Tiger Woods will need a good round to make the cut at Farmers Insurance

PGA Tour Farmers Insurance Open leaderboard https://www.pgatour.com/competition/2018/farmers-insurance-open/leaderboard.html

Canadian Press

Playing for the first time since recovering from a fourth back surgery that cost him another year on the PGA Tour, Woods was mostly steady, sometimes spectacular and ended his day with an even-par 72 that left him seven shots behind Tony Finau. (-7 65) in front of big crowds at the Farmers Insurance Open in ideal conditions in San Diego.

Today he plays a revamped North Course at Torrey Pines and begins play T84th and will start the second round just outside the cut line.

He looks healthy, hitting the ball a long way and he did have 3 birdies all from tap in range, however the fact is that Woods didn’t make a putt longer than 4 feet.

He normally eats up the par 5s but only played them in even par, and didn’t give himself any other birdie chances inside 15 feet.

He had this to say after the round. “It’s hard to make a lot of birdies when you’re not giving yourself any looks, and I didn’t do that today. Tomorrow, hopefully, I’ll drive a little better, get my irons obviously a lot closer and we get the better of the two greens tomorrow. So we’ll see what happens.”

Just a reminder, he is playing the PGA Tour for only the second time since August 2015. That was right before he had a second and third surgery on his back, which kept him away for some 15 months. He returned at Torrey Pines last year and opened with a 76 on his way to missing the cut. A week later, he withdrew after a 77 in Dubai with back spasms and was gone again.