Tiger Woods Makes Cut After Shooting Even in Northern Trust Round 2

Given a second chance to make things happen at the 2018 Northern Trust, Tiger Woods once again fell short.

Woods carded an even-par 71 and sat on the cut line and in a tie for 68th place at the first FedEx Cup playoff. He is 10 strokes behind leaders Jamie Lovemark and Brooks Koepka.

Frustrated by his approach shots throughout the first round, Woods found greens at a more regular rate Friday but failed to convert his birdie opportunities. He missed three birdie putts inside 10 feet and left himself with a number of attempts outside 20 feet.

The score will no doubt be frustrating, as Tiger was two or three good putts away from making a run up the leaderboard. He hit 16 of his 18 greens but finished his round with 35 putts, including an ugly three-putt on No. 18.

After hitting the fairway and getting on the green in two, Woods had a 28-foot birdie putt that would have gotten him to two under for the day. He missed and left himself just inside four feet for a somewhat tricky but makable putt—which he subsequently missed.

PGA's putting strokes gained metric says Woods lost nearly three strokes on the greens alone.

This could bring to a halt a streak of good finishes that brought Tiger into 20th place in the FedEx Cup standings heading into the tournament. He had three top-10s in his previous four events, including a second-place finish at the PGA Championship that briefly saw him take the lead Sunday.

One could argue he would've been better off missing the weekend than making it. That would've given him two additional days of rest as he continues his busiest stretch of golf in five years.

But given the way he putted Friday, odds are Tiger will be happy to work the kinks out this weekend.