The three previous Open Championships at Scotland's famed Turnberry course were arguably won by the greatest golfer at the time.
In 1977, Tom Watson out-dueled Jack Nicklaus, Greg Norman stole the show in 1986 and Nick Price sunk a 50-foot eagle putt on the 71st hole in 1994 to win the Claret Jug.
So where was the world's current No. 1 golfer when the leaders teed off for the final round? Well, Tiger Woods was home.
Woods, the 2-1 favorite, finished five-over (145) through 36 holes and on the wrong side of the cut line. Taking a closer look his stats they show the ugly truth: only 15 of 28 fairways hit and only 21 of 36 greens in regulation.
You don't win much golf, especially links golf, posting numbers like that. But that's been the M.O. on Tiger, and what many analysts fail to see.
Throughout his career when he's forced to hit his massive drive with pin-point precision, on courses like Turnberry, Woods tends to end up in the woods (or heather in this case). The enduring image from Tiger's Open Championship is him bent over fruitlessly look for his ball among the tall yellow grass on the 10th hole.
Tiger is the biggest name in the sport, and leaving the Open Championship early is a big surprise to most. If watch closely, and can see his struggles in foul weather and playing with deep roughs, this isn't a surprise at all.
Woods played a six-hole stretch at 7 over par, and that should expose his game. As good as Tiger plays most of time, there's still plenty of room for him to improve, especially on the links. I'm certainly not ready for Woods' coronation by analysts as the "Greatest Golfer ever".
As for cleaning up his act on the course, I'll let ESPN The Magazine's Rick Reilly take over.
2 comments:
Tiger needs to scale back on a course like Turnberry and take what it gives him. How did Watson nearly win on this course? Accuracy---because it sure wasn't his driving distance. I am not convinced Tiger is fully healed from his injury, or if he is, he's still rusty from the layoff.
Turnberry proved to be a very difficult course and Tiger was not up to snuff mentally to take on the tight fairways and sloping greens. Better luck next time el Tigre!
He's the greatest ever. Period. His injury isn't 100% healed. He'll get better and dominate again. Your observations about his game are correct, though. In order to stay as dominant as he was before the injury he's going to have to find a way to win that doesn't require pinpoint long-distance drives. It's not like he can't return to that form, but in order for him to jump far ahead of the pack in the "greatest ever" conversation he'll have to find a way to win that he can take longer into his career. I'm pretty sure he'll be able to do that. After all, he's not the Andy Roddick of golf with only a great long ball to his name.
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