Stephan Jaeger isn't about to rest on his PGA Tour accomplishments from the past month, which include four top-40 finishes, a tie for sixth at the Wells Fargo Championship and $463,135 in earnings.
Which explains why his stay back in Chattanooga this week will be brief.
The former Baylor School and University of Tennessee at Chattanooga standout is having the best stretch of his PGA Tour career, having made four consecutive cuts at the Zurich Classic, Mexico Open, Wells Fargo and AT&T Byron Nelson. Yet those four tournaments followed a run of four missed cuts at The Players Championship, Valspar Championship, Valero Texas Open and RBC Heritage.
"It kind of comes and goes in waves in golf," Jaeger said this week. "You're on a high for a little bit and you want to continue that high as long as you can. Then you switch something, maybe not on purpose, and it doesn't feel right and takes you a couple months to get back. Being in Florida was rough. There was a lot of bad weather at The Players - I think I got my second round in on Sunday.
"Valspar is a hard course, and if you're not on your game, those places down there can expose you quickly. I'm happy to be on this positive run for a change."
Jaeger, a six-time winner on the Korn Ferry Tour, has ascended to 117th in the FedEx Cup standings during his second stint on the PGA Tour and has amassed $703,318 this season. He did not meet the qualifications to enter the PGA Championship that starts Thursday in Tulsa, Oklahoma, but will leave Sunday for Texas, where he will play in a U.S. Open qualifier early next week before resuming his PGA Tour schedule at the Charles Schwab Challenge, which starts May 26 in Fort Worth.
The German-born Jaeger is seeking his fourth appearance in the U.S. Open, which remains the only major in which he has competed.
During his first go-around on the PGA Tour in the 2017-18 and 2018-19 seasons, Jaeger admitted he sometimes had to battle nerves given the slew of elite competitors he had admired while at Baylor and UTC. His career-best finish at the Wells Fargo Championship was the result of a closing 66, which was one stroke back of the best score of the day, and he had matching 7-under 65s last Friday and Saturday before a final-round 72 that dropped him from 12th to 38th.
"Good golf can take care of a lot of the nerves," Jaeger said. "If I feel comfortable in what I'm doing, I don't get too intimidated by anything. I just want to have as many opportunities on Sunday as I can to post a really low round and maybe have a chance to win.
"I just didn't putt well enough Thursday and Sunday at the Byron Nelson."
Jaeger always appreciates coming home, but he's not using this week to accept a lot of congratulations for his recent success.
"With me, the satisfaction is never great except for that Sunday night or that Monday, and then I pretty quickly go back to work," he said. "I think I've got a good grasp on my swing right now and am happy with the way I've prepared these last couple of weeks, but I also know I've got to change a couple things in my putting and a couple other things that haven't been working as well.
"I've been in a pretty solid stretch, and I like where things are going. The confidence is coming back like it was in the Korn Ferry, so I'm excited to see what happens."
Contact David Paschall at dpaschall@timesfreepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @DavidSPaschall.