Tiger Woods goes quietly at The Players Championship

Tiger Woods zipped through an inconsequential final round at The Players Championship in the recent form we’ve come to expect from the 14-time major winner. There were a few nice shots that set up birdies, some impressive scrambling and the constant struggle to keep the ball in play off the tee.

Tiger’s alignment was a mess this week, and he repeatedly aimed left and lost the ball left -- his cut shots failing to cut, and a rare attempted draw just completely overcooking and hooking into the trees. While he settled near the bottom of the leaderboard all weekend, the scorecards didn’t even tell the full story of just how much of a grind it was for Woods. The shakiness off the tee continued right out of the gate on Sunday. He hit a ball so far left on the fifth hole that it landed in an area that wasn’t really conceived as a part of the hole. It was probably the farthest drive left at that hole all week, but it settled in a spot that had been trampled down by the crowd and with a relatively open angle to the green. He made a par but the card didn’t reflect how ugly that first swing was.

The same miss crept up on the ninth hole, where he bombed another ball left -- only two balls all week had been farther left on that hole. The left miss was definitely the theme at Sawgrass for Tiger’s tee shots, but he lost a couple right on the front nine as well. He’s definitely crossed up right now, both on the set up and with his swing from the tee box. That’s something he can hopefully correct with his swing consultant Chris Como, because other parts of his game looked just fine.

Despite the constant struggle and wildness off the tee, Tiger still has the game in other areas to squeak out pars, make cuts and turn in the scorecards that are competitive on the PGA Tour. That’s not the standard he holds himself to, of course, but it’s where we’re at right now for a guy who just finished back-to-back events on Tour for the first time in 600 days!

Tiger caught a little form off the tee after making the turn, hitting three straight respectable drives. And when he’s playing from the fairway, all was well and good. His irons were good enough to post birdies when he’s in the fairway, and he carded three straight red numbers from Nos. 10-12. The mid-to-short irons have been fantastic, and from 153 yards out, he stuck one to five feet at the 10th hole.

That started the birdie train on the back nine, but the left miss off the tee promptly came back to derail it. The 14th hole has historically been Tiger’s worst at TPC Sawgrass -- it’s an intimidating view from the tee box with water lurking down the left side. Despite all that poor history, he had navigated that hole unscathed this week ... until Sunday. Tiger yanked his drive way left into the drink again. It went so far left, that he had to drop back towards the tee and could never really pull off a recovery. The result was his first every triple bogey at The Players.

So this weekend, Tiger made his first triple ever at The Players and made two doubles in one round for the first time ever in his career. It doesn’t matter how solid other parts of his game are, those big numbers will continue to pop up if he can’t get off the tee. Saturday it was a ball into the trees that landed short of the ladies tee, Sunday it was that yank into the water. He leaves having matched his career worst for double bogeys or worse at a tournament (5).

After hitting just two fairways on Sunday at Augusta, he hit just four on Sunday at Sawgrass. Even with those big numbers, the final round card was not a disaster -- he finished with an even-par round (via PGATour.com)

This week was a grind from start to finish. He made the cut on the number with a lengthy birdie putt on his last hole of the second round and then spent the weekend just trying to keep it in play during a 3-over 36 holes. Woods said the week was a “mixed bag” after his round but that the swing is way more comfortable that it was at the Masters. But TPC Sawgrass is probably not the best place to still test it out, and he was punished with those big numbers.

Tiger will now take the next three weeks off before playing the Memorial the first week of June. He’s back to at least being able to compete in PGA Tour events and not embarrass himself, which is something he couldn’t say during that chipping disaster at the start of his season. But there’s still work to do with his swing before he’s contending again.

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