Day In Review: A crazy day ends with Watney in the lead

PONTE VEDRA BEACH, Fla. -- Nick Watney's on fire. So is Lucas Glover, who has carried over his momentum -- and his beard -- from last week's win.

An injured Tiger Woods is gone. An early departure, similar to last year.

Columns

Ross: Experience evidently matters
Wacker: More questions for Tiger
Round 1: The Day in Review

PLAYER REPORTS

Nick Watney's prep time pays off
Glover full of confidence
O'Meara, field's oldest, fires 66
New driver works well for Kaymer
Crane's wacky finish: All wood
Cabrera bounces back from surgery
Toms stays patient, fires 66
Mickelson derailed late in 71
G-Mac back's after tough month
Duval finds the correct balance

TIGER WITHDRAWS

Injured Woods done after 9 holes
Foley: Tiger was sore day before
Playing partners saw his pain
Video: Tiger discusses his WD
Tracking Tiger's knee problems
Photo gallery of Tiger's day
Scorecard: 3 bogeys, 1 triple
Give us your reaction to Tiger

VIDEO

Video: Round 1 recap
Video: Shots of the day
Video: LIVE@ highlights
Video: Watney on his 64
Video: Glover on his 65
Video: O'Meara on his 66

RELATED

Full Leaderboard
Round 2 tee times
TOUR Report: PLAYERS
Interview archive
Video Highlights
FedExCup projections
Kodak Challenge update
Daily wrap-up of Round 1

Meanwhile, a 54-year-old named Mark O'Meara, who hasn't played in this event in eight years, found the Fountain of Youth (it's actually in nearby St. Augustine just down the road on A1A) to find an unexpected spot near the top of the leaderboard.

Welcome to the first round of THE PLAYERS Championship. Crazy, indeed.

LOCAL HAIRCUT: Nick Watney's leading 8-under 64 wasn't fashioned alone or without local inspiration.

His caddie, Chad Reynolds, has quite a bit of knowledge of the area. The Jacksonville, Fla., resident formerly caddied for Vijay Singh, who has lived here and practiced out of TPC Sawgrass for years. Singh is famous for spending much of the day on the back of the range, with his caddie close by.

"(Chad) claims that Bermuda is the best putting surface because he's from Florida," Watney said. "Yeah, he reads them well."

Reynolds served as a more humorous inspiration earlier this season when he and Watney made a pact that neither one would cut their hair until Watney finished outside of the top 10. Watney began the season at the Farmers Insurance Open in San Diego in late January and recorded five consecutive top-10s over a seven-week stretch, including a win at the World Golf Championships-Cadillac Championship.

He was tied for sixth in late March after three rounds at the Transitions Championship but shot a final-round 73 to fall to a tie for 13th, prompting visits to the nearest barber.

FEDEXCUP: Should Watney go on to win Sunday, he would move to the top of the FedExCup points standings, based on the latest projections after the first round (click here).

BEARDED NO GLOVER: Lucas Glover, who's in second place after a 7-under 65, holds the rare distinction of being both a bearded golfer and one who plays without a glove.

Glover grew his full Grizzly Adams-style facial hair in the offseason because he said he was too lazy to shave. He said the beard will come off if it becomes too itchy or hot. Someone even created a Facebook page for his beard, and he doesn't have a personal one.

"No, the ball doesn't know what I've got on my face," Glover said. "But it's just something to do."

With a name like Glover, it would seem natural to have some type of golf glove deal. Last week, when he beat former Clemson teammate Jonathan Byrd in a playoff at the Wells Fargo Championship in Charlotte, N.C., neither player wore a golf glove, a rarity these days.

SMALL FIXES: How quickly things can change in a golf game.

Last week, Lucas Glover's work on some new swing changes finally clicked after a poor stretch of play and he won the Wells Fargo Championship. This week, reigning U.S. Open champ Graeme McDowell might still be feeling the same vibes. He has missed the cut in three of his last four starts and then spent last week in Orlando with his coach, Pete Cowan.

Quick results -- he shot 67 on Thursday, putting him in a tie for fifth. It's his lowest first round score of the year. The last time he was in Florida, he shot 80 in the first round at Bay Hill and missed the cut.

"I felt like a light switch came on a little bit," said McDowell, the reigning U.S. Open champion. "I started seeing the golf ball behaving again."

TIGER'S DEPARTURE: Tiger Woods' front-nine 42 was his worst nine-hole score in PLAYERS history and one off his career high on the PGA TOUR. But more concerning was that his left knee and Achilles continue to bother him after suffering an injury one month ago at the Masters.

Water Log: 17th hole

How many tee shots found the water at the famous 17th island green? Check out Thursday's numbers. Click here

Woods was forced to withdraw after nine holes, the second consecutive year he's made an early depature due to injuries at TPC Sawgrass. Last year, he left while playing the seventh hole on Sunday due to a neck injury.

