DUBLIN, Ohio — Tiger Woods wanted more out of his opening round at the Memorial on Thursday, but he still posted a respectable 2-under 70 in his first competitive round since he missed the cut in the PGA Championship at Bethpage two weeks ago.
Woods, who began his round on the 10th tee, hovered around par for most of his day until birdies on Nos. 7 and 8 (his 16th and 17th holes) got him into the red, five shots behind leader Ryan Moore.
Most importantly for Woods, who said he was under the weather with some sort of illness at Bethpage, is that he’s in better shape than he was two weeks ago.
“I’m definitely feeling a lot better and I’m hitting the ball a little bit better,’’ Woods said. “I just need to not make a couple loose mistakes like I did [Thursday], and it could have easily turned and shot 5- or 6-under par. It’s one of those days it could have easily flipped. I could have gotten a few more out of [the round]. It’s so soft out there. It’s definitely gettable. And obviously you look at the scores, the guys are doing it.’’
Indeed, there were some low scores posted from the morning wave, when Woods played, with Moore’s 65, Jordan Spieth shooting 66 and a number of players, including Martin Kaymer and Marc Leishman shooting 67s.
“I just didn’t want to get too far behind, the way the conditions were,’’ Woods said. “We didn’t have any wind early. It was soft. And coming up nine [his 18th] it seemed like everybody was 3-under par or better.’’
Woods, who made a nifty up-and-down for a par save on No. 10 and birdied No. 11, stalled on Nos. 13 and 14 with a couple sloppy approach shots, the first of which landed in a greenside bunker and the second spinning off the green on 14.
“I was close to being easily a few more under par,’’ Woods said. “It was soft enough that it was gettable. And I just didn’t quite do it. I hit a couple loose irons early on, hung in there and finally got it turned around at the end.
“We were on the clock most of the back nine [for slow play]. That made things a little more complicated. That was frustrating, because we still had the last eight holes we were on the clock. The group ahead of us — JT [Justin Thomas] doesn’t take a lot of time, Rory [McIlroy] plays quick, and Jordan was 7-under through 13 holes. So they’re obviously playing fast. And we were obviously not.’’
Phil Mickelson, playing with two drivers in his bag, shot a 2-under 70. One of the drivers he uses to cut the ball and keep it in the fairway and the other he uses to “bomb it.’’
“I don’t see many golf courses here after the rest of the year where there’s an advantage of flying it 325 [yards],’’ Mickelson said. “Here there are six of those occasions, four of them the wind will come into play. And I wanted to try to do well here, but wanted to get practice in with the other one. I felt like I hit the long driver, probably hit it five or six times.’’
Rory McIlroy, shooting a 3-over 75, struggled with three double bogeys and a ball hit out of bounds. … Gary Woodland had one bizarre day, carding birdies on five of his first six holes and then undoing much of his work by taking a triple-bogey eight on the par-5 seventh hole. He finished with a 3-under 69.
