Seven birdies are hard to ignore!

The furor has abated for another time, it seems. Michelle Wie has missed yet another PGA Tour cut, this time in Normanesque fashion. Remember those days when Greg would post a high round on Thursday, the battle back on Sunday, to fall a stroke or two short? That’s the only negative I can find in her play. She seems to start slowly, demanding the big finish in order to survive. That, however, may be attributed to youth intersecting with maturity.

Seven birdies are hard to ignore. Obviously, five bogies are pretty obvious, too. When someone birdies almost half the holes on a tour course during a tour tournament (note the critical simultaneity) that dog can hunt. Five or so others have posted seven-birdie (or the equivalent) rounds through the first days, but only Tommy Armour III (or is it IV?) has surpassed the total, dropping eight tweeters today as he signed for minus six.

What is interesting to note is how many three-putts she had on Friday. Assuming none, then she failed to get up and down for par on five of the six greens she missed in regulation figures.

It will be captivating for the statistically-inclined to return to Tiger’s days as a teen on the tour, and determine if he made bunches of birdies to complement bouquets of bogies at Riviera and the other tracks he ran. We know now that, had Miss Wie been able to avoid four of the five bogies, she would have stayed for the weekend. That she did not pack her tent after the first day and go home reveals much of her character and pride.

I remember when Morgan Pressel would get her hat handed to her in US Opens, then go back and heal her wounds in junior competition. Nothing wrong with that approach. Wie has chosen to avoid this passage, instead facing the fury of a spot-lit stage. Almost always written as a character, rather than born a human, this protagonist will provide an interesting denoument as the events and years pass. How or what will unfold could simply not be scripted.