Tiger Woods - driver

Here's my thoughts about Tiger.

I watched him on Sunday and noticed he hit his driver A LOT. Same on Saturday and Friday. Another thing I noticed is that he DID NOT hit many fairways. Last year at the British open he dominated the field and didn't bring the driver out of the except twice (I think). My big question is, if you can hit a 300yd 2-Iron straight down the pipe everytime, why would you even pull out your driver? Yes, I know that hitting a driver is the most exciting thing in golf, and the fans want to see Tiger hit the big bombs, but when you're down one stroke at Oakmont, with some of the thickest rough ever, why not swallow your ego and hit the safe shots?

Just my thoughts, because I know if was Stevie, I would've snapped that driver in half and handed him 3 wood or 2 Iron and let him dominate the field.

he hit 17 greens on saturday, so it wasn't necessarily the driver...he is definitely not as accurate,but he went 393 on #12 yesterday and still couldn't birdie. His short game hasn't been as strong lately and he won't get the roll that he got in the British last year. I'm sure he'll use more 2 irons at Carnoustie. He's not necessarily going 300 with the 2 iron either...that was usually on a downhill shot with roll. I bet he's "only" about 270 off the tee with the 2 iron, which will give you a ton of long irons on most PGA courses.

he needed to snap the putter...his double at 3 and missed put at 13 cost him.

His double at three didn't come from his putter though, and he only had one 3-putt. At Oakmont, they couldn't play out of the rough, it was insane. On Saturday he played great, he hit 9 fairways and 17 greens. Sunday, he hit 5 fairways. If he hit 4 more fairways, I bet he would've hit 4 more greens, thus 4 more pars, and one less bogey.

Seriously I think the pros whine a lot about the roughs, I mean we (the amateurs) are playing with knee high rough and unlike the pros we seldom find the ball when we hit the rough.

And I wouldn't be surprised if he has a pressure from Nike to use the new sumo driver.

he should get a 9.5 driver instead of like the 8 he has now..he'd be way more consistent even if he lost 15 yds of distance.

Check out this interesting article from ESPN.com: http://sports.espn.go.com/golf/usope...bob&id;=2907515

Bottom line is that no one finds the fairways with great regularity at the U.S. Open, so its better to be 330 yards from the tee and in the rough than 280 from the tee and in the rough. Cabrera for example only hit 4 fairways on Sunday and 5 on Saturday. But he was bombing the ball an average of 310 yards. You can certainly debate whether the "bomb and gouge" style of play is good for the game, but the fact is that the professionals have determined that "long and wrong" gives them the best chance of success.

Intresting article and intresting thought. I guess it the statistics show that his game plan and his amount of fairways hit would be more efficent. And I'm sure Nike wanted to see that big ugly yellow (I mean that in the least offensive way possible to all of you Nike swingers out there )club sole everytime Tiger swung.

I believe Tiger's 3 wood also has that ugly (but not so big) yellow sole on it as well.

He should of had some one putts though. He was set up to score and failed to convert.

I can't remember exactly when Tiger said this:

"I'd rather be long and in the trees than short and in the trees."

It really is a very true phrase.

I think the fairway stat might be missleading. There were a lot of shots on Sunday that ended up in the first cut. It counts as a missed fairway, but it was not penal. In fact it made the ball sit up pretty nicely for their second shots.

My "in the tree" shots suck, because that usually means I hit a mean slice.

Worst idea of the thread.

What's Tiger need to change? Nothing. he's won 2 of the last 4 majors, and the two he didn't win he came in second. He also has like 3 wins on tour this year and is leading the World Golf Rankings, Money List, and Fed Ex Cup. Sure he could hit a few more fairways, but in reality he just hasn't made his really clutch birdie putts of late, and the field is becoming more competitive and less intimidated by him IMO. My prediction is that he'll win atleast one major this year, as well as atleast 6 regular stop victories, and everyone will still be debating why tiger is playing horrible.

I definitely agree with most of this post, sometimes I think people forget that 2nd place in 2 consecutive major championships is far better than most people can hope for. I would also agree with the stipulation that the main reason he has gotten 2nd in the last 2 majors, rather than 1st would be that he just hasn't gotten those clutch Birdie putts to fall like we expect him to.

I think it's far too early to say that the sky is falling.

I certainly agree with this. Woods greatness isn't because he can maintain a pinnacle of play at all times. Even the greats go through slumps, whether it be golf, baseball, etc. What makes him unique is that he manages to hit that pinnacle of play more often than any one else. Granted at that level of play, there are going to be guys with enough confidence and ego to go after him and beat him. But he's tops, and until he melts down for consecutive years, he's always going to be considered the guy to beat.