PGA Tour: The "Honda": Notes from the Ballwasher

1).Wonderful theatre at the Match Play last week, and a most deserving winner. Waste of time debating any improvements to the format - we'd all have differing ideas on that. But Hunter Mahan was outstandingly the best golfer once Zach Johnson had made a mess of his 19th Round One hole and good luck to Mahan as he moves forward. He'll turn 30 in May with 2 x WGC's in his back pocket, but only two run-of-the-mill events and "should do better" is written large on his career report card.

2).Rory went on about his semi final vs Westwood being his "final", but surely that's just the nature of match play?
From a point of view of English pride, not to say prejudice, I thought Lee was a touch unlucky Sunday morning. Off to a better start than even Chubby could have dreamed of and then a decent-looking iron into the 5th rolled up against the "collar" at the back of the green. Three strokes later and he was firing a lovely iron into the par 3 6th. But Rory holed his longer putt and Lee missed his. Lee's head down, two holes lost, Rory perking up, game over. Shouldn't be that way though and Westwood must know that he will only win the big ones by overcoming adversity along the way.

3).Mahan enjoyed his first outing with his Ping Nome putter having used a Ping Anser all his career. Now Nome sounds to me like the Alaskan town the sled dogs run to in the Iditarod, but Mahan was HOT on the greens from Thursday onwards.

4).OK, just to break the promise not to debate the format. Is it in the interests of the integrity of the game to hold a consolation match? Set aside the loot, just measure Wilson's achievement in winning a meaningless match-up in golf's new currency, official world ranking points. And he collects 7.6 pts for beating Westwood vs Paul Lawrie, for instance, who only won 8.88 points for winning two very meaningful matches. Just saying.

5).And on the subject of Aberdeen's favourite golfing son, it was timely to read that Aberdeen Asset Management are now sponsoring Martin Laird (impressive week, Martin). Which just goes to show how prescient Johnny Miller is as he spent all Saturday talking about Martin Laird, the man from Aberdeen. That Johnny!!!

6).That's the West Coast done with and the American golfing press is tickled to death about US golfers winning all nine tournaments. Partly courtesy of Robert Allenby's 18th hole Mayakoba meltdown of course. The last time Americans won nine in a row to start the season, the streak ran to 11 before Ian Woosnam scraped home in New Orleans. I'd put a lot of money on this year's streak not reaching 11.

7).So it's off to the "Sunshine State", and "The Honda Classic". "International" Tour players are queueing up to play in this intra-WGC week as they strive to register their mandatory 15 events for the year. Europe-based players seem to struggle mightily to get to grips with grainy Bermuda greens and don't expect anything less this week. PGA National is a Tom Fazio design which staged the 1983 Ryder Cup (where Europe finally came of age as a viable competitor) and the 1987 PGA Championship.
Personal note: I played PGA National in 1985, was walking down a front nine fairway when we heard a crack behind us and a Titleist fizzing over our heads. We looked back to see wtf was going on only to see a rather large golfer speeding by us, crouched over the front of his golfcart like Cav winning a TDF sprint. "Thanks guys," yelled Craig Stadler as he whizzed by.

8).Since those days Jack Nicklaus has "re-done" the course and redefined the signature "Bear Trap", holes 15 (par-3), 16 (par-4) and 17 (par-3), the most difficult hat-trick of consecutive holes on Tour last year. pgatour.com notes that only 12 golfers have completed the tournament in the five years the "Honda" has been played here without registering a bogey on 15, 16 or 17. Luke Donald (feet up this week) enjoyed the best score, a miraculous -5 here, in 2008, and Camilo is the only other to do better than -2 on these holes.

9).The golfers will have warm weather this week, mostly dry and sunny but with that ever present March wind. All of which makes it an improbable course to see Tiger playing at, his first visit to the tournament in 18 years (perhaps he'll be playing Quad Cities this year after all?), especially with the penal nature of so many of the holes. And Rory's high ballflight is similarly unlikely to be best suited to the course. Expect a strong tee-to-green player to prevail, along the lines of the five Honda Champions here so far: Mark Wilson, Els, Yang, Villegas and Sabbatini.

10).This week is the last opportunity to qualify for Doral's WGC Cadillac event next week. The field has pretty much been finalised with just new entrants to the owgr top fifty, and FedEx points top ten, able to graduate to Doral. Europeans on parade over and above the usual suspects include Bjorn, Canizares (nice job qualifying courtesy of his T5 finish last week) and Clarke. YE Yang was runner up last year and I could see him playing well again, along with Justin Rose who has form here also. Rory? Tiger? Top Twenty? Maybe?

