Friday, May 10, 2013
The Players Championship
It's not one of the four "major" golf tournaments. But it feels to me this weekend's Players Championship is shaping up to go down as one of those Wilt's-100-point-game/the-undefeated-Bears-lose-in-Miami/Jim Rice-and-Mitchell Page-go-toe-to-toe-on-Monday Night Baseball phenomenons, so I'm starting a thread for comment. Please do. And here's a link to the PGATour.com stream of the Tiger Woods group.
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Yes, I said Mitchell Page.
ReplyDeleteTiger: eagle on No. 2, his 11th hole of his second round.
ReplyDeleteT1. Lee Westwood, 9-under through 31 holes
ReplyDeleteT1. Tiger Woods, -9 through 29
T1. Robert Castro, -9 through 18
T4. Kevin Chappell, -8 through 55
T5. Ryan Palmer, -7 through 32
T5. Webb Simpson, -7 through 31
T5. Sergio Garcia, -7 through 30
Cool! The PGATour.com stream dudes just said that Russ Cochran had a hole-in-one on this course's third hole in 1994!
ReplyDeleteKevin Chappell of Fresno, Calif., birdies his last hole of the second round to join the first-place tie at 9-under with Roberto Castros of Houston; Lee Westwood of Worksop, Nottinghamshire, England, and Tiger Woods of Cypress, Calif.
ReplyDeleteTiger breaks the tie! Birdie on his 13th hole today sends Woods to 10-under and alone in the lead.
ReplyDeleteSergio Garcia of Borriol, Castellón, Spain, has joined the second-place tie at 9-under.
ReplyDeleteBelfastCrusader @BelfastCrusader
ReplyDeleteSergio Garcia gets to -10 and co-leads with Tiger. Garcia the 2008 #theplayers champ is -6 thru 14 today
11:28 AM - 10 May 13
Tiger slips back to 9-under as, on his 16th hole today, he can't quite scramble back for par from a poor tee shot. Sergio is alone in the lead at 10-under. Woods rejoins Castro, Chappell and Westwood in the tie for second place.
ReplyDeleteOn fire, Sergio has gone to 11-under with another birdie on his 17th hole!
ReplyDeleteRoberto Castro is now on the course, and his birdie on No. 2 draws the first-round leader to within a stroke of tournament-leader Garcia.
ReplyDeleteAnd Tiger closes his second round with a birdie for a second-straight 67. That's 10-under for the tournament and tied with Castro for second place, behind Garcia, who also is now finished until Saturday.
ReplyDelete1. Sergio Garcia, 11-under through 36 holes
ReplyDeleteT2. Roberto Castro, -10 through 20
T2. Tiger Woods, -10 through 36
T3. Kevin Chappell, -9 through 36
T3. Lee Westwood, -9 through 36
Rory McIlroy, 6-under, is scheduled to tee off his second round in about 20 minutes.
ReplyDeleteCastro has slipped back to 9-under, so, for the moment, anyway, tomorrow's last pairing would be Sergio Garcia and Tiger Woods.
ReplyDeleteLeaderboard at 2:50 PM EDT:
ReplyDelete1. S. Garcia (ESP): -11 (36 holes)
2. T. Woods: -10 (36)
T3. K. Chappell: -9 (36)
T3. L. Westwood (ENG): -9 (36)
T5. R. Palmer: -8 (36)
T5. Z. Johnson: -8 (21)
You know what's a good song? "For Once in My Life," as done by Stevie Wonder. That's a good song.
ReplyDeleteRory McIlroy bogeys the 7th hole to fall back to 6 under par.
ReplyDeleteRory McIlroy bogeys the 8th hole to fall back to 5 under par.
ReplyDeleteLeaderboard at 4 PM EDT:
ReplyDelete1. S. Garcia (ESP): -11 (36 holes)
2. T. Woods: -10 (36)
T3. K. Chappell: -9 (36)
T3. L. Westwood (ENG): -9 (36)
T3. Z. Johnson: -3 (26)
Roberto Castro is 6-over for the day and 3-under for tournament with two holes to play in his second round. PGATour.com stream guys say the cut line is projecting at even par.
ReplyDeleteThe PGATour.com stream guys refer to putters as "flat sticks." When golfers are in danger of missing the cut and they're down to just a few opportunities to pick up birdies, the PGATour.com stream guys call what those guys are doing "hole-hunting." And the PGATour.com stream guys have pet names for almost everyone; they're not really nicknames, just cute, shorter versions of the golfers' actual names. So, for example, Aaron Baddeley is "BADS," and (of course) Matt Kuchar is "KOOCH."
ReplyDeleteA ball in the water is "wet."
DeleteThis is exactly what it's like to hang out with my Generation Y nephews who wear these nylon athletic shirts that all these Generation Y golfers wear.
