Bowditch: THE Story of the Bob Hope Classic

You know that a story is developing when a guy plays the same course as Mr. 60 (aka Pat Perez) on the same day, in 19 more strokes. I took a quick look at Steven Bowditch’s numbers on Wednesday at the Palmer Course, and realized that he made two doubles and four bogies on his way to that seven-over score. On Thursday he made four more bogies, yet still managed to shoot -3. Today, the guys made two more doubles and four more bogies, yet shot even par! Shades of Wie, this guy is volcanic!

Steven Bowditch has managed to turn three eagles and nine birdies into a plus-four total after three rounds. Right now it’s five o’clock EST on Friday, and C-Squared has the lead at -20. The Ryder Cup veteran has posted five birdies against no bogies today, and is without a bogey on the week (oh, the curse!) So what’s the difference between first and 115th place? Singles and Doubles.

Bowditch can take heart in the John Cook saga. We saw him get cooked last week by Wie and others with a couple of high-70s scores. This week? After a 70-74 start, a nice 63 has him in the top 25 heading into the weekend. For my money, they should exempt Bowditch into the final rounds, since this guy is amazing television! No one else has shown this penchant for turning pars into under- and over-par scores since … Wie last week.