No Longer Swing and a Prayer

It’s one thing to play a good game, which Fred Couples hasn’t been able to do much of recently. But it’s another to talk a good game and this is where Couples is the leader in the clubhouse. You’ve got to hand it to Couples, who can go off on more tangents than a geometry teacher.

Fredspeak is looking at ordinary events and putting a slightly different spin on them. You understand all the words, it’s only that they’re not delivered in a plain brown paper wrapper.

A sample: “I’m a lot older than I was when I was 30, which is kind of hard to believe.”

Or ... “It’s kind of like going down the freeway 110 miles an hour, which I don’t do.”

Or ... “It’s not like you’re missing cuts and falling off the tournament truck.”

Did Fred mean to say “turnip” truck? Possibly. But at the same time, “tournament” truck works fine too, and thus you have the magic of Fredspeak. You know, everything’s plausible.

On opening day of the Williams World Challenge, Couples played as well as he talked Thursday on his way to a six-under 66 that tied him with playing partner Mark O’Meara for the lead.

It was a good day for the old guys, who both have been answering questions about retiring and having to explain their world ranking--100 for Couples, 153 for O’Meara. O’Meara is 45 in a month, Couples just turned 42 and both were invited to play in the $4.1-million, 72-hole event hosted by Tiger Woods.

“I think I ought to get a percentage,” Woods said.

O’Meara and Couples are two shots ahead of Woods, Scott Verplank and Vijay Singh in the elite 16-player field where even last place is worth $130,000.

Couples doesn’t plan on finishing anywhere near that now that he is armed with a new weapon, a Scotty Cameron so-called “belly putter” model that extends into Fred’s, well, belly. Coaxing the ball across the green and into the hole has been Couples’ major problem, which he freely acknowledges. He had only two top 15s all year and made $385,984, his worst total since 1986.

If you figure that he didn’t play much better in 1999 and 2000, then it’s not at all difficult for Couples to assess his predicament.

“It’s basically been a mediocre struggle with last year being terrible,” he said.

Couples took eight weeks off after the PGA Championship, but missed the cut at the Reno-Tahoe Open. He took another six weeks off and came back at Las Vegas, this time with the new putter. He shot 63-64 the first two rounds.

Said Couples: “It was comical.”

He didn’t finish well and tied for 46th, but he kept the putter, closed with a 67 and shot 13 under a week later at the Disney. Now he’s thinking about playing well next year, instead of struggling one more time.

O’Meara missed eight cuts in 21 tournaments. His best finish in a stroke-play event was a tie for 12th at the Buick Challenge, the last full-field event of the year, which was worth $74,800 and enabled him to keep his streak of making the top 125 on the money list every year as a pro. It was a down cycle, said O’Meara, who also said he has regained his focus and is ready to play as many as 26 events in 2002.

“It’s still in there,” O’Meara said of his ability.

“Pride, that’s what pushes myself and Fred,” he said.

Woods said there were other factors with O’Meara: “He lost weight, he’s hitting the ball better and he’s worked on his swing.”