| AP Sports Headlines |
Friday, July 19, 2002
By JIM LITKE
AP Sports Writer
GULLANE, Scotland (AP) - This wasn't the day to worry about the rest of the field.
On this day, Tiger Woods wasn't even the best player in his threesome.
"All he did throughout the day," recalled playing partner Shigeki Maruyama, "was sigh."
Added Justin Rose, the third member of the group, "The first time you play with him is a bit of an eye-opener. But I didn't get caught up in watching him or all the stuff that goes on around him."
Actually, Rose did more than just avoid the undertow. After a practice round Tuesday, the young Englishman came into the interview room and said he expected to play well in the opening round - despite the craziness that playing alongside Woods always entails. Predictably, one tabloid turned the kid's modest prediction into a back page boast: "Rose vows, 'I'll play MY game!'"
After picking up the morning papers, friends called and bet Rose that Woods would hammer him. Not even close. Like Maruyama, he shot 68 to Woods' 70 and pocketed a few quid in the bargain.
"I think," Rose said after some quick calculations, "that I got 5-2 odds."
The local bookies had pegged Woods' chances of winning his third major tournament in a row at an even lower 7-4. And you'd think if he was serious about this Grand Slam business, that Woods would be in a hurry to figure out which side the gas pedal is on. But that wasn't the case Thursday.
On a day made for scoring, with little wind and enough sun that even the Scots began worrying about tan lines, Woods left a half-dozen good birdie opportunities out on the course and pronounced himself unconcerned.
"What are you going to do?" he said. "I was committed to my lines, I felt good over the putts, I hit good putts and they just didn't go in. And that's OK."
Less tolerable, though, were the cameramen who make Woods the most-photographed athlete this side of Anna Kournikova. And the usual pack was swelled even more because of Maruyama and Rose, considered the standard-bearers for Japan and England, and followed by hordes of their own camera-toting countrymen.
On the first tee, Woods settled over his ball and then backed off when a camera shutter clicked. When he finally did hit the shot, it flew wide right, some 20 yards off the fairway and almost to the entrance of the East Lothian Tourist Council tent.
By the time Woods found his ball in the waist-high heather, he found enough cameramen behind him to qualify as a tourist attraction himself. Carefully, he settled over the shot and then suddenly, backed off again and headed in the direction of the photographers.
"You guys got enough ... pictures already?" he said. "You did it on the tee and you're doing it now."
Being Tiger Woods, though, he quickly got back to business, wielding his lob wedge like a scythe and swinging as hard as he could. An incredible shot freed the ball from the rough and left Woods with just a sand wedge into the green on the 448-yard, par-4 hole. After knocking that shot to 8 feet, he made the putt for par.
"I don't know how I did that," Woods said.
That may have qualified as his only surprise of the day. While much of the competition took advantage of an unusually benign summer day - nearly a quarter of the field broke par - Woods played with surprising caution. He hit 11 of 14 fairways and 15 of 18 greens, but rarely risked firing anything close to the flag.
"You can only shoot yourself out of the tournament the first day, and I certainly didn't do that," Woods said.
By the end of the day, it was hard to argue the point. With the rain expected back by Friday and the wind sure to follow, everyone agreed this was the day to roll the dice at Muirfield.
"It was definitely there for the taking," Brad Faxon said
Yet Woods seemed to be getting himself ready for a different tournament and the storms still at least a day away. He didn't make any putts longer than 8 feet and two of his three birdies came after 2 putts at par-5 holes. At least four putts in the 18- to 20-foot range lipped out.
Still, he lost precious little ground. Three players shot 67 to tie for the lead. Rose and Maruyama may have won the day, but they were among a dozen players crowded onto the leaderboard one stroke back.
"I got myself where I needed to be," Woods said, "especially if the weather is the way it's supposed to be the next two days."
Only the really brave or the really foolish doubted he was right. When someone asked Maruyama whether his round meant he was closing the gap on Woods, he broke out laughing.
Maruyama then answered quickly in Japanese and a translator began smiling, too.
"Not at all," she said.
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Jim Litke is the national sports columnist for The Associated Press. Write to him at jlitke@ap.org
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