Woods makes no excuses to golf’s younger generation superstars

Starting at the 10th hole, the 42-year-old made bogey at the par-four 11th and dropped another shot at 14, although he negotiated the course’s risky “Green Mile” without further damage.

He had only seven birdie opportunities inside 20 feet, even though he kept the ball in play for the most part.

Keith Mitchell briefly tied Peterson for the lead, but a triple-bogey 7 on No. 18 pushed him to three shots off the lead.

“They’re on the slower side”, Woods said. My feels just aren’t matching up with the speed of these greens.

“I just need to make some putts”. I just kind of want to be a dad and like be around my kid and my family more often, even though, yeah, they’re here this week, but they can’t come every week.

In January during a chat at the PGA Show, Bill Price, TaylorMade’s senior director of putters and wedges, told me there was nothing new to report on the Tiger front, but that he and his team were anxious to start the process. Two of those were three-putt bogeys, and just for good measure, he also missed a very makable nine-footer for birdie on his 16th hole of the day. Despite sinking a birdie putt from 27 feet on the eighth, he three-putted on both the fourth and the 16th. But a poor pitch shot leaves him with a 24-footer for birdie, which, of course, he misses. “I made some good swings and hit some good putts”.

And he was still out of golf recovering from back surgery last summer when Quail Hollow hosted the PGA Championship.

“The way the golf course is set up and the way it’s playing right now, the guys are going to be stacked”, he said.

“Most of the golf courses I’ve played have been really hard setups, whether it’s Torrey, LA., Honda, no one went low”. He’ll start the second round six shots behind leader John Peterson, who used back-to-back eagles to shoot 65. Rory McIlroy is in a group at 3 under par.

“Not really, I’m just trying to get better”, he said. “I’ve always been a pretty good putter all of my career, so that’s something I’ve never really anxious too much about”.

Woods headed directly to the practice green after finishing his post-round interview around 6:30 p.m. He’ll tee it up with defending Masters champion Patrick Reed and defending U.S. Open victor Brooks Koepka at 12:50 p.m. Thursday and 7:40 a.m. Friday.

It was Woods’ first time back in the public eye since that furious lead-up to the first major of the year, during which he evoked memories of the glory days with a T-2 finish at the Valspar Championship and a T-5 at the Arnold Palmer Invitational.

Dogged by injury and scandal, it has been 13 years since Woods last triumphed at Augusta and it appeared as if many of those teeing it up at the year’s first major had forgotten what a ruthless competitor he was back then. It’s the only golf course where he has missed the 36-hole cut twice.