PS: The "Cadillac" field as it currently stands is listed on the Fantasy thread.

Kwini you have excelled this week. The link of Iditarod to hot putter is a masterpiece I didn't see coming. Take a bow!
Fascinated to see this weeks action. Not a course I have taken too much note of in the past but clearly a serious test.
Luke having another week off from an event he has won seems strange? Recognise expanded domestic responsibilities but after a stop start beginning thought he might be looking to get fully established?
Not sure if it is just paper talk but the Lee Westwood was my final line from Rory is a bit pathetic if real. Also agree your point re Lee. Must come a point where the bad luck is overcome by course management etc. He drew some bad lies and that piece of outrageous good fortune from Rory when he could have gone oob but recovered to birdie a par 5 must have hurt, but he is more than good enough to deal with those. I'm backing him for a major and several others this year.

Cheers puligny,
I was tempted to go all David Bowie and paraphrase the Rolling Gnome etc, etc., but thought that would be too obscure and date me way too much!

Donald has chosen to ditch the Honda in favour of The Transitions in a fortnight's time; in fairness, despite his success at PGA National, his "Honda" win was at a different course.

We've been documenting the return from injury of golfers to the PGA Tour, but not many have been out for longer than Hank Kuehne who tees it up on Tour this week for the first time in five years.

Of the famous Kuehne golfing family, Kuehne has fallen on hard times, injuries and the dreaded drink (not to mention Venus Williams) taking their toll.

He has 18 events in which to win $636K in prize money to regain fully exempt status on Tour. He's being interviewed now and his responses vis-a-vis a full-time return to the Tour will be interesting to hear.

puligny,

I agree with your comments on Lee Westwood. Again, in contention (in fact in control of the semi final) then a couple of bad breaks and he shows little resistance. His record is looking more similar to Monty's as each year goes by. As you say, bad luck can only be a valid excuse for so long. For example Rory found another gear and put two amazing scoring runs together in both the semi and final. For the last few years Lee seems unable to react to circumstances coming down the stretch. I guess being an average putter only makes it more difficult.

kwini,

The coverage we got in the UK included plenty of interviews with the US players, and not just Tiger and Lefty. All the guys came across as great blokes in particular Kucher, Maham and Wilson. I agree Maham deserved the win for his play over the week, but also because he held his game togther well when Rory hit him with low numbers on the back 9. Would Lee Westwood have coped as well? - I'm not too sure he would have.

Not sure what to make of Rory's recent near miss. does he have the Westwoods or is he that good that his 'B' game is good enough for a top 5 most weeks.

kwini,

Did Luke always plan to miss the Honda or has he changed his plans to work on his game.

Looking forward to the Honda and of course WGC the following week.

Luke Donald hasn't played the "Honda" since his 2nd place near miss in 2008. Injured 2009, not on schedule since. Think he always favoured The Transitions this year.

Think some are a bit harsh on Westwood. By his own standards Rory was pretty poor till the Semi Finals but managed to scrape his way through as it was matchplay, it happens. I believe Rory was only -3 for the week until the Semi Final. Westwood played a lot better in the earlier rounds but was hit by Rory's scoring run in the Semi Final.

I dont think LW is a good putter by any means but because his long game is that good he hits more greens than most. When he has exceptional putting weeks he blows apart the field like he did in the Nedbank.

Think some are players are either playing the Honda or the tournament after the WGC so that they are not playing 4 weeks in a row.

"...And he collects 7.6 pts for beating Westwood vs Paul Lawrie, for instance, who only won 8.88 points for winning two very meaningful matches. Just saying...."

IMO, Wilson earned 3.8 points for beating Westwood. if they had not played the consolation match, Westwood and Wilson would have split 3rd and 4th place.

And, in addition to Lawrie, there were 7 more players that earned 8.88 pts for winning two matches (or 71 total OWGR pts).

I don't have a problem with the consolation match. It is analogous to player birdieing the 72nd hole to finish solo 2nd, when the tournament winner is already in the clubhouse.

Hi GPB,
I only used Lawrie as an example of 3rd round loser as he was the first British golfer to succumb that I thought of.

