2018 Valspar Golf Championship in Tampa, FL

[iacas]

 

[MrGolfguy67]

Great round by Paul Casey today. Shooting an awesome 6 under (65) with all the final round pressure and coming from outside the top 10 starting the day to take home the victory.

[RFKFREAK]

Happy for Casey.  He bounced back nicely after a rough round yesterday.  If it wasn't going to be Tiger it's good to see an older guy who hasn't won in a while take it down.

[GrandStranded]

So... How much fun will the Masters be this year? Anyone looking forward to it? LOL

[Shorty]

8 minutes ago, Pretzel said:

 

Good run. A 2nd place finish this soon upon his return is promising.

Understatement? Promising?

Given that most people thought he wouldn't be able to compete at all if he came back,  you'd have to say that this result is sensational. Not a great round, but no ugly doubles or a 3 putt on 18 to (hypothetically) drop from 3rd to 7th which is kind of what you'd be expecting.

The swing looks fantastic and the roll on 17 was as pure as anything I've ever seen.

Downside - - from now on any tournament without him is boring.

Only two weeks ago people  were getting excited about the POSSIBILITY of him making a cut.

Exciting times ahead

Edited March 11, 2018 by Shorty

[iacas]

OWGR 76th was with a win. Top 100? 125?

[RFKFREAK]

5 minutes ago, iacas said:

Man nobody really did much today except Casey. Garcia.

Yeah, in one way it made it exciting but without Tiger being in contention it would have been rather bland.

[MuniGrit]

7 minutes ago, GrandStranded said:

So... How much fun will the Masters be this year? Anyone looking forward to it? LOL

Especially if you got in on the 100-1 odds.

[onthehunt526]

Tiger is so close to winning again. Won't surprise me if he wins at Bay Hill, then the Masters.

Oh and by the way... I don't need to do the chicken wing thing.

[Shindig]

Two Sundays in a row I managed to watch a bit -- and today I was able to sit down and watch (as opposed to working on something with the TV on).  Going to have to make sure I can sit down to watch next Sunday.

[onthehunt526]

Johnny Miller wasn't there. If Johnny was there, Tiger would have won.

[jbishop15]

Course was tough today. Tiger was off, but he was close, too. Paul Casey really rebounded. Thought Tiger was gonna pull it out in the end. 

[onthehunt526]

5 minutes ago, jbishop15 said:

Course was tough today. Tiger was off, but he was close, too. Paul Casey really rebounded. Thought Tiger was gonna pull it out in the end. 

Ball striking was solid, putter let him down. He played well tee-to-green and made literally nothing except that bomb at 17.

I'd say that this week was a solid B or B+ game for Tiger. If Tiger had his A game, the kids can't beat him and that's a fact.

[Pretzel]

1 hour ago, Shorty said:

Understatement? Promising?

Given that most people thought he wouldn't be able to compete at all if he came back,  you'd have to say that this result is sensational. Not a great round, but no ugly doubles or a 3 putt on 18 to (hypothetically) drop from 3rd to 7th which is kind of what you'd be expecting.

The swing looks fantastic and the roll on 17 was as pure as anything I've ever seen.

Downside - - from now on any tournament without him is boring.

Only two weeks ago people  were getting excited about the POSSIBILITY of him making a cut.

Exciting times ahead

I don't disagree. I'm all aboard the hype train personally, but I was typing on my phone at an Old Chicago where I was watching the tournament (didn't want to go into a lot of detail). 

I'm glad that he's back and competing well again, because I grew up watching him play and win in a dominating fashion. He's playing some solid golf, and what I liked best watching this week was his solid play off the tee compared to some of his previous efforts and his past. I'd like to see Tiger play in some majors again and compete up at the top of the leaderboard, if all goes well and he stays healthy. At this point I'm trying to be cautiously optimistic to avoid potential disappointment if something happens, but it's not working very well.

[klineka]

1 hour ago, onthehunt526 said:

Ball striking was solid, putter let him down. He played well tee-to-green and made literally nothing except that bomb at 17.

I'd say that this week was a solid B or B+ game for Tiger. If Tiger had his A game, the kids can't beat him and that's a fact.

I didnt think his ball striking/approach shots were solid today. He even admitted he was getting in between distances with his irons all day and wasnt able to be fully aggressive with the approaches.

Seemed like he had 30-40 footers for birdie putts pretty regularly and missed the green a few times from the fairway with wedges in hand.

Then the couple times he was less than 15 feet, the putts just didnt drop.

I agree that that is probably a B or B+ round for him.

[iacas]

The positives:

• T2
• Never saw the course before
• Four rounds straight under par
• 148 OWGR
• WAY the hell ahead of schedule
• Driver
  • clubhead speed
  • control, for the most part
• Return of the stinger
• short game
• putting, generally (you're always gonna have days like today)
• healthy, happy, smiling

The negatives:

• Uhhhh, he didn't win?
• His irons weren't spectacular today. Just "okay."

[onthehunt526]

24 minutes ago, iacas said:

The positives:

• T2
• Never saw the course before
• Four rounds straight under par
• 148 OWGR
• WAY the hell ahead of schedule
• Driver
  • clubhead speed
  • control, for the most part
• Return of the stinger
• short game
• putting, generally (you're always gonna have days like today)
• healthy, happy, smiling

The negatives:

• Uhhhh, he didn't win?
• His irons weren't spectacular today. Just "okay."

Had a lot of in between yardage by his own admission. I think he wins next week.

[phillyk]

I haven't read through everything so hopefully this isn't repeated, but did anyone else think Tiger played too safe in round 4?  It seemed like his 3 wood and driver were working just fine the previous days but he kept using long iron stingers.  Why not get aggressive, at least on 18 to try and give yourself more mid/short irons and try to get the ball closer to the hole on approach shots?  Idk, I'm just making excuses for the guy, but it just seemed unlike him.  Anyhow the whole tournament was fun to watch.