Funny ad from Dick’s Sporting Goods

A Guest Post:

Tiger Woods feels he is improving all the time after picking up his second win of the season in the WGC-Cadillac Championship at Doral last weekend.

Woods secured his 17th World Golf Championship success and his first since 2009 with a two-shot victory in Florida, despite bogeys at the 16th and 18th. The world number two carded 71 in the closing round to end 19-under.

Woods was delighted to see off the challenge of Steve Stricker, who gave the 14-time major champion putting tips before the tournament. The friendly gesture backfired on Stricker as Woods putted his way to glory and dominance in the golf betting odds.

“I’m just trying to get better. It’s very simple. I feel like my game’s becoming more efficient. It’s more consistent day in and day out, and I’m very pleased with the progress I’ve made,” said the 37-year-old.

Graeme McDowell started the final day in contention but failed to put sufficient pressure on Woods. He hit a double-bogey at the last to drop into shared third place, with Phil Mickelson, Sergio Garcia and Adam Scott.

“The way Tiger was playing, I was always in chase mode. He was always going to be a tough guy to catch. Fair play to him. He played fantastic golf the last couple of days,” said McDowell.

Meanwhile, the only player ranked above Woods, Rory McIlroy, left the tournament in high spirits after a bogey-free 65 in the final round saw him finish in the top 10.

The Northern Irishman went into the event with question marks over his mental state after a bizarre walk-off in the Honda Classic. He responded with a positive showing in Florida.

“I feel a lot better. Regardless of the score, I hit a lot of good shots over the last three days,” said McIlroy.

Tiger Woods certainly put on a display at the Blue Monster this past weekend, just as he had at Torrey Pines earlier this year. In between, though, he had that rather pedestrian effort at the Honda and an inglorious dumping at the WGC Match Play. So for me, the jury is still out on his “return.”

Here’s why: Tiger absolutely owns Torrey Pines (8 wins) and Doral (7 wins). Combined, those two alone are a Hall of Fame career. In addition to Torrey and Doral, Tiger has won seven times each at Palmers’ Bay Hill and at Firestone, home of the WGC Bridgestone. Those four courses account for 36% of his wins. Throw in the Memorial (5) and the Masters (4), and those six account for 38 of his 76 wins. That’s 50% of his wins on just six courses.

In contrast, Jack’s 73 wins include 6 at Augusta, four at Pebble Beach (three Crosby titles, and one US Open)  and three at the Tournament of Champions at LaCosta. As far as I can tell, along with St Andrews (2), Baltusrol (2) and his own Memorial (2) those are the only multiple wins on a single course.  So Jack’s percentage of wins on his top 6 courses was 26%. That means, of course, that his other wins were spread out over a lot more courses.

But this isn’t a Jack vs Tiger piece. My purpose is to ponder the meaning of Tiger’s two wins thus far in 2013. I’m not sure what conclusion to draw, other than that Tiger can win on courses where he is comfortable. That’s been the trend in Tiger’s career. I think you can safely count him as a favorite, but by no means a lock, at the Masters. Augusta apparently is the least favorite of his personal playgrounds. I also think it would come as no surprise to see him win at Bay Hill, The Bridgestone and the Memorial.

Heh. If someone at PGA Tour HQ really wanted to screw with Tiger, they could move the tournaments away from his five favorite tracks. He might never win again.

The only sure thing, I think, is that with Tiger playing better than he has in years, television ratings for the events he deigns to play will be up. That, and the bettors will have him as the favorite in every tournament he plays.

At The Honda Classic on Thursday, Tiger Woods shed shoes and socks and made an improbable par from a pond. Video below:

Jean Van De Velde is thinking: Why couldn’t I do that.

It seems as though the Golf Digest Fantasy cover from 2010 has come true. Tiger and the POTUS played a round of golf today. The press, however, was not permitted to observe. So, barring a White House photo release, this is the best we’ll have.

I thought this was funny. Not ROTFLOL, but a small chuckle.

I am SO buying a house like this when I hit the lottery.