"That walk wasn't normal," said playing partner Matt Kuchar, "and I think by the third hole I started seeing some grimacing."

FEELING YOUNG: When you're Mark O'Meara, the oldest guy in the field, and you shoot 66, here are the jabs that you grin and bear: "Did you play all the holes?" "Did you play the white tees?" Even on tournament eve, when asked at dinner by O'Meara's wife, Meredith, how O'Meara was playing, good friend Tiger Woods said, "Short."

But O'Meara, the oldest player to tee it up at age 54, persevered on Thursday, taking advantage of a fast and firm course to shoot 66 in his first PLAYERS appearance in eight years. He took just 24 putts, much of it attributable to a funky putting grip he calls "The Saw," that takes the right hand out of play.

He finished his round with birdies on 15, 16 and a 32-footer on 18 to come home in 32. Two other 50-plus players, Corey Pavin and Kenny Perry, shot even-par 72s.

The oldest player to make the cut in a PLAYERS was Julius Boros at age 55 years, 174 days in 1975. The oldest winner was Fred Funk, at age 48, in 2005.

O'Meara, who's in the field because he won last year's Constellation Energy Senior Players Championship on the Champions Tour, would love nothing more than break the latter's mark on Sunday.

FEELING LOVELY: Davis Love III obviously loves playing in this part of the country, with five victories at The Heritage in Hilton Head, S.C., and two wins in THE PLAYERS encompassing almost half of his 20 career PGA TOUR victories. Each site is within an easy two-hour drive of his home at Sea Island, Ga.

He finished tied for fourth last year here, but has struggled this season because of various illnesses before firing a first-round 68 on Thursday.

"Not throwing up the day before you play is generally good," Love said.

STROKES GAINED-PUTTING: The PGA TOUR's new primary putting statistic details how many strokes players have gained on the field via their performance on the greens.

Matteo Manassero, at 18 the youngest player in the field, is making his first PLAYERS appearance. But that unfamilarity with TPC Sawgrass evidently didn't bother him on the greens, as he was the most productive performer with his putter en route to shooting even-par 72.

Here are the top 10 players who gained the most strokes putting in the first round.

FATHER KNOWS BEST: David Duval and David Toms are inspired by their sons in their efforts this week.

Duval, a 39-year-old Jacksonville, Fla., native and the 1999 champion, shot a first-round 70 in his first PLAYERS start since 2006. His 6-year-old son Brayden has spent much of the week at the nearby beach, gathering more than 200 shark's teeth, turtle shells and starfish.

"It's been nice hanging at the beach and finding shark's teeth and playing a little bit of golf," said Duval, who now resides in Denver.

Toms, 44, shot a first-round 66 to match his career-low PLAYERS round. He is motivated by his 13-year-old son Carter, who recently began seriously playing the sport.

"I haven't won a tournament when he's been around and really was into golf," Toms said. "He was young the last time I won (2006 Sony Open in Hawaii). I'd like to play great again just for him to be able to see that."

ONE HOLE, BIG DIFFERENCE: You can decipher how minute the difference between greatness and mediocrity is in golf by looking at two players and one hole on Thursday.

Brian Gay was 5 under for the day -- including a hole-out eagle on the par-4 12th hole and a birdie on the par-3 17th -- as he teed off on his final hole, the difficult par-4 18th. He drove left in the hazard, dropped and hit his third shot in the same water near the green and wound up with a quadruple-bogey 8 to shoot 71.

For Ben Crane, it was actually the 17th and 18th holes that made the difference in his 4-under 68. Starting on the back nine, Crane hit the bulkhead that surrounds the 17th green twice -- on his tee shot which bounced over the green and on his return shot. He made bogey. On No. 18, his second shot with a 5-iron hit the bulkhead again and bounced under a TV stand behind the green. He made bogey.

"What did Jack Nicklaus say? The better I am the luckier I get," Crane said.

TWO OUT OF THREE: The threesome of Bubba Watson, Luke Donald and Mark Wilson comprised the first three spots, respectively, in the current FedExCup standings. Donald (69) and Wilson (70) held up their positions, but Watson (76) continued a poor string of play at TPC Sawgrass. He has missed the cut in three of his previous four tournaments and has broken par just twice.

CUPCAKES FOR ALL: Despite suffering with an ailing right elbow injury, defending champion Tim Clark has made many more friends this week at TPC Sawgrass.

The South African first requested that his native flag be taken down on site at the Circle of Champions, to be replaced by the Spanish flag, flown at half-mast, in honor of Seve Ballesteros, who died last weekend.

Then on Thursday he ordered 1,800 cupcakes from Cami Cakes in Jacksonville to be delivered on site to tournament volunteers and the media in appreciation for a job well done.

Clark shot a first-round 74.