Monday Mulligan No. 1

Nick Faldo and Jim Nance tried to frame Tiger’s god-awful final Sunday round as something to do with playing with Phil and being somehow intimidated or unable to handle the uncomfortable experience of Phil dominating. They went so far as to credit Tiger for bringing the best out of Phil’s competitive expertise. Balderdash, I say, to their attempt to build interpersonal drama during air-time.

What I saw, what we all saw, was a Phil who nailed it early and rode the feeling to the end.

What I also saw was a Tiger who felt not like Tiger, but probably like Phil has been feeling for many weeks. Out of sorts. Out of control. Imperfect. Okay, I’ll say it: old.

Tiger doesn’t have meltdowns, as some writers have put forth. Tiger is a mechanical genius, and when the mechanics fail him, birdies don’t happen. It’s not emotional, it’s a failure of the machine known today as Tiger Woods 3.0.

I’m proud of Charlie (great comeback), Ricky (at last), Aaron, Kevin, Dustin, Padraig, Ken (nice!), and all the others scoring in the top ten and ties. What a great group of maturing PGA Tour golfers we have.