 million check, but Spawn has never made more than $3 million in any season of his career. But the victory will give him a lot of needed security and plenty of perks. Player Champions will receive their next five seasons of PGA Tour membership, with an invitation to the Masters, a US Open, a PGA Championship and will open for the next three years. Having the privilege of playing in four majors solidifies the player's schedule and therefore Spaun can spend more time at home and not play weekly as he does now.
It will also give him time to take his family to his beloved Disneyland and he will have a season pass.
However, it doesn't mean that Spaun will have to fight for PGA Tour membership in 2026. His strong start to 2025 is thought to be that he is quite sitting in the FedEx Cup rankings. He is currently 15th and second in Aon Next 10. That means there's a path to the remaining big money signature events. But he's still a loser this week, a role he's enjoying in the middle of the championship.
“I think it's kind of a mentality I have this week. I feel really freed. I have nothing to lose,” Spawn said.
“I'm in the best place to run in the Top 50, Top 30 by the end of the year. Try to keep playing good golf and feel like there's nothing to lose.”
He may have nothing to lose, but Spaun has everything to gain. More than anything, his victory at TPC Sawgrass allows him to spend more time with his wife and daughter.
Jack Mirco is a golf staff writer who plays SB Nation. Follow him with x @jack_milko.
