Over the closing holes he was playing for nothing but pride and receiving cheers of sympathy and encouragement whenever he stayed out of trouble. It was as if all the mothers in Atlanta had joined hands and placed them around his shoulders in a pastoral display of support.
He came to Georgia bristling with machismo and looking, he said, for the ‘w’, the short form for a position on the podium he once owned. He left it a rudderless mess barely able to keep his ball in play. His second-round 73 for a 10-over-par finish owed everything to his visceral refusal to give in.
The bad stuff yesterday defied analysis. In posting successive double bogeys at 11 and 12 Woods went through the cannon of comedy shots; pulls, pushes and snap hooks that sent his ball into woodland, sand and water. There were four birdies, too. Woods can not spell choker. He fought to the end, mostly against a game that no longer bends to his will.
“I think I was in nearly, what, 20 bunkers in two days. And I had four or five water balls. So that’s not going to add up to a very good score,” Woods said, adding that his principal emotion was “frustration and disappointment that I’m not contending in the tournament. So, next time.”
Effectively his year is over. His early exit here means a failure to qualify for the lucrative FedEx play-offs which account for four weeks of the season beginning in 12 days’ time and bringing an end to the PGA Tour. His next scheduled events are in November in China and Australia, time enough to return to the range and rebuild at a sustainable pace.
He might also want to rewind the clock 18 months and trade the hubris for humility. The empty boasts of last week when he told us he was not like other men and that he almost had the ball on a string, were the stuff of elementary school on the first day of term. Perhaps the experience of Atlanta is the dose of reality his game needs.
“I think it’s a step back in the sense that I didn’t make the cut. But it’s a giant leap forward in that I played two straight weeks, healthy. That’s great for our practice sessions coming up. We are going to be able to work and get after it, something, unfortunately, I haven’t been able to do. I thought I could come in here and play the last couple of weeks and get it done somehow, but I need some work.”
The leaderboard was not a pretty sight for European eyes. Anders Hansen on three under par is the only European in the top 10. More positively the leaderboard remains condensed and at one under after a second-round 68, Lee Westwood lurks almost unseen but poised to strike, four behind joint leaders Jason Dufner and Bradley Keegan.
Stealth does not come naturally to Westwood. He is the world No 2, stands six feet tall and can lift 350 pounds off the floor without slipping a disc.
In other words he has size and presence. Despite those impressive credentials, Westwood has passed through the first two rounds without attracting a television camera or much of a following on the course. Neither have we seen much of Luke Donald, whose 71 left him two shots behind Westwood on one over.
Three players withdrew with illness yesterday, re-inforcing the fortitude of McIlroy. The damaged tendon in his right wrist was heavily taped but it was not the long stuff that was causing him most pain. The speed of the greens had him befuddled all day, his ball frequently bolting four feet past the hole. His 73 was a poor reflection on the quality of his ball striking, but he survives for the final two rounds.
Darren Clarke did not card a birdie all week. The putting surfaces that were already difficult to read quickened on day two giving those on the cut mark fits. That was not a concern for Clarke. He looked tired coming into this and will sleep for a week when he returns to Portrush today.
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