Sunday, January 18, 2009

The Long and The Short of It...












Forgive the somewhat lame pun in the title, but after 3 rounds the Sony Classic in Honolulu features two of the best "feel good" stories of this young golf season.

Tommy "Two Gloves" Gainey, a good ol' country boy, and one of the Tour's longest hitters, squeaked by the cut line on Friday, and then fired a cool 66 o Saturday to put himself in great position to finish high on the final leaderboard. As many of you know, Tommy is an alum of TGC's "Big Break", and is basically an all around good guy - think Boo Weekly circa 2004...

Tadd Fujikawa (a Monday qualifier for this event,btw), thought by many to be a bit of a fluke two years ago when he made the cut at this event at the tender age of 16, also squeaked by the cut line on Friday. His showing on Saturday was pretty amazing - posting a cool 62 for the low round of the day (and his best as a Pro). Tadd's challenges have been well chronicled - from his struggles shortly after turning pro at 16, to his Dad's problems with the "po-po" (that's a Corey Smith reference, one of my favoite musicians). Tadd now sits only two strokes off leader Zach Johnson's -10.

Anyway - we will see what transpires today, as the pressure is on both of these guys who are both trying to get to full time status on the PGA tour. My predictions: Gainey shoots a 68, moving into a tie for 11th place; Tadd slips back to shoot a 71, getting his first top 10 finish. Best luck to both of you guys !

Bonus Prediction: Boo Shoots a 65 to win the event...

1 comment:

JS said...

TTG (Tommy 2 Gloves) is a great guy. He fixed his putting in the fall swing and if he can improve his GIR stat, he will make some good money this year. He will have to do that too. Finishing 146 on the money list last year will only get him about 15 starts on tour unless he plays well early.