Tiger knows he has plenty of work to do today and in future
PALM BEACH GARDENS — Tiger Woods is still thinking like he once did, imagining a Sunday climb over the 10 names that are above his on the leader board. The only way to win the Honda Classic, however, is to start playing like old times, too.
Remember the 2012 Honda? That was four back procedures ago for Tiger. He came to PGA National as the No. 1 player in the world, and he arrived for the final round at PGA National looking to post a scary low number, just in case nobody else wanted to win the tournament.
The man started the day nine shots back, for crying out loud, and his closing 62, with eagles on both of the par-5 holes, would
have done the trick if Rory McIlroy, the eventual winner, had flinched even a little.
“It’s just a different golf course now,” Tiger said Saturday after shooting a 1-under-par 69 and falling seven shots off the 54-hole lead of Luke List. “Back during that day it was softer and that number (62) could be had. In these conditions, it really is tough to get anything going.”
That’s the rational side of Tiger’s brain. But you want to hear from the other side, right? The aggressive one. The one that sparks
out all those muscle memories from 14 major championships and countless performances so dominating that the competition simply melted away.
OK, here goes.
“Today was the highest score I could possibly have shot,” he said.
Go on.
“I’m going to have to do something under par, for sure,” Tiger said. “You never know what can happen the last few holes here. A lot of things can happen and have happened in the past.”
Better, better. Now bring it home.
“I’ve got a shot going into tomorrow,” he said. “My job is to go out and post a number. … Those other guys will still have three or four holes to go when I’m done and hopefully my number will be good enough.”
That’s his story, and he’s still hoping to stick it to ’em.
Really, though, it’s asking too much of a player with just nine PGA Tour rounds in the books since back fusion surgery 10 months ago. It’s expecting a 65 or something sillier from a game that until Saturday had not scored in the 60s in an official Tour round since 2015.
The best thing to do here is acknowledge the progress that Tiger has made with his irons, good enough that through 14 holes Saturday he was leading the field with an average proximity to the hole of 19 feet on his approach shots.
There are fewer of the squirrelly drives that led him to miss the cut last week in Los Angeles, too. Matter of fact, Tiger hit nine of 14 fairways in the third round, his most accurate day so far.
The only thing lacking was a string of success on the many makeable birdie putts Tiger gave himself. Two of them fell, from 6 and 14 feet, but too many others burned the cup and skittered past, like the 16-footer on No. 10 that took Tiger to his knees.
While other contenders were cashing in all around him on the front nine, the best Tiger could do was a 1-under 34. He stayed basically motionless in the crucial, early hours of Moving Day, while List, Webb Simpson and Alex Noren were going out in 32.
“If I could have just made a few more putts on the front nine,” Tiger said, “I could have got the round started.”
When it nearly went off the rails with a couple of yanked tee shots and bogeys from the left rough on holes 15 and 17, Tiger longed even more for the kind of cushion a few earlier birdies could have provided. Others were finally gaining some traction on the putting surfaces, with a 65 turned in by Justin Thomas and Noren, plus eight more scores of 67 or better.
When Tiger closed down his day with a birdie on No. 18, he had to do it the hard way. Tee shot in the fairway bunker. Slashing 234-yard second shot into the rough wide of the par-5 green. Tricky chip to tap-in range.
“I would say less wind today,” Noren said when asked why the Champion gave up 21 sub-par rounds on Saturday. “Not straight in on No. 17, for example. The rain (Friday night) made a little bit of a difference to the greens, too. You can go for them. They hold a little bit better.”
Put it all together and there are plenty of contenders, not just Tiger, who are capable of posting a great score and getting to the clubhouse just as the leaders are stepping, nervously, to the Bear Trap.
That’s where Jamie Lovemark gave the lead away on Saturday with a double bogey from the lake on No. 15. As for Tiger, he’s played the Bear Trap’s three challenging holes at 5-over par this week.
“There’s a lot of golfers I’m trying to beat,” said Thomas, who starts the final round tied for second place and honing in on his eighth career Tour win. “Definitely if Tiger starts making a charge, I’ll know or I’ll see, but just because it’s him am I necessarily worried? It’s just the fact there’s a lot of players there that could just as easily do what he could do, you know?”
Tiger, naturally, still thinks of the days when nobody could do what he did.
Fans have seen him nearly win here in 2012. They’ve seen him trudge along in the middle of the pack for four rounds in 2013. They’ve seen him start hot in 2014 only to withdraw 13 holes into the final round with back spasms.
Is there anything new Tiger can show us at the Honda today? I don’t think so, but what he’s done so far is more than anyone realistically could have expected.
“I’m making some tweaks in my golf swing,” he said, “but also trying to understand what this body can do. It’s not like it used to be. Those angles are gone.”
Not the story angles, however. With the Masters just six weeks away, they are only beginning.