My Brain is the Weakest Club in The Bag...
When I wrote about Tiger, and how he is on a comeback - I may have made a mistake. The cat has a great looking swing - but in his last match he put the ball in all the wrong places. And that's mental error that, in match play - can bury you.
The president's cup will go on for three more days, and if Tiger continues to throw the ball down the wrong side of the slope - it's his fault. He might shine at the practice Tee, but shotmaking depends on good strategy and for a difficult course such as the one they're playing - he can't afford to put the ball on the wrong side of the slope. You just can't keep playing a game of up and down, in match play. Half the time the match doesn't even hole out.
Woods is at his best when he is pushing his own envelope. It is there that he can play the mental side of golf - find his opponents weaknesses. There are a myriad of little games he has been known to play. Asking an opponent to hole out on a putt of short length, for example. It forces the opponent to question his ability. Woods needs such gamesmanship to push himself into a state of competitive edge - and when he is unsatisfied with his game, I have found that , as an adult player - he loses playfulness. Woods is no longer a young, up and coming Golf star. He's a mature individual with questionable decisionmaking skills.
And when he starts second guessing himself - or is no longer able to enjoy the game for what it is - his game goes downhill faster than a golf ball on the wrong side of a slope. 7 and 6 is such an horrific loss, it's hard to see Woods do anything other than play dead in the matches to come. The match was over in 12 holes.
I may have made a mistake.
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