You may have heard that Tiger held a press conference today for his upcoming AT&T National golf tournament. It was Tiger’s first appearance since his WD from the Players Championship after 9 holes and naturally, people were interested to hear if he was planning on playing at Congressional next month (shocker alert: He is).
However the press conference took an interesting turn before it even started when Tiger posted the tweet above to his Twitter account. And then right before the start of the press conference, Tiger posted this:
I didn’t post anything about it on this site, but it’s been all over the interwebs that 2 weeks ago Rory Sabbatini received a 30-day suspension from the PGA Tour that was supposed to start this week. However if you check the tee times for tomorrow, Sabbatini is scheduled to tee off at 12:13 with Tom Lehman and Kenny Perry.
Apparently Sabbatini, who is sometimes known for having a “difficult” personality, got into an argument on the golf course at the Zurich Classic with his playing partner, Sean O’Hair. The details are fuzzy, but apparently the two had to be separated by O’Hair’s caddy/father-in-law, and then they revived their argument once in the locker room.
Late yesterday, Ian Poulter sprinted from the 17th tee all the way to the green, putted out, and then teed off on 18 while his playing partner Dustin Johnson was still on the green and Phil Mickelson’s group was just walking off the 18th tee. Why the rush?
By putting a ball in play on the 18th, Poulter and Johnson were able to finish their round even though the horn sounded to end play. If the horn had sounded while they were still playing the 17th, they would have had to show up for a 7:30ish tee time this morning, play one hole, and then hang around for a few hours to start their 4th round.
I think DJ owes Poulter a drink for getting him a few extra hours of sleep this morning.
The 17th at TPC Sawgrass is a tough hole as Alex Cejka, Paul Goydos and Edoardo Molinari can attest. The group scored a combined 20 on the par-3.
Cejka and Molinari both put 2 shots in the water. Cejka then 3-jacked it for an 8, while Molinari managed to salvage a 7. Goydos, who only put one in the water, had the honors on the 18th teebox with a solid double bogey.
For those of you counting at home, that’s 5 shots in the drink between the three of them. Video after the break:
After shooting a 42 on the front nine, Tiger Woods withdrew from the Players Championship this morning, citing pain in his left leg.
“The knee acted up and then the Achilles followed after that, and then the calf started cramping up,” said Woods, who triple-bogeyed the par-4 fourth hole and made three bogeys and no birdies. “Everything started getting tight, so it’s just a whole chain reaction.
He’s had 4 surgeries on his left knee and did not start at Quail Hollow last week due to lingering pain in his knee from the Masters. This withdrawal certainly raises the question of whether or not Tiger will be 100% at next month’s US Open. And even if he is physically healthy, will he have had enough playing reps to be competitive?
This week the world’s best (well except for Lee Westwood and Rory McIlroy) are gathered at the TPC Sawgrass for the so called “fifth major”, the Players Championship. Like many others, I think the “fifth major” label is stretching it a bit, but if you just went by the coverage on the Golf Channel, you’d think the US Open was being held this week.
That said, the Players Championship is always a fun tournament to watch and the notoriously difficult island green on the par-3 17th is one of the most exciting holes in golf. So who do I think will emerge victorious on Sunday?
