2010 Masters Friday Clippings

Too bad the scribblers didn't have much to work with after round one of the 2010 Masters. And as amazing as Tiger's round was, as wild as it is to see 50-year-old Fred Couples atop the leaderboard with a 66, it was 60-year-old Tom Watson's 67 that stole the show. 

LEDES

Larry Dorman in the New York Times: 

It was a mesmerizing first round of the Masters on Thursday, with leaders stacked up like cordwood, roars cascading across the greensward and enough big names popping out of the past and onto the big boards to give veteran Augusta National watchers whiplash.

Mark Reason in the Telegraph.

Tiger Woods was rather pleased with himself. The redemption drive had been smashed down the middle of the first fairway. The pink dogwoods were coming into bloom. Life might be beautiful again. And then came the roar, the wall of sound that said ol' Tom Watson ain't quite done with you yet Mr Woods.

James Corrigan in the Independent:

Just as Tiger Woods was shrugging off five months of rust and ridicule to record an opening sub-70 for the first time in the Masters here yesterday, so two evergreen champions were proving that some sporting reputations can last a lifetime. Fred Couples and Tom Watson might have 110 years between them – but they also have the first two spots on the Augusta leaderboard.

Lawrence Donegan in the Guardian:

 The old codger strikes again and this time he has a partner in tow.

Paul Newberry for AP:

The shots. The fist pumps. The roaring galleries at Augusta National.

Tiger Woods played as though he'd never been away.

QUICKIES

Golfweek's staff puts together a quick 18.

GolfDigest.com's Birdies and Bogies

SI/golf.com posts a Confidential.

THE OLD GUYS

Bob Harig on a round for the ages and the inspirational role Tom Watson's son played in convincing the old man he could still play Augusta National.

He said, 'Dad, show me. Show me you can still play this golf course.' You know what, I wanted to show him I can still play the golf course."

And he did, at least for one impressive round.

Tom Watson, at age 60 the oldest player in the field, is hardly showing his age just like this past summer at Turnberry.

Joe Posnanski, who has been covering Watson a long time, writes for golf.com: 

Only, maybe, this was about more than the score. I once asked Watson to tell me something about himself that would surprise me. He told me that he did not like playing golf on sunny days. It bored him. He craved wind. He needed a challenge. He longed for dare-to-be-great situations. When he first turned 50, he had mixed feelings about playing on the Senior Tour; he loved being around his old friends but he did not have the same feeling playing those tournaments. Trouble is, then he would come to Augusta and feel dwarfed by the course that he had once dominated. He missed 11 of 12 cuts. "I can't play here," he told us again and again. No, Watson did not seem happy at all to be growing older.

But, lately, something has changed. Maybe it was Turnberry. Watson, of course, created the golf story of 2009 when he went to Turnberry and played his heart out and came to the 18th hole needing only par to win the British Open at 59. He hit his second shot too flush, missed his par putt, and lost in a playoff. For a while, he saw that tournament as a failure. He did not win, and as everybody knows the whole point is winning.

 Jeff Babineau notes this about Watson's chances going forward:

He also knows as well as anyone that beautiful Augusta National, the one set up so scoring-friendly on Thursday, can turn on you in a second. It lurks around the corner like a bully who wants your lunch money. 

“It doesn’t matter what it is right now,” Watson said of his score, which matched his lowest round at Augusta. “It matters on Sunday. That’s all that matters. 

“The beautiful thing about this golf course is that there’s a tragedy awaiting you just about on every hole. It’s always there. And you always know it. And that’s what can happen here. 

“It’s never over.”

Cameron Morfit writing for golf.com:

Couples (three wins and a second in four starts in his first season on the Champions Tour) and Watson (one win) have dominated the 50-and-over set. Now we see why.

They led the field on Thursday with 24 putts apiece. The 60-year-old Watson was the only player in the 97-player field without a bogey. Couples, 50, made seven birdies, tied with Westwood for the most of the day. The ball doesn't know how old you are.

Garry Smits on Couples's amazing season so far:

Couples has won three of his four Champions Tour starts this season. The only one he didn't win was in Hawaii to open the season - when Watson birdied the final hole to nip him by one shot.