DeleteTo land a first shot on the green on a par-3 hole is to get "on board."
DeleteTaking aim directly at the flag is "attacking the hole location."
DeleteLots of ambient cussing to be heard on the PGATour.com stream. Lots!
DeleteTo have a shot sail wide of the hole is to "hang it out there to the right/left."
DeleteI'm not complaining. It's a blast to listen to the PGATour.com stream dudes, and they really, really know their golf. This particular point might not have been real hard to figure out, but they spent all morning--as Tiger, Sergio and Westwood were lighting it up--that low scores would be hard to come by this afternoon.
ReplyDeleteIndeed, the only difference in the top of the leaderboard since I last posted it at 12:30 Central today is that Roberto Castro, the only afternoon tee time among the group, is no longer part of it.
ReplyDelete1. Sergio Garcia, 11-under through 36 holes
2. Tiger Woods, -10 through 36
T3. Kevin Chappell, -9 through 36
T3. Lee Westwood, -9 through 36
Castro finished 6-over for the day, and he'll go into Saturday's third round 3-under for the tournament.
ReplyDeleteThe PGATour.com stream guys indicate that the gallery around the 17th tee is largely now drunk.
ReplyDeleteNow they're doing a little feature on Rory McIlroy, who says his nickname is "Rors."
ReplyDeleteThe first concert that Rors ever attended, he said, was a 50 Cent show in Belfast.
DeleteRors is walking on to the 17th tee at 6-under for the tournament.
ReplyDeleteRors parred, by the way.
DeleteDavid Lingmerth--a 25-year-old from Tranås, Sweden, whose uncle, Goran Lingmerth, kicked for the 1987 Cleveland Browns--has a short birdie-putt opportunity coming at No. 17 that would bring him to 9-under for the tournament and tied for third ...
ReplyDeleteDavid Lingmerth bottoms his 3-foot, 7-inch birdie putt (he's 27 of 27 from 5 feet or shorter on tour this year, says the PGATour.com stream guys) to join Chappell and Westwood in the tie at 9-under for third place.
ReplyDeleteUncle Goran once hit eight field goals in a game for Northern Arizona against Idaho!
ReplyDeleteThe PGATour.com stream guys like Tiger's chances "if he gets the flat stick working" because "he hasn't even found the magic on the green yet."
ReplyDeleteRors is done for the day ... 6-over.
ReplyDeleteWell, congratulations, Tiger Woods, who ended up winning the Players Championship in a highly compelling but hardly breathtaking finish. I didn't get to see much of Saturday and Sunday's action as we were celebrating Mother's Day. We were just getting back from the out-of-this-world buffet luncheon at Pennyrile State Resort Park as Tiger was double-bogeying No. 14 to drop him back into about a four-way tie for the tournament lead, with about another six or nine golfers within a stroke or two. Here's what Woods and the contenders did in his last four holes:
ReplyDelete-- he scrambled together a very difficult par save on No. 15 as several of those golfers who suddenly found themselves in position to overtake red-shirted Tiger on Sunday of the "fifth major" just as suddenly found ways to give away a stroke or two themselves;
-- he birdied No. 16 to retake the sole tournament lead;
-- he parred the very dicey No. 17 as Sergio Garcia, playing in the group behind him, had just creeped back into a first place tie with his own birdie at No. 16, and
-- he reached the par-4 No. 18 green in two windmill-punch strokes as Garcia collapsed and then carded his two-putt par to heap pressure on rookie David Lingmerth to birdie the final hole to force a playoff (and right before Lingmerth ended up three-putting for bogey).
Like I said, I didn't see much of Saturday's and Sunday's action, but it was pretty clear this did not turn out to be some sort of epic clash of the world's best golfers in which the sport's recent past, present and future overlap on one another in a weird and glorious flash of sports history. Instead, it turned out like so many other vintage Tiger Woods tournament victories. There's a lot of talk now about the Tiger aura being no more and the level of competition being so much greater today than it was 10 years ago. The parts of this tournament that I saw this weekend sure didn't seem to bear out those statements, however. Instead, Tiger just sort of ruthlessly mounted a lead and, when he did finally show a little vulnerability late in the proceedings, he got stronger and everybody else got weaker.
Very good analysis. I would only add that while all of this seems like "typical" play from Tiger Woods, he hasn't actually played this way since 2009. So it's exciting to have this version of Tiger Woods back.
ReplyDeleteOh, definitely ... he says he's getting better, and I totally agree. I thought this was more like the old days of Tiger and the rest of the field than what we've seen in some time.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I should say that I was really impressed with David Lingmerth. I don't know if this weekend was a sign that's going to be a regular contender on the tour for the next 10 years or if this weekend was his Bob May moment, but, whatever, he gave it a good go.