Players Championship 2016: Tee Times, Pairings and Predictions for Friday
With one round in the books Thursday, Jason Day is perched atop the leaderboard at The Players Championship at nine under par.
However, his lead may not be safe for long. A pack of five players is lurking just two shots behind the reigning PGA Championship winner, and the Australian superstar will need to come up with another brilliant round Friday to enter the weekend with a 36-hole lead.
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With a thrilling second round on the horizon, here's a look at Friday's tee times and groupings, courtesy of the PGA Tour:
| 7:15 a.m. | Boo Weekley, Shawn Stefani, Andres Gonzales |
| 7:15 a.m.* | Kevin Na, Morgan Hoffmann, Chad Collins |
| 7:26 a.m. | Ryan Palmer, Patrick Rodgers, Carlos Ortiz |
| 7:26 a.m.* | Jonas Blixt, Sean O'Hair, Adam Hadwin |
| 7:37 a.m. | Bryce Molder, William McGirt, Colt Knost |
| 7:37 a.m.* | Carl Pettersson, George McNeill, Jason Bohn |
| 7:48 a.m. | Scott Piercy, Ben Martin, Hunter Mahan |
| 7:48 a.m.* | Robert Streb, Kevin Streelman, Brendon Todd |
| 7:59 a.m. | Vaughn Taylor, Matt Jones, Vijay Singh |
| 7:59 a.m.* | Fabian Gomez, Padraig Harrington, Retief Goosen |
| 8:10 a.m. | Brian Stuard, David Lingmerth, John Senden |
| 8:10 a.m.* | Zach Johnson, Patrick Reed, Sergio Garcia |
| 8:21 a.m. | Justin Thomas, Davis Love III, Alex Cejka |
| 8:21 a.m.* | Adam Scott, Rickie Fowler, Matt Kuchar |
| 8:32 a.m. | Smylie Kaufman, Jimmy Walker, Russell Henley |
| 8:32 a.m.* | Hideki Matsuyama, Graeme McDowell, Louis Oosthuizen |
| 8:43 a.m. | Camilo Villegas, Harris English, Keegan Bradley |
| 8:43 a.m.* | Bubba Watson, Rory McIlroy, Dustin Johnson |
| 8:54 a.m. | Brendon de Jonge, Erik Compton, Soren Kjeldsen |
| 8:54 a.m.* | Scott Brown, Harold Varner III, Byeong-Hun An |
| 9:05 a.m. | John Huh, Spencer Levin, Rafa Cabrera Bello |
| 9:05 a.m.* | Ken Duke, Steve Wheatcroft, Andy Sullivan |
| 9:16 a.m. | Greg Owen, Scott Pinckney, Kiradech Aphibarnrat |
| 9:16 a.m.* | Mark Wilson, Charles Howell III, Jon Curran |
| 12:30 p.m. | Jason Gore, Graham DeLaet, Francesco Molinari |
| 12:30 p.m.* | Ricky Barnes, Jason Kokrak, Patton Kizzire |
| 12:41 p.m.* | Johnson Wagner, Jerry Kelly, Kevin Chappell |
| 12:41 p.m.* | Cameron Tringale, Daniel Summerhays, Will Wilcox |
| 12:52 p.m. | Gary Woodland, David Hearn, Hudson Swafford |
| 12:52 p.m.* | Freddie Jacobson, Chad Campbell, Matthew Fitzpatrick |
| 1:03 p.m. | Matt Every, Aaron Baddeley, Ernie Els |
| 1:03 p.m.* | Shane Lowry, Troy Merritt, Paul Casey |
| 1:14 p.m. | Tony Finau, Peter Malnati, K.J. Choi |
| 1:14 p.m.* | J.B. Holmes, Brian Harman, Chesson Hadley |
| 1:25 p.m. | Danny Willett, Brandt Snedeker, Justin Rose |
| 1:25 p.m.* | Jim Herman, Emiliano Grillo, Brooks Koepka |
| 1:36 p.m. | Martin Kaymer, Henrik Stenson, Phil Mickelson |
| 1:36 p.m.* | James Hahn, Bill Haas, Ryan Moore |
| 1:47 p.m. | Russell Knox, Jim Furyk, Billy Horschel |
| 1:47 p.m.* | Charley Hoffman, Danny Lee, Chris Kirk |
| 1:58 p.m. | Branden Grace, Jason Day, Jordan Spieth |
| 1:58 p.m.* | J.J. Henry, Steven Bowditch, Nick Taylor |
| 2:09 p.m. | Chris Stroud, Daniel Berger, Bernd Wiesberger |
| 2:09 p.m.* | Jason Dufner, Kevin Kisner, Luke Donald |
| 2:20 p.m. | Ian Poulter, Marc Leishman, Bernhard Langer |
| 2:20 p.m.* | Martin Laird, Jhonattan Vegas, Si Woo Kim |
| 2:31 p.m. | Brendan Steele, Jamie Lovemark, Jeff Overton |
| 2:31 p.m.* | Chez Reavie, Kyle Reifers, Zac Blair |
Thursday Review and Friday Preview
Day was the story of Thursday's opening round, and rightfully so.