"Once I got going I kept making putts," Couples said. "To win Augusta at age 50 would be a pipe dream. I've got a lot of golf left to even think about being in contention."

TIGER WOODS

Kevin Garside on the first tee scene when Tiger arrived.

Can someone check the pulse of Woods. He may not have one. The most eagerly awaited tee shot in the history of golf was reduced to something approximating to the monthly medal at Wooten Under Edge. Millions watching world wide, patrons shoe-horned 50 deep around the tee-box, and the words of Augusta chairman Billy Payne hanging heavier than the pollen.

Ron Sirak at GolfDigest.com:

As Tiger Woods eased onto the first tee at Augusta National, employees of the club -- cooks, busboys, waiters, maintenance workers -- moved onto the clubhouse veranda and balcony and popped out of the trees on the right of the first fairway to watch, drawn by a man who by color, age and energy felt a lot like one of them. The year was 1997 and Tiger Woods was playing in his first Masters as a professional, a tournament he would win by an astonishing 12 strokes.

That scene was replicated on Thursday, when Woods, no longer the baby-faced 21-year-old when he won the first of his four green jackets, made a debut of a different sort.

Dan Mirocha on the first tee scene:

The scene began very presidential. Five Georgia State Sheriffs cleared a path leading from the back of the clubhouse, past the big oak tree and onto the putting green just behind the first tee box. Members, past champions, patrons and media members were stacked shoulder-to-shoulder waiting for him to arrive. The doors swung open and there he was. 

Tiger Woods, led by several security guards and plains-clothes officers, made his way past the massive crowd and onto the putting green. As the gallery stirred, Steve Stricker, Ian Poulter and Yuta Ikeda teed off just yards away. The noise level never lowered for them. 

Doug Ferguson noted this about the first tee gallery:

Throughout the morning, however, anticipation was building toward Woods' return. A single row of fans stood behind the ropes along the first fairway a half-hour before Woods teed off. When he approached the green, the crowd stood 10-deep in spots, a gallery that included European Tour chief George O'Grady and about 15 people from Woods' circle — his mother, friends, employees, Nike chairman Phil Knight and other sponsors.

Bill Pennington says it all started at the 8th hole for Tiger.

But on the eighth hole, it was as if Woods discovered his inner, or former, self. Blame the airplane, one of two that had trailed and teased him Thursday. Or maybe an hour and a half into his new world, Woods decided that the unemotional approach was a great rehab idea gone bad on the course — a failed clinical experiment.

Whatever it was, Woods suddenly began playing with added fervor and swagger. He confidently twirled his club after good swings and shot that pool hustler’s grin at the caddie Steve Williams. He brought back a modest fist pump, mouthed (inaudibly) at least one naughty word and let a club drop from his hands after a sloppy shot.

He took risks, and guess what? The ball started rolling into the hole in fewer strokes again.

From the eighth hole on, Woods displayed, for him, a typical brand of dazzling golf.

Jeff Rude at Golfweek.com:

To one man’s ears, the applause for Woods ranged from 90 to 50 percent of the typical past. His walks off the first tee and to the ninth green were met by roars of yesteryear, as if he had just gotten out of church rather than out of sex scandal. Some other audible response was tepid.

The main difference from then and now was Woods’ countenance. He was friendlier to and more interactive with galleries. He appeared to carry through the pledge of being more respectful to the game. He smiled more than usual. His reactions to shots weren’t as high and low as before.

TMZ posted video of Tiger's lone tantrum caught on camera. 

John Paul Newport on Tiger's round: 

By the back nine, however, he was feeling so comfortable he starting dropping clubs in anger again, just like his old self. He did it at 11, tossing in a swear word for good measure, and at 14, and finished with a four-under-par 68. There are many pitfalls on the way to recovery—or, as Mr. Watson put it in his postround news conference describing what he considers the beauty of the Augusta course, "there's a tragedy awaiting you just about on every hole."

Tiger's Q&A session is here. Lot of short answers and only a few embarrassing softballs. 

