Tiger Woods Honda Classic: Breaking Down Tournament Outlook After Poor Start

Tiger Woods is going to need a little vintage Tiger magic if he wants to get back in the thick of things at the 2013 Honda Classic. 

Rounds 1 and 2 weren't kind to Woods as he struggled to stay on the right side of par and barely qualified to continue playing through the weekend. After shooting 70 in back-to-back rounds, Woods made the cut by just one stroke.

However, it's not how you start the weekend; it's how you end it. So there's still plenty of time for Woods to make things interesting.

Woods is certainly no stranger to this situation. He didn't get off to the best start in the Honda Classic 2012 either. After posting marginal scores in Rounds 1, 2 and 3, he made a late surge on the final day by shooting a 62 and moving to second on the leaderboard.

He'll need another perfect round like he had last season if he wants to find himself anywhere near the leaderboard. He's currently nine shots off the lead and six shots outside of the top 10.

Looking at what Woods has already done this season, it's a possibility that he can find his swing and get in a groove in time to make a serious run. He's already posted one win this season: He claimed the Farmers Insurance Open in January.

The only issue with that is that Woods didn't have a particularly strong finish in that tournament. After posting scores of 68, 65 and 69, he struggled to hold on to his lead with a 72 on the tournament's final day.

Whether it's age or just a lack of the killer instinct he was once known for, the days of a locked-in Tiger closing out tournaments are long gone. He showed in last year's Honda Classic that he is still able to catch fire and make a final push, but his performance in the Farmers tell us that he's also capable of near-meltdowns.

How Woods finishes out this tournament should tell us a lot about what we can expect from him for the rest of the season.