Tiger Woods: Golf Icon Must Improve Par 5 Performance to Regain Lost Form

Tiger Woods has to dominate par fives to win on the PGA. He was terrible on those holes at Augusta, and that highlighted everything that was wrong with his game this week. He was struggling to strike the ball. 

Woods hit just 50 percent of the fairways over the four rounds at Augusta. That is well below the almost 70 percent rate he had been hitting them on the year. 

This led to him finding just 56 percent of the greens in regulation. Entering the tournament, he was over 70 percent. 

Nowhere were these struggles more apparent than on the par fives. 

Nick Masuda of golfweek.com offered up this quote from Woods: 

"

If I look back on the week, I played the par 5s atrociously. This is a golf course you just have to dominate the par 5s, and I did not do that at all this week.

"

Woods only birdied two of the 16 par fives. That is not going to cut it for Woods, who counts on par fives to make serious noise.

Woods has played the par fives 264 times in the Masters. He is 84 under in those 264 holes. He has been able to dominate these holes because of his amazing ball striking. Woods is typically fantastic with his irons, and when he is in the fairway, a birdie is almost expected. 

Ball striking had not been Woods' problem heading into Augusta. His most recent struggles had come with the putter, but those issues are quickly becoming a thing of the past. His putter has been getting better with every tournament. 

He had just 114 putts in the 72 holes at Augusta. That number put him in the top 20. Had you told most golf fans that Woods would end the Masters in the top 20 in putting, most would tell you that would be good enough to win, or at least be in contention. 

But no one was expecting him to struggle with his ball striking like he did. Tiger is not going to win tournaments unless he dominates the par fives, and he is not going to do that when he is struggling with his ball striking.