I certainly take your point, but the PGA Tour is perfectly happy for any multiple losers in a sudden victory play-off to be clasified as T2, without playing further holes. And rightly so.

The thing with the Match Play consolation is that it's for TV only.
Lawrie and other 3rd round losers would have been bitterly disappointed to have to go home - do you think the consolation match loser feels the same way? Not for a second - they probably feel that they'd rather be somewhere else and get outathere asap.

Anyway, it's not going to change so we'll have to grimace and bear it.

Not many golfers in this week's field that could qualify for the Cadillac:
owgr top fifty:
#59: Furyk: Probably needs a T2 to reach the top 50.
#60: Allenby: Needs to finish at least 2nd alone to make it.
The following would all need to win the "Honda":
#65: Els
#66: Moore
#71: Levin
#74: O'Hair
#76: Sabbatini
#84: Ryan Palmer may get in with a win, will be right on the edge but would probably qualify via the FedEx Top ten:

Most PGA Tour players will qualify via the FedEx route with a win! Otherwise very high finishes by John Huh, Levin, Charlie Wi, John Rollins, Howell, Pettersson, O'Hair, Barnes and some others would do the trick.

Fantastic effort Kwin. Really appreciated.

You are directly on target with the consolation match for TV only. It really doubles their chances to get a marquee name and they had just that with Westwood.

Poor Mark Wilson. This guy's proven it more than once that he can get it done on Sundays on the PGA tour, but is hardly mentioned or discussed. For every one who labels Mahan an underachiever, I suspect someone is naming Wilson an overachiever. He needs to wear Poulter-like clothes, grow Mahan like facial hair or both. He seems to have that golf skill thing covered, time for a PR person.

kwinigolfer wrote:Not many golfers in this week's field that could qualify for the Cadillac:
owgr top fifty:
#59: Furyk: Probably needs a T2 to reach the top 50.
#60: Allenby: Needs to finish at least 2nd alone to make it.
The following would all need to win the "Honda":
#65: Els
#66: Moore
#71: Levin
#74: O'Hair
#76: Sabbatini
#84: Ryan Palmer may get in with a win, will be right on the edge but would probably qualify via the FedEx Top ten:

Most PGA Tour players will qualify via the FedEx route with a win! Otherwise very high finishes by John Huh, Levin, Charlie Wi, John Rollins, Howell, Pettersson, O'Hair, Barnes and some others would do the trick.

Does that include Harri??

John,
I'm pretty sure pd said Harrington wouldn't qualify via the owgr and that looks right to me.
He would almost certainly qualify via the FedEx route with a win, definitely not otherwise.

Lots of chat about poor, poor journalism. So no substitute for hearing about golf straight from the horse's mouth.

Lee Westwood gives a very good interview for the Tour hacks, well worth a read here:

http://www.pgatour.com/2012/tournaments/r010/02/29/transcript-westwood/index.html

Good to know that he won't be missing Cheltenham - priorities clearly in place.

Cheers Shotrock,
Regarding Mark Wilson, I don't believe any American, apart from Woods and Mickelson, have more than Wilson's five wins in the past five years. Dustin has five of course, but Furyk for instance just has four.

Great stuff, kwini

Indeed, Harri can only reach #53 at best with a win at Honda (not so confident really, his previous win there was on a different course i think).

But as you say, a win would get him to 613 pts in FedEx cup this year, which may just be sufficient...

Cheers,
I saw PD's piece that he cant make Top 50. Good to know he has a chance via Fed Ex route.............albeit a long shot.............

Kwin - Are you getting belted, or is the snow event south of you? Looks like some good skiing in Old Forge this coming weekend.

No snow yet. Rumours of a middling snowfall tonight and tomorrow but only about 6 inches I think. Poor season for the ski areas here, puts a dent in our economy.

Not quite sure where to post this, but there is a 5 min film regarding Paul Casey's return from injury up on the ET website - interview and footage of his rehabilitation exercises (not quite a Rocky film training montage though). He sounds happy / positive.

Can't isolate a direct URL, but it's currently on the home page and in the video section tagged with today's date [happy birthday Doon, by the way].

http://www.europeantour.com/videoaudio/video/index.html

kwinigolfer wrote:I was tempted to go all David Bowie and paraphrase the Rolling Gnome...

