Jason Day wasn’t supposed to win The Players. He’s lapping the field anyway.

The world’s best player might just run away with another big piece of hardware.

With Jordan Spieth and Rickie Fowler headed home for the weekend, Jason Day looks nearly unbeatable through 36 holes at TPC Sawgrass. He finished up his second round this morning, grabbing a birdie on the 15th en route to a 7-under-par 65 to break the 36-hole scoring record previously held by countryman Greg Norman. With scoring conditions expected to toughen as the wind kicks up in the afternoon, Day stands four shots clear of Ireland’s Shane Lowry and five shots clear of the rest of the field. It’s the largest midpoint lead ever at The Players.

Will Day suck the drama out of the tournament long before we reach the 17th on Sunday? Could Rory McIlroy follow up his second-round 64 and run him down on moving day? Here are three things to watch over the weekend from Sawgrass.

Casual observers might not fully appreciate what Day’s had to do to turn in his record-setting performance through the first two rounds at Sawgrass. The Stadium Course isn’t a bombers’ track or a place where Day’s length provides much of an advantage. The course’s lines off the tee often don’t suit hitting driver and most players have to step down to fairway woods and irons off the tee. Day’s scores at The Players have reflected this in the past -- with just one career top 10 finish at the venue.

This year, he’s clearly taken a different approach -- carving the course up off the tee with perfect placement of 3-woods and long irons. And he’s capitalizing with brilliant short irons and wedge play, too. It should scare the hell out of other guys on tour that the world’s best player has figured out how to break scoring records and run away from the field on a course that doesn’t even suit his long-bombing style of play.

Even if it doesn’t strike fear in the hearts of some of his peers, it’s at least demoralizing for competitors to watch shot-for-shot. Spieth said just as much in his press conference after missing the cut, saying Day just “isn’t really missing golf shots right now.”

The golf course is going to get firmer, faster and windier Saturday afternoon -- and Day’s certainly benefited from playing a healthy majority of his opening 36 holes in perfect morning scoring conditions. But the world’s most dominant player right now has the chance to suck all the drama out of Sunday within the first few holes of the third round. If he comes anywhere close to his 63 or 65 from the first two days, he’d need a monumental collapse on Sunday just to give his fellow competitors any hope.

Anyone else that would like to win The Players will need help from Day in the form of backing up. Otherwise, it’ll be seven wins in 17 starts for Day -- a Woodsian winning rate that’s evidence of the healthy gap between him and Spieth/McIlroy in form over the past 10 months.

Rory had Twitter ablaze with his video game-like start to his second round early Friday. He stood at 8-under on the round and tournament through 11 holes after starting on the back nine, with the course record squarely in play. He played the final seven holes at even par after a bogey on the par-5 9th, but that was still good enough for a 64 on a golf course that McIlroy has said he’s “parred-to-death” in the past.

At the time he walked off the golf course, he wasn’t in the lead, but looked to be in good position to just be a fistful of shots back heading into Saturday.

Then that Jason Day guy did Jason Day things, again.

Mcllroy will start the third round just a couple groups ahead of Day at T-12, but he’ll be a full seven shots behind to start his round. That’s hardly out of it, considering how you’d expect the golf course to show a bit more teeth in the afternoon. Rory doesn’t need to get all seven shots back today, but you’d like to be within four at least heading into Sunday. Unless the wheels just totally fall off for Day, he’ll probably need a 68 or better to keep himself in the ball game heading into tomorrow.

Of the big group at 10-under and 9-under, the big-hitting Gary Woodland is the highest in the world rankings at No. 77. Of course, James Hahn proved last week in Charlotte that golf is dumb and it’s a big waste of time to predict anything based on form because people that haven’t made a cut in months can win golf tournaments. Whatever.

Still, some guys will fade. You shouldn’t expect Shane Lowry to be one of them. You might know Lowry as the jolly red-bearded Irishman who doesn’t care if you hear him shouting swear words in a funny accent into TV mics. He’s also got plenty of game, a world top-40 player who won in a strong field last year at Firestone. Don’t expect playing alongside the flaming-hot Day to be too much for him. It’s not worth writing off the other member of their afternoon threesome, Jonas Blixt, either. The Swede lives in Ponte Vedra, is a member at Sawgrass and has had enough reps on the golf course to know the quirks and wind gusts as well as any.

Looking further down the leaderboard, Zach Johnson (-8), Brooks Koepka (-8) and Sergio Garcia (-6) have differing playing styles, but all have the pedigree to make a run on the weekend. Garcia’s played the course as well as anyone on Tour over the past few years, winning here in 2008 and contending on Sunday a handful of times since.

A cadre of world-class talents such as Spieth, Phil Mickelson and defending champ Fowler may have missed the cut. But the leaderboard is still loaded and the best player in the world is still here, dominating in a way we rarely see to start the weekend at Sawgrass.