RichF

So, on a similar note, how much is he getting paid to fly all the way over to the JBWere Masters in Australia in November? Does he still command a AU$3 million appearance fee? Or does he just think " Oh I'll fly over for a week-long knock-about and keep my game sharp ?"

Not / never going to happen. There's NO chance Woods will even consider playing 3 links courses in Scotland in September unless serious dollar is involved....nothing to do with practice or swings or Monty or where his game his now or anything....it's all about the money .

How much is on the table? US$1million? More?

Quote: Hummmmm....

Yep - I've played (and I'm sure everyone else has) like that a LOT of times but in reverse: flushing 2 and 3-irons and then duffing 9-irons and PWs...

FFS, what is going on with Tiger on #12???

Tiger's putt at #7.

IMO, he should just sack this year off, fire Foley (Woods doesn't need a 'Butchie' a 'Haney' or a 'Foley'...he can sort it out all by himself) Consider: The Masters '11: he was the worst in the field in putting, blazing the way toward more three putts in a round than any other player. WGC Bridgestone '11: he set records for the worst driving performance of the year with 39% in fairways. PGA Championship '11: landed in almost every sand trap, in short his iron play was as bad as anyone at that level in years and his distance-control is awry. The hallmark characteristic of the collapse by Woods isn't any one area of his game, but all facets of his game. Considering the level Woods was at, and considering where he is at now, it is very reminiscent of what happened to David Duval. I honestly think....Woods appears to be completely empty right now. Reached a time in his life where golf is no longer something he is driven to succeed at, instead he feels about golf the same way most of us feel about our 9-5 jobs.

...or a complete breakdown of distance-control which is about to get him to +8.

Should've stayed in bed.

Quote: +1

Quote: My memory isn't as 'encyclopedic' as yours. I don't recall his driving being that good Sunday though!?

Seriously though, sarcasm and cheap-shots aside, you never know what to believe what anyone says. John Cook said (and I don't recall the exact quote): "his swing is really clicking" or words to that effect just before the WGC Accenture...and look what happened there. Iacas has stated earlier that he finished T4 in this year's Masters...but as I countered, he's pretty good around that course from year-to-year anyway...remember the "I almost won the tournament with a 'Band-Aid' swing today" quote. I'd be more concerned about his putting more than anything....as history shows us, every great player with a great golf-swing pretty much always get 'un-done'(sic) by the putting in the end. I'd say get the knee/Achilles sorted, forget the rest of 2011 and make a totally fresh start in 2012.

Quote: You're right - it's better than a full-field PGA tournament! Familiarity with the course, regardless of good-swinging or crap-swinging...I think 4 Wins and a low of T8 in the last 15 years answers that one. You're right...again - he hit some balls with his putter. C+ Must try harder!

Quote: 1 - http://progolftalk.nbcsports.com/2011/07/26/woods-coach-foley-says-student-has-not-been-hitting-any-golf-balls/ 2 - Okay, a full-field of 80 of the best of the PGA and European Tour combined.

Coming back to play at WGC Bridgestone Invitational ? Full-field PGA tournament New caddy Same crackpot-swing-coach Still-as-yet-unproven-swing 'Healed' knee\Achilles Zero balls hit on the range Good luck with that one...

I think Bob Rotella and a lot of rounds at Portrush played far importance on Clarke's win than texts...

Quote: But to be fair, there is a large % of people who purely watch Tiger Woods (and Tiger Woods alone ) because of these reasons and of course the introdcution of EA Sports' 'Tiger Woods PGA Golf' - it seems to be that their entire viewpoints are based on this.

Actually, yeah - I agree - Saturday morning, I liked watching each 2-ball go out and try and get somewhere with the weather going off like it did...that's one thing I DO like about The Open. Day 1 at Royal Birkdale in '08 was almost identical (I was there - it was horrible, yet I enjoyed it) and Carnoustie '07 - very similar weather days....

What - you mean one of the new up-and-coming players, fresh off a Masters-Meltdown, playing almost perfect golf, shooting at every pin possible and setting tons of records? Errr.....yeah, I'd say it just about pips it.

Quote: Mickelson also came out with it: “The hard holes have fair, easy pin placements and the easy holes have ridiculously hard pin placements, so we don’t see too many birdies other than maybe the par-fives, I wish it would be the other way round because then we’d have some birdies and we’d have a lot more bogeys and doubles. But I don’t set it up. It’s not my job. It’s my job to find an effective way to play it. But the way it’s set up means it will lead to par, par, par, par.”

Pretty un-eventful Open again : no great rounds; no collapses; no final round H2H; crap weather and a complete non-pick for a winner. This is why The Open is my least favourite of all...it's like, a lottery.

Tomorrow's forecast is fine until midday...then it's rain/thunder for a couple of hours...anyone from Par can win this and although I think someone is going to make a charge, mid-morning, they are too far back (+4) Going with DJ ...

Bubba apologises: Repentance, thy name is Bubba Watson, the American Ryder Cup star who began this Open Championship week with a wholesale apology to the great nation of France after causing uproar on his last trip across the Atlantic to play in Versailles. The world No15 missed the cut in the French Open two weeks ago but that was the least of his problems after a succession of incidents and interviews that, if nothing else, perpetuated the stereotype of the insular and coddled PGA Tour professional. Among his many "crimes" was a misguided tour of the great Parisian landmarks, or as Bubba put it "that big tower " (the Eiffel Tower), the "building starting with an L" (the Louvre) and "this arch I drove round in a circle" (the Arc de Triomphe). " I didn't know how to pronounce the names in the right way. That's my bad. They say it was disrespectful and I'm sorry for that. But I'm a golfer not a history major," he explained before heading off to play a practice round at Royal St George's. Over the last year Watson has become one of the most popular figures in American golf. His big-hitting, freewheeling style has often led him to be compared to John Daly and this season it has paid dividends on the course, securing him two victories on the PGA Tour. His popularity was threatening to spread to Europe, although he acknowledged he now has ground to recover. "I didn't know I had done anything wrong until I got back to the United States and discovered there had been a lot of negative press about me. I didn't mean any harm. I just told [French journalists] what was different over there to what I was used to. That's what was wrong. I was uncomfortable,'' he told the Guardian. "It is just like being uncomfortable with heights. I am uncomfortable with heights, I'm scared of the dark and I am scared of big crowds. So for me to be among a bunch of big crowds like there was in France – it was different for me." That being so, Watson, who has in the past said he suffers from attention deficit disorder, might be in for a shock this week, with organisers at The Open in Kent expecting upwards of 40,000 spectators every day. Contrary to earlier reports, the 32-year-old American did not receive a $200,000 (£126,000) appearance fee for journeying across the Atlantic. He did in fact choose to play in France, believing that he needed to broaden his horizons. However, he was shocked when he arrived for the tournament and discovered he was the draw card in the field. "I didn't understand that I was the big star of the week because I don't go over to Europe that much. I'm not used to being the star, so I have never been interviewed when I have played that bad. "After the first day I was 128th and after the second day I was still in the hundreds, so I couldn't understand why anybody would want to interview me playing bad golf," he said. "But now I see that I was wrong. There is a lot of learning I have to do and a lot of growing up I have to do." As for future overseas trips, Watson said he intended to play in two more European Tour events this year. "I would also like to go back to France next year," he added. "Though I am not sure they will want me after all this stuff." http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2011/jul/11/the-open-2011-bubba-watson

Quote: He wasn't that good a player before...and generally, ********er's WAGs tend to be on the 'smokin' side... Anyway, War, Bubba!