Tiger's also going to make some bookies unhappy if he keeps this up, reports Mark Lamport-Stokes. Ladbrokes alone would take a $4.57 million hit. But they're not counting or anything.

OTHERS

 Steve Elling on Lefty's quiet 67, somewhat unnoticed with the other incredible stories.

He hasn't finished better than T8 all season and in his six most recent rounds heading into this week, he cracked 70 once and had three scores of 75 or higher. With no victories in his first seven starts, this marks the second time since his winless 2003 season that Mickelson has gone this far into a season without recording a victory. In 2006, he won his eighth and ninths starts in succession -- in nearby Atlanta and six days later at Augusta National.

All that said, there is evidence to suggest that having the family around for moral support will help him fight through the final 54 holes to claim his third green jacket since 2004.

After all, Lefty said Amy last attended a tournament at the Presidents Cup last fall, and even though she never left the hotel, Mickelson went undefeated and was the best player on the American team.

That would be the ideal tonic for everybody.

Alex Miceli on a resurgent David Toms putting off surgery.

Sean Martin on the other just-like-old-times duo of Kuchar and Barnes. Doesn't have quite the same ring as Couples and Watson, does it?

Oliver Brown reports on Lee Westwood's opening 67 that included hitting all 18 greens in regulation.

Westwood ascribes the impressive extra distance in his game, which has added as much as 15 yards to every drive, to enhanced upper-body strength derived from a disciplined fitness regime.

Plainly, his diet has been rethought as part of the programme. Once he would have been happiest sharing a Guinness or 10 with Darren Clarke, but on Thursday he could not have looked more content walking after a 307-yard tee shot at the 11th – the longest of the day on that hole – munching on an apple.

But in this immaculate setting, protocol must be observed when it comes to fruit disposal. The point was lost on Westwood, who thought nothing of tossing the core into the pine straw. Step up caddie Billy Foster, who quietly gathered it up and placed it in the bag, ready to be jettisoned a little less conspicuously. 

Dave Shedloski on David Duval's tee ball on eight hitting wife Susie.

She did not know immediately that it was her husband who had struck the tee shot until she looked at the ball, a Nike marked with a red dot. "I hope that's not his ball," she said before leaning closer and, upon seeing that it was, putting her hand up to her mouth to hold back a laugh. Not wanting to break his concentration, she asked the small gallery in the vicinity not to divulge the news that the ball had hit his wife. No one said a word.

FLORA AND FAUNA

Connor Threlkeld says the FAA is going to interview the pilot who flew the lurid Tiger banners over Augusta Thursday.

Kathleen Bergen, an FAA spokeswoman, said her association received calls about two banners being flown over the tournament Thursday and decided to send the inspectors to interview the pilot and check the single-engine Cessna. Although Bergen said that from reports the plane appeared to be flying safely and at the appropriate altitude, inspectors would seek to confirm that as well as whether the pilot has the appropriate credentials. She said planes that carry banners also must be approved through the FAA to do so in a specific region.

“We will ensure that the operator had banner towing authorization for that area,” she said.

Bergen said she didn’t yet have the pilot’s name or which airport the plane flew from, but she did say it’s believed the plane is owned by an Ohio-based company.

She said that when it comes to airplane banners being flown “the FAA does not regulate messages on the banners, period. The FAA’s role is related to aviation safety.”

TMZ had this of one banner.

Doug Ferguson on what would normally have been a huge story, Jack Nicklaus joining Arnold Palmer to hit the ceremonial first tee shot.

Arnold Palmer brought the mock bravado. Jack Nicklaus countered with self-deprecating humor.

Two old rivals, who between them have played 95 times and won 10 green jackets, got the Masters off to a much-anticipated start on Thursday with ceremonial tee shots that didn't go very far but left both of them pleased.

"As long as we don't hear it land, we're both in good shape," Nicklaus said. "And that was what we did."

John Huggan reports that Augusta's range cost a grand total of $140 million, including the purchase of nearby properties for parking and other costs. All to be used 3 weeks a year!

And finally, the Ancient Twitterer…