The start of Tiger Woods’ day at the Torrey Pines South Course was most uncharacteristic. In what appeared to be a nonchalant approach at the start of the second round of the Farmers Insurance Open on Friday, Woods set himself back two shots when he four-putted the first green from just inside 30 feet.
Yes, four-putted.
The birdie putt there wasn’t even close, but it was the 8-footer for par – which Woods neglected to even mark and realign – that really caused fans to gasp. It rolled 6 feet by, and Woods needed two more putts from there to finish off a double-bogey.
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According to the PGA Tour, it was the 13th four-putt of Woods’ career, and his first since the 2019 WGC-Mexico Championship.
When Woods dropped from 3 under to 1 under after that first hole, it looked like he’d spend the rest of the day flirting with the cutline – which, at that point, was right at 1 under. Consider that in Woods’ 19 previous Farmers Insurance Open starts, he has missed only one cut. He’ll add another check in the right column after salvaging a 1-under 71 to move to 4 under overall.
After his unexpected start, a lack of touch with the putter seemed like it might derail Woods’ whole day until he finally reached No. 6, the first par 5 on the course. Starting with that birdie (where he tapped in from 3 feet after nearly holing a pitch shot), Woods went 4 under in a five-hole stretch, getting really hot with three consecutive birdies from Nos. 8-10.
Suddenly he was inside the top 10 and on the second page of the leaderboard.
On the back nine, however, Woods just couldn’t keep the magic going. He bogeyed the 12th and looked like he might par out until he pulled his drive into a penalty area on the left side of No. 17 and walked away with bogey. A closing birdie at the par-5 18th went a long way.
Woods had produced a 3-under 69 Thursday in his highly anticipated season-opener on Torrey Pines’ North Course, and even he seemed pleased with how smoothly he’d come back from a five-week break over the holiday season. He remained largely stoic on Friday as he seesawed from disastrous to lackluster to remarkable.
While Woods will easily make the cut at the Farmers, he was six shots off the lead by the time he finished his round.
Jon Rahm and Collin Morikawa, the twentysomethings with whom Woods was paired the first few days, will also both play the weekend. Rahm had a second-round 71 to reach 5 under, and Morikawa also landed at 5 under after a second-round 69.
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