A round that probably could have been to 2 to 4 under and turned into 6 [under].
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“I finally figured something out today on the putting green, but the damage had already been done”.
“What now? I’m going to go home and watch the leaders tee off and play”, Woods said Saturday morning after polishing off a 1-over 73 that sent him packing from Whistling Straits.
For one, he’s now 187th in the FedEx Cup standings and now ineligible for the first FedEx playoff event, the Barclays, where only the top 125 players in the standings advance. Woods is 187th.
Just before 8 a.m. (ET) he set the tone, igniting the gallery, and even himself, with a bold flop shot that bounced twice and trickled into the hole for an unlikely birdie at his first hole (No. 10).
With Tiger Woods apparently veering towards skipping this week’s Wyndham Championship in North Carolina and thus calling an end to his 2014-15 season, David Duval, a former world No 1 who knows all about slumps, made the case for Woods to honour his commitment. “I got aggressive with it and I went for it and I pulled it off”. “I’ve never seen it like this, lined up on both sides, several deep”.
His round began with a birdie the hard way – he missed the green on this approach, but holed out a flop shot to get himself below par early.
In the second round, Woods hit just four of 11 fairways but then needed 33 putts. Schwartzel, who won the 2011 Masters, is ranked 45th in the world. “We’ll decide next couple of days”.
He returned to Whistling Straits at 7am to complete the final five holes of his disrupted second round, and then it was back to Florida in the private jet to consider how to fill his time in the absence of any meaningful golf to play. In somewhat of a weak and wide open field, Thomas and odds of +2800 seem good to me. Matsuyama shot a 5-under 65 and Koepka, who finished in a tie for fifth last week at the PGA, shot a 3-under 67. At No. 86 on the points list, McGirt is in virtually no danger of missing the playoffs. The winds left numerous temporary structures in bits with debris scattered all about, including the pop-up broadcast studio erected behind the first tee.
But perhaps nobody’s dealing with more than Billy Hurley III. He placed 5th at the PGA Championship last week but is still suffering from slight discomfort in his hip; horse for the course for sure.
Hurley, 33, is at No. 131 on the points list and is only here this week because he’s trying to secure his PGA Tour card for next year.
“He still draws the crowd and I think that’s just a testament to his career and what he’s been able to do”, 2012 U.S. Open champion Webb Simpson said of the 14-times major victor.
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Or could it be that, as Woods has struggled, the masses have started to realize how much his greatness was taken for granted over the years?
