US Open Golf 2012 Leaderboard: Steadiness Will Lead to Tiger Woods' 15th Major

Everything Tiger Woods has endured over the last three years, all the personal turmoil, all the swing changes, injuries and relative disappointment, will lead the golf's most recognizable figure to his 15th major victory at Olympic Club. 

Since his monumentally infamous off-course saga, Woods has entered uncharted waters as a role model and a golfer. 

Woods simply didn't have the immense mental concentration that's needed to perform at golf's highest levels over the last three years. He fired his coach, hired a new one, battled injuries, dealt with overwhelming embarrassment and was playing a different, more mortal-like type of golf. 

Gone was his notion that he was unbeatable, and opponents all of a sudden weren't folding at his mere presence. 

His game was more erratic than ever, and for the first time, was relying on creative shots from the rough and around the green to simply give him a chance to make pars. 

While he was ultimately unsuccessful, the lessons learned about grinding his way through a round will be the most underrated determinant in Woods winning his 15th major on Sunday. 

US Opens are overt in the way they reward the elite ball strikers and severely punish those who hit shots astray. Everyone strikes an errant shot on occasion, but the sometimes overlooked test that holds true at every US Open is one's ability to recover after their poorest shots. 

Never has this aspect of one's game been tried more than at Olympic Club this week. 

Woods has struck the ball marvelously through two rounds, but his keen ability to get the ball up-and-down out of precarious positions as been just as impressive.

He's meticulously rolled through his rounds, seemingly giving more to avoid mistakes than to make a slew of birdies.

The US Open is all about steadiness and avoiding the big number, and Woods' recently troubling experiences and finely tuned swing have supplied him with the game to past golf's most stringent test. 

UPDATE: Sunday, June 17 at 9:10 p.m. ET

Check out the full leaderboard here. 

POS	PLAYER	Score	Thru
1	J. Furyk	E	11
2	W. Simpson	+1	14
T3	E. Els	+2	13
T3	P. Harrington	+2	17
T3	J. Peterson	+2	15
T6	M. Thompson	+2	F
T6	D. Toms	+3	F
T8	G. McDowell	+3	11
T8	J. Dufner	+4	15

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