Tiger Woods shoots 82 in Phoenix Open for worst round as a pro By
Ryan Ballengee 50 minutes ago Devil Ball Golf
Tiger Woods has never scored worse as a pro than he did on Friday at the Waste Management Phoenix Open.
Woods shot and 11-over 82 at TPC Scottsdale for his worst-ever round as a professional, worse than the 81 he shot in the third round of the 2002 Open Championship. It was raining on that day, too, at Muirfield, but gale-force winds didn't whip up at TPC Scottsdale.
His second round was like the first but with more lighter fluid. The same things plagued Woods on Friday: cluenessless with the driver and a complete mental block in his short game.
The first four holes weren't good, but a good-enough 1-over-par start. Then he took an unplayable lie after his drive at his fifth hole, the 14th after starting on the back nine, leading to a double-bogey 6. Woods followed with a duck hook into the water at the par-5 15th, the total opposite of where his drive went on Thursday. Triple bogey.
When Woods made a 20-foot putt to save par – par! – at the par-3 16th, the roar from the crowd made it seem like a birdie. It was almost as if they were trying to will him to something better.
Then Woods couldn't get up-and-down in three from 40 yards away at the drivable par-4 17th. Deflated, Woods came up short from the fairway with his approach at the 18th. Bogey, why not. The outgoing 8-over 44 tied his worst-ever score for nine holes as a professional, equaled in the third round of the 2013 Memorial Tournament.
At that point, what was Woods to do? He wasn't going to shoot a back-nine 26 to miraculously make the cut.
"Just keep fighting," Woods said after the round. "Just keep grinding over each and every shot."
He deserves credit for that, taking the turn and not walking directly toward his jet and flying home. He played the back nine, and it was equally ugly, even if the score was six shots better. At the par-3 fourth, Woods skulled a chip shot from back of the green into a bunker in front of it, leading to a double-bogey. Woods birdied the fifth, the hardest hole on the course for the second day in a row, then dropped shots with a bad bunker shot at the sixth and a three-jack at the seventh. Another birdie at No. 8 gave a glimmer of hope that he'd have a chance to avoid a historic low, but a limp effort at the ninth locked up history.
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http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/golf-devil-ball-golf/tiger-woods-shoots-82-in-phoenix-open-for-worst-round-as-a-pro-195901637.html Never thought I would ever see the day, that a mere mortal like me could beat Tiger Woods at golf. Divorce wrecks everything, on both sides. That is my experience, and apparently, Tiger's experience as well.