Damn... I'm sure it would have been worthwhile reading. Just think if they would have named the putter Ping 'Wasilla'. Could you imagine paraphrasing Bowie's "Warszawa"? Now that would have been quite something:

Mmmm-mm-mm-ommm
Sula vie dilejo
Mmmm-mm-mm-ommm
Sula vie milejo
Mmm-omm

Cheli venco deho
Cheli venco deho
Malio
Mmmm-mm-mm-ommm

Helibo seyoman
Cheli venco raero
Malio
Malio

venice,
Evoking Wasila is a bit beyond the palin . . . .
Think I messed up the Bowie ditty, wasn't it Laughing Gnome??!!

Doesn't help my Montrealers, dead last. Snow this week, maybe that will inspire them.

Looking forward to this week's event. Off at 6.50 a.m. Eastern Time and a completely different feel, and field, to the West Coast events. Rory off at 7.30 a.m., three trips here so far with a 13th place finish in 2009, out with the washing the past two years. Very low expectations for him until he drives down Magnolia Lane.

So do we think Woods really did want to become a Navy Seal?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/golf/9112707/Tiger-Woods-thought-of-giving-up-golf-to-become-a-Navy-Seal-according-to-former-coach-Hank-Haney.html

It seems Tiger is not prepared to confirm or deny this, although he hides behind this as already having provided a response about his thoughts on Hanks book.

Here he gets heated with a reporter;

http://www.weiunderpar.com/post/tigers-beauty-of-a-presser-video

If we consider his unusual upbringing by an ex military man who imposed almost military like conditions to the young tigers life is it any wonder he would have such thoughts in times of disillusionment?

Funny to hear Tiger today calling Miceli 'a beauty'! So true....

kwinigolfer wrote:venice,
Evoking Wasila is a bit beyond the palin . . . .
Think I messed up the Bowie ditty, wasn't it Laughing Gnome??!!

Doesn't help my Montrealers, dead last. Snow this week, maybe that will inspire them.

I thought you wrote Rolling Gnome to coincide with the roll of the putts. You 'Montrealer' fans must be taking a ton of heat and beatings from Ottawa and Toronto. It's a good thing the Quebec Nordiques are no longer around (well they are sort of... in Colorado) or you'd be further in the ditch.

Off topic: can't believe I didn't know this until last week: all-time great pianist Oscar Peterson was born in Montreal. Another fine feather in the city's cap.

Oscar and Leonard Cohen, among others. Adopted son Jean Beliveau still in a Montreal hospital following a stroke.

Rolling gnome - I did kinda, because that phrase comes up in the song, but had remembered the sing as Rolling Gnome, which was a blunder!

Just read Tiger's interview transcript - he sounds more like Mitt Romney every day. Priceless piece about avoiding California income tax. What an entitled berk.

Seals and Tigers:

Mac,
There's nothing new on this, just Haney's spin on it.
In Dec 2010 he responded at a press conference: "Well, I've always wanted to become a SEAL" etc, etc.
I think Tiger has decided he's dissing whatever Hank Haney says or writes, but I wouldn't be surprised if the golf press circled the wagons in support of Miceli (who I don't care for one bit, but can hardly be blamed for asking perfectly legit questions); I followed this when Callahan's book came out, but Doug Ferguson also reprises it in detail for the AP.

Some interesting Bear Trap stats...

Padraig is apparently one of the best, if not the best with a total of -5 over 8 rounds, while Rory is somewhere at the opposite pole with a total of +16 over 12 rounds (+6 of these only in last year's last round!)....

Already nudging 70F as the early Honda starters hit the practice range this morning.

Temps up to the mid-eighties (30C) by afternoon, but fly in any ointment will be winds 10 - 20 mph. Similar for Round 2.

Second hardest course on Tour last year with average 18-hole score above 72 strokes on the par 70 lay-out.

Let the fun begin.

I wonder if Poults W/D... last night was saying he has 101.2 temperature...

Wonder if that was a cold or his reaction to playing with Woods?

Due off at 12.30 this afternoon, will keep an eye open for any alternate replacing him.

kwini, just curious... if a player gets sick the morning of the 1st round and decides to w/d before starting, would that tourney still count towards his pga tour yearly quota?

I know one of the bear trap holes is an augusta 12th template hole (maybe just the green) but I am struggling to remember the others.

What are the others like and what makes them so tough for the pro's?

pd,
I'm pretty sure it wouldn't count as a tournament played, almost positive on that. That was the most disingenuous aspect of Stenson's act at the Match Play: his one hole played not only earned hom $45K and 2 ranking points and denied them to an alternate, it counted towards his 15 events. But I imagine the Tour told him "what for" as he was condemned to play Fall Series tournaments that I doubt he planned on.

