The Memorial round one: Time for Tiger to play catch-up

What an excellent way to shrug off the travails of The Players. Respect to Sean O’Hair for the way he threw down the gauntlet to the chasing pack Thursday. What is interesting is who took it up. Not Tiger Woods, having another of his periodic off days, nor Phil Mickelson, forced out by wrist trouble that had the legions who lumped on him thinking Tiger would indeed falter seething. Not even Zach Johnson, whose sore throat forced a hasty exit after an uncharacteristic triple bogey on the 15th.

Instead it’s two unassuming Aussies, Rod Pampling and Nick O’Hern, dissecting the fairways with some precision golf, followed closely among others by one Ernie Els.

Tiger reckons he played better than his score suggests and his stats, while not stellar, bear him out. That suggests the strong possibility that, after an evening of strenuous practice, he could come back to the leading pack Friday. He actually managed to hit more fairways than a number of the leaders.

I’d love to see O’Hair come out swinging again Friday, but I doubt it will be as good as round one. In fact his game is not the all-round work of art it might be. His iron work is a joy as usual and his putting on song, but he’s not hitting the fairways as often as he can and this could hurt him.

Two that impress among the chasers are O’Hern, who is making up for his distance deficiencies with some superbly accurate driving, and Aaron Baddeley, who posted the best all-round figures Thursday and could be a danger if his back lets him go the distance.

For all his bogey-free round, Els is a bit of a puzzle. His overall figures are not that inspiring and you wonder whether he can maintain the pace or, like last week at Wentworth, slam into reverse gear.

Two others I’m watching are defending champion Carl Pettersson, having a rank season so far but clearly in tune with this course, and his fellow Swede Fredrik Jacobson, who is another with the kind of all-round game suited to this track, but has recently been firing big blanks.

PS: I’ve nothing to add to all that’s been said already on the subject of Michelle Wie - greed, ignorance, folly, you name it, this story’s got it - except to wonder how she stays so slim. She seems to get through an awful lot of pork pies.