About My Picks... and Tiger's Game

At the halfway factor we realize a piece extra about how THE PLAYERS is going to shake out. As it seems, it seems like this may be a sprint to the end given that no person has been able to distance themselves from the field.

Not yet, anyway.

All-in-all, my "5 to Watch" aren't doing so horrific:

• Jordan Spieth kinda shocked us all by missing the cut. However, even #2 in the world is entitled to an off-week every so often.
• Erik Compton and Tiger Woods are both at even par (T61), barely making the cut yet still only 8 shots off the lead of Kevin Na and Jerry Kelly.
• Jim Furyk continued his good play from past weeks. He sits at -4 (T13).
• And Ben Martin is at -5 (T7), the best of the bunch and a mere 3 shots off the lead. You guys thought I was crazy to pick him, didn't you?

Of course, the big talk has been about Tiger's struggles with his game this week. The fact that his injured hand and the jet lag from his China trip cost him 3 weeks of practice has everybody debating what his priorities should be and how long it will take him to get things back in shape.

I thought I'd pipe in with some thoughts approximately Tiger's journey lower back to a competitive recreation as well.

It's clean to forget about that it's been best a chunk extra than a year due to the fact Tiger had returned surgery. In the past, whilst Tiger wanted to alternate his swing he had time to consider what adjustments he wanted to pursue and who he desired to coach him via them. This time there was no making plans -- Tiger in reality determined himself mendacity on his returned in pain and thinking if he could ever be able to play golfing once more. (If he could ever be capable of play along with his youngsters again, for that count number.) He's needed to discern out what his body could allow him to do and then select his first-class alternative from that.

That's now not the first-rate manner to embark on a swing rebuild!

When Tiger says he is played quite properly this week -- as an example, that he's been driving it pretty well -- a few folks have laughed at him however his stats do endure that out.

• He's made 11 birdies for the two rounds, which is T4 in the field.
• He's hit 17 of 28 fairways -- nearly 61%, which is pretty darn good for Tiger. He's never been particularly good at hitting the short grass.
• And he's second in Putts per GIR.

Granted, he's only hit a little over 55% of his GIR (20/36), but his assessment that he could have been two or three shots lower each round is reasonable. Thursday he left at least two putts (that I saw) just short but dead in the jaws, and I've seen several putts graze the edge of the hole both days. And he's hit some pretty impressive recovery shots on a course where he's never had a lot of success, despite having two wins there.

Yeah, it is smooth to assume him at -4 had a few greater putts dropped. All matters taken into consideration, he simply has performed quite well.

Best of all, now he's going to get more rounds of aggressive reps. Although he's not likely to win this week -- in spite of me picking him as a player to look at -- I'd say Tiger is on a quite desirable tune to preserve improving as he makes his comeback from surgery.

And that's what we are all hoping for, isn't always it?