"Any athlete that's under the scrutiny like he's been under, there's a little price you have to pay, and so it slowly erodes."
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Nick Watney's 64 was impressive, but old geezer Mark O'Meara shooting 66 is pretty astounding considering a few things. Golf World's Brett Avery, tweeting fun stats this week, noted this:
24th @2011Players start for Mark O'Meara, now -5 through 17 holes. Made his debut in 1981 at Sawgrass CC, year before move to @TPCSawgrass.
Making O'Meara's presence on the leaderboard even more impressive is this, pointed out by Alex Myers in his look at the round:
O'Meara may not have played here since his three straight missed cuts from 2001-03, but he's been playing in this event since 1981 -- the year before it moved from Sawgrass Country Club. His best finish was a solo third in 1987.
Naturally O'Meara was asked about Tiger's WD and he spoke at length about his pal. Brian Wacker writes:
Plus, as Mark O'Meara noted, Woods picked up the tab when the two had dinner Wednesday night at Ruth's Chris Steak House. "It's not that often he goes to the hip," O'Meara joked.
Clearly something was amiss, though, and Woods may have been more injured than he was letting on.
When O'Meara saw Foley on the driving range this week, he asked the swing coach how Woods' leg was. According to O'Meara, Foley said, "You know, his leg is not good. I mean, he can hit balls, but he's having a hard time walking."
It was a decidedly disjointed first day at the Players Championship for the longtime buddies -- O'Meara shot a 6-under 66 and claimed a share of third place at age 54, while Woods headed home with yet another chronic injury to his leg at age 35.
It felt like one of those sci-fi, trading-places scenarios: O'Meara, who hasn't played regularly on the PGA Tour for years, was the guy in the interview room talking about his stellar round, while Woods was home licking his latest wounds. O'Meara, who now lives in Houston, played practice rounds at TPC Sawgrass with Woods on Tuesday and Wednesday and was as stunned as anybody else when he learned before he teed off that Woods had withdrawn after nine sloppy holes.