Coming off a tie for fifth place at the Zurich Classic in late April, Day didn't skip a beat as he tied a course record at TPC Sawgrass with a 63 to take sole possession of first place.
Perhaps most impressive was that Day recorded the 63 without a blemish on his scorecard. Day tallied nine birdies and nine pars to hit a mark only four other players before him had touched. And according to Golf Channel's Justin Ray, two of the previous four players who shot 63s at TPC Sawgrass went on to win The Players Championship that weekend.
The test for Day moving forward will be sustaining that level of production now that he isn't motivated by a pack of players ahead of him.
"I was under par going through my first nine, but there were guys at seven under when I was at five under, and I'm sitting there going, OK, I've got to keep pushing," he said, per Golf Channel's Rex Hoggard. "When you see someone up the leaderboard that's kind of distancing themselves away from the field, you've got to do something to catch up to them."
But based on recent results, it would be a surprise to see him fall far from the top Friday. Day not only tied for fifth in the Zurich Classic but also secured back-to-back wins in March at the Arnold Palmer Invitational and WGC-Dell Match Play.
"Day still has three more rounds on what promises to be an increasingly difficult course, but considering his confidence and commitment to playing the right type of golf for the Stadium Course, it’s starting to feel like he’s bound for his own statement week," Hoggard wrote.
The story differs for Jordan Spieth, who returned to the PGA Tour following a monthlong layoff.
After collapsing down the stretch at the Masters, Spieth wasn't in peak form Thursday. Although he went even on the back nine following a start on the 10th tee, Spieth's performance on the front was uncharacteristically volatile.
Although he birdied Nos. 2, 3 and 4, Spieth set himself back with consecutive bogeys on Nos. 5 and 6 before closing his round out in birdie-par-double bogey fashion.
But as the two-time major winner noted following Thursday's round, his performance wasn't as bad as the final score of 72 indicated.
"I really only had two bad swings today,'' he said, per ESPN.com's Bob Harig. "I'm hitting the ball great, which is what I've really been working on the past couple weeks, trying to get more consistent and better ball-striking, better control of it."
If Spieth can carry that confidence over into Friday, he should be primed for a steadier showing that throttles him into red numbers entering moving day.
One more contender worth touching on is Shane Lowry, who set a TPC Sawgrass record by shooting 29 on the back nine Thursday, according to the PGA Tour:
Beyond the fact that Lowry entered The Players Championship at No. 36 in the Official World Golf Ranking, his historic day was a tremendous surprise since he entered Thursday in something of a cold spell.
Lowry has just one top-10 finish to his name this year—a tie for sixth at February's Phoenix Open—and he sandwiched a tie for 39th at the Masters in between missed cuts at the Houston Open and Wells Fargo Championship.
So given the rate at which Lowry has regularly lingered outside of contention, expecting a repeat performance Friday would be ambitious, to say the least.
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