Woeful Woods plumbs new low
They came to praise Tiger Woods, not to bury him. But he buried himself Thursday with a first- round 76 at the Open Championship.
While golf’s new sensation, Jordan Spieth was shooting five underpar 67 ( leader Dustin Johnson shot a 65), Woods’s continuing struggles emphasized the distance between what he is and what he used to be.
In 19 rounds he and Spieth have played in the same events this season, Woods now trails the 21- yearold by 110 strokes. It was his worstever round as a professional at St. Andrews, by three strokes.
Eight of the nine amateurs in the field beat him.
And his peers were left to mourn his steep descent into mediocrity.
NIGHT AND DAY: Jason Day’s life was turned around by reading the Tiger Woods story. Thursday he shot 66 and beat Woods by 10.
“I mean, I grew up watching him. He was my idol growing up. He’s why I’m a professional and why I chased the dream. It’s tough,” said the Aussie. “The good thing about it is I saw him struggle before and he came back and got to No. 1, so I know that he can get back out of this, it’s just depending on how much he wants it.
“Before, I think the way he used to kind of get back at things, he used to get pissed off at himself and it kind of got him back to where he needed to be mentally. But today? he just wasn’t hitting it close enough. He made a few mental errors around the greens and then just tried to press from there. It’s just difficult to do.”
MYSTERY WRAPPED IN ENIGMA: “I think we’re all shocked as players how good Tiger Woods is and has been, to see him struggling the way he is right now,” said Graeme McDowell. “It speaks volumes about what this game is all about. I’m standing here talking about lacking confidence and belief in what I’m doing. You see a guy like that whose career highlight reel would take days to watch. It’s a tough old game.”
ROAD TEST: Zach Johnson, who made five on the 492- yard, parfour
17th, was asked if he was surprised not a single birdie had been made on the Road Hole all day. “I saw some in the group behind me,” Johnson quipped. “I think they all made 4.”
Indeed, on a day when five dozen players broke par on the Old Course, one of the game’s toughest par- fours played mostly into the wind, to a field average of over 4.8 strokes. One entire page of the draw, comprising 21 players, was blemished with 13 bogeys, three double- bogeys and a nine, by Mark Calcavecchia, on the hole.
SCARE TACTICS: A number of fans at various points in his round greeted Tom Watson with masks bearing the five- time champion’s face.
“Those are ugly masks. I told them there’s way too many wrinkles in those masks,” said Watson, 65. “It kind of scared me looking at those things, like geez.... that guy is ugly.”
NAE WIND NAE GOLF: Lee Westwood, who shot 71, on the vulnerability of the Old Course when it’s relatively calm: “I think this golf course needs a fair breeze blowing. Obviously none of us like playing in rain, but I think you want a 15, 20 mile- an- hour wind blowing on this golf course, otherwise the players just murder it basically.”
GOOD TO BE LUCKY: Jordan Spieth figures he caught a break at the last hole because he hit his tee shot left into the far side of the adjoining No. 1 fairway. From there, he pitched to about 15 feet, and made the birdie putt.
“I hit a drive that would have been in big, big trouble on any other hole. Luckily it was the 18th at St. Andrews.”
He had bogeyed the 17th, failing to get up- and- down after his approach found the Road Bunker.
“( At) 17 today, you purposely try and miss the green on the second shot. There’s almost no other way around it. That kind of takes away the point of the hole, but at the same time, it’s the Road Hole at St. Andrews, and today’s pin position ( directly behind the bunker) is really the only time you can’t really play the hole. I got it into the bunker there and hit a good bunker shot and just not a great putt.”