They weren’t all troubles. Brendan Steele took time out to show appreciation to one in our country’s service.
But the Torrey Pines South Course took a bite out of Steele today, Saturday. Despite his best efforts, he could muster only a 2-over-par 74, which puts him 1-under par for the tournament in a tie for 46th place.
Nevertheless, the Idyllwild native rewarded his supporters with some marvelous shots. On the par-3 11th, he knocked a 48-foot sand shot 5 feet from the hole, then canned the putt for a fine up-and-down par save.
On the par-4 17th he dropped a 28-footer with his putter from off the green for a birdie. And on the par-3 eighth hole he sank a 20-footer for his second and last birdie of the day.
For the tournament so far, Steele has lost 0.713 strokes to the field tee-to-green, while gaining 1.199 strokes against the field putting — a reversal of his more usual statistics. He has averaged 31.644 putts per round, which is quite a few, but it’s difficult to tell whether that means he’s not putting so well or he’s not getting his approach shots close enough to the pin to give him a reasonable chance to sink birdie putts.
Until two years ago, the PGA Tour website was able to answer that question with a stat called “proximity to hole,” but the new, “improved” pgatour.com website no longer gives a player’s proximity-to-hole statistic for each round or even for each tournament. So much for website improvement.
Steele tees off at Torrey tomorrow, Sunday, at 8:40 a.m. from No. 10 South.
Jack Clark may be reached at jack@towncrier.com.
Photos and video by Jack Clark
