McIlroy: ‘Freedom’ tops golf league’s big money

Tiger Woods enters Friday’s second round of the U.S. Open at Pebble Beach looking to move up the leaderboard. Woods grinded out a 1-under 70 on Thursday, leaving him five shots off the lead held by playing partner Justin Rose. Woods, Rose and their other playing partner, Jordan Spieth, will tee off on the 10th hole at 11:24 a.m. ET. PGATOUR.COM will have hole-by-hole coverage of Tiger’s round. Rd. 2 preview notes STARTING ON 10. The 493-yard par-4 10th ranked as the toughest hole on Thursday, playing to a stroke average of 4.449. With the back nine at Pebble Beach considered the tougher of the two nines, Tiger hopes to hang on for the first part of his round as he tees off on the 10th. “Right away we’ve got a tough par 4 right from the get-go,â€� Woods said. “And we have the harder side to start off on, and hopefully I can finish up on the front side and have the full seven holes where I can get it going.â€� On Thursday when he teed off on No. 1, Woods made three birdies in the first seven holes (and also suffered a double bogey at the par-3 fifth) before finishing with 11 consecutive pars. IRON PLAY. Woods ranks first on the PGA TOUR in greens in regulation, and also in proximity from 200 yards and out, but he was not happy with his irons in the opening round. “I didn’t hit my irons as crisp as I’d like,â€� Woods said. One of the keys to success at Pebble Beach, he says, is making sure his misses are in the correct spots – specifically below the pin. That’s what he’ll try to do on Friday in order to avoid having as many lengthy par putts as he faced (and converted) on Thursday. “If I happened to not feel comfortable with a number, dump the ball 30, 40 feet, move on about my business,â€� Woods said. SCORING BY ROUND. It shouldn’t be a complete surprise that Woods started off slowly on Thursday. He ranks just 68th on Round 1 scoring average on the PGA TOUR this season. The good news? He progressively gets better throughout the week. His Round 2 scoring average ranks 52nd on TOUR, his Round 3 scoring average ranks 20th, and his final round scoring average ranks 14th.

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PLAYA DEL CARMEN, Mexico – It wasn’t easy, but you can’t argue with the results. Matt Kuchar survived some shaky play down the stretch and rattled in a par putt from just inside three feet on 18 to shoot a final-round 69 for a one-stroke victory over Danny Lee (65) at the Mayakoba Golf Classic on Sunday. J.J. Spaun (66) and Richy Werenski (67) tied for third, three back. “It feels extra sweet having kind of had to suffer through a year of not playing great in 2018,â€� said Kuchar, whose last victory before today came at the 2014 RBC Heritage in Hilton Head, South Carolina. “Being four years removed since my last victory I realize how difficult it is to win on the PGA TOUR.â€� With the win, Kuchar earned a spot in a handful of prestigious tournaments, first on the calendar being the Sentry Tournament of Champions in January. With his regular caddie, John Wood, at a reunion, Kuchar won with a club caddie, David “Toucanâ€� Ortiz, who had been assigned to him by the tournament director. Ortiz, a father of two from Playa del Carmen who caddies every day at El Camaleon Golf Club, was in tears as he accepted congratulations and rolled up the flag on 18 as a souvenir. Although he went into Sunday with a four-shot lead, and kept a nice cushion for much of the day, Kuchar bogeyed the 14th and 15th holes, missing putts inside 10 and 5 feet, respectively, to make it close. With Lee on his heels, he closed with three pars to win. The last one might have been the hardest. With mud on the back of his ball, which sat on the front fringe, he wasn’t sure how hard to hit it. He guessed mostly right, and the ball rolled to a stop nearly three feet short. It was a straight putt, but felt like a very long three feet.     “I certainly made it exciting coming in,â€� said Kuchar, who moves to fifth in the FedExCup. “It wasn’t the finish I was hoping for; I would have liked to have been able to five- or six-putt that final green. Winning out here is so difficult. The strength of field every week is awfully good.â€� This week marked a return to form for a player who was used to being in the upper echelon but had fallen off. Kuchar was 76th in the FedExCup last season after being in the top 20 for eight straight years. He missed cuts, which he said was “not in my vocabularyâ€� and “extremely frustrating.â€� He missed the TOUR Championship. He turned 40. All of which led to some big questions. Could he win in his 40s, like Fred Funk, the 2007 winner here? Could he reel off multiple wins, like Vijay Singh? Could he reach 10 or even 15, or was all of that wishful thinking? Kuchar imagined hoisting more trophies, but also couldn’t be sure he wasn’t done winning. “I’ve thought the other side,â€� he said. “I’ve thought, man, kids are getting younger and stronger and it’s more and more challenging for a guy that plays my style of golf to win and win multiple times.â€� He came to Mayakoba without knowing exactly where his game was. He’d worked hard with his instructor, Chris O’Connell, leading into his only other start of this season, the Shriners Hospitals for Children Open in Las Vegas, but finished T57. He was hitting the ball well, but not scoring. He did both in Mexico, where he stayed in a casita on the beach with his wife, Sybi, and their two sons, Cameron, 11, and Carson, 9. Kuchar shot 64-64-65 over the first three rounds, leaving no doubt as to the state of his game. Even with his relatively ho-hum 69 on Sunday he broke the tournament record at 22-under and broke a win drought of four and a half years. It was also his best 72-hole score on TOUR. After wiggling in that final three-footer, he hugged his caddie, Ortiz, tossed his putter to the turf and embraced his sons. He kissed Sybi, who caddied for four holes in the first round after Kuchar’s playing partner Zach Johnson lost his caddie, Damon Green, to illness (heat). The family savored the moment together. “My kids have now gotten into it,â€� Kuchar said. “And so we do a lot of kind of family afternoon time on the golf course. It’s really been kind of one of those great, you know, father-son and even the whole family, even Sybi will come along and we’ll cram four people in a cart and just go out and play nine holes or six holes or four holes, whatever we have time for. “I’ve really enjoyed those sessions,â€� he added. “My life has evolved. I used to only go out and be by myself or with a competitive match, and now having some kids to bring along, it’s really been rewarding. Fun times for me on the golf course.â€� He still wants to win a major, and to play on the U.S. Presidents Cup next year. He even spoke of potentially reeling off multiple victories in 2019. First, though, Kuchar was headed to this week’s Australian Open, followed by the World Cup. His season of frustration, the doubts about his future, the existential angst of a milestone birthday—all of it had been wiped away. “Turns out,â€� Kuchar said, “forty may be the new twenty.â€�

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