Interesting in Westwood's transcript yesterday that he confirms that the Ryder Cup will count towards his 15 events - I know that applied in the past to Presidents Cup play (Goosen being a beneficiary) but assumed that was because the Pres Cup was run by the Tour.


Mac,
http://www.pgatour.com/tournaments/r010/course.html

On the par 3's (15 & 17), the wind is the biggest issue, with water right and bunkers left.
The par 4 16th has a relatively small landing area and also has water right and bunkers and mounding left. Then the second shot carries water and is into the prevailing wind. Big green, so a gir does not mean an automatic par or better.
It's the penalty shots that mount up to big numbers. Low ball flight preferred!
Can't see any resemblance to the 12th at Augusta whatsoever!

I thought jack was meant to have moved a tee or something to make one of the par 3’s play to a narrow green back to front, with a bunker over the back and one to the front left?

Maybe not, in which case I must be thinking of another course.

Yippeeee!!! My two top picks in one of the Fantasy Teams this week are Rose and Yang!

Mac,
There are elements of that on 17, perhaps even 15, though at least there's a bail-out area on 15 from what I remember.
Any visual similarity with 12 at Augusta though is in Jack's mind only.

More double bogeys than birdies so far this morning.

pd, Bingo! Me too!!

Wow!!! Not so bad after all... Fair play to Rosey for turning that one around so quickly!! Great eagle!

Wouldn't you just love to see Jesper have a great tournament?

I'd like to see Parnevik play well and it would be a nice change to see Poulter play well. Not this week though.
princedrac's exclusive "top tip" was inspired. Poulter w/d's with the sniffles.
Cejka also cejka'd out.

kwini, all of a sudden we're looking very pretty with Rosey as a pick!!!

Great day(s) for Carballo, playing alongside Tiger and Lee!

Lots of Rorys at the top!! Love one, hate the other...

C'mooon McIlroy!!!!!

McLaren wrote:I know one of the bear trap holes is an augusta 12th template hole (maybe just the green) but I am struggling to remember the others.

What are the others like and what makes them so tough for the pro's?

Mac, I believe you might be thinking of Muirfield Village. I believe #12 there, a par 3, has a green that is like the 12th at Augusta. It runs mainly side to side with a bunker in front and over the green, as well as water in front of it.

How nerve wrecking would/could that be?? In as an alternate, then told you are playing with Woods and Westwood haha!

Master McIlroy -4 and on the par 5 3rd. I know he has a high ball flight but I've also heard his ball flight is so strong it stands up to the wind fairly well for a high ball player.

Hope Wilson has another good week. Class golfer.

What's really impressive is that the soon-to-be world #1 and my favorite to win at Augusta went that low on the back. Good stuff.

Thanks Kev

You know what, I think you are right that I am thinking of the one at Muirfield Village.


PS

Welcome to the site, and with knowledge like that just displayed you will be a welcome addition.

McLaren wrote:Thanks Kev

You know what, I think you are right that I am thinking of the one at Muirfield Village.


PS

Welcome to the site, and with knowledge like that just displayed you will be a welcome addition.

Thanks Mac. I have been on in the past but it was a while back. This site got blocked for some reason at work but now I can get back on. Although I couldn't recall my old user id so I had to create a new account. I tried to post a link to the 12th at Muirfield Village but being a "new" member I am not allowed to do that for 7 days.

Kev

I looked up a few photos of muifield villages 12th and it looked a lot like augusta's so it must have been that I was thinking about, maybe it looks a little longer than ANGC's.




I notice there are only two par 5's this week, I always think fewer par 5's mush favour certain players. harrington for one will be loosing less strokes to the field.

Spot on Kev! Elevated tee as well.

Mac,
I always think par 70 courses favour Woods less than 71's or 72's, though Firestone makes a mockery of that!

Impressive start from Rors, and from Davis, plus super "bounce back" from Inspector Rose, as pd mentioned. Scoring better than past years, so far anyway.

i see Darren Clarke is in the field. whats your best bet on his 2 round score?
im guessing 158 strokes!

Cant wait to see the highlights from Rory's round later on Sky.

Cant remember the last time I thought that about any player after round 1.

any idea what time sky start at?