Masters Confidential: Will Tiger's playing partners suffer?

Every morning this week, writers and editors from Sports Illustrated and Golf Magazine will address one pressing question about the Masters in a daily version of PGA Tour Confidential, our weekly roundtable discussion.

Jim Gorant, senior editor, Sports Illustrated: K.J. Choi said he was happy to be paired with Tiger Woods because he likes playing in front of big crowds, but getting Tiger duty this week has to hurt. How many shots do you think it will cost Choi and Matt Kuchar to play with Woods, and what can they do to combat the problem? If you had to choose between playing in Tiger's group, the group in front or the group behind, which would you take and why?

Jim Herre, managing editor, SI Golf Group: I expect Matt to fire his caddy and put Dad back on the bag. Just spell Dad's name right. He was a total ham while caddying for Matt last time — cheering, signing autographs, mugging for TV, etc.

Damon Hack, senior writer, Sports Illustrated: I'd rather play with Tiger Woods at the 2010 Masters than the 2001 Masters. That Tiger lapped fields and made opponents squirm. This Tiger? Who knows? Last time we saw Tiger in a major, K.J. Choi's countryman, Y.E. Yang, was beating him at the PGA. K.J. and Matt will be fine.

Michael Bamberger, senior writer, Sports Illustrated: Artful questions, but I disagree with the premise. For KJC, a showman at heart, playing with Tiger will be worth half a shot a side, or two shots over the course of 36 holes. Poor Matt, that's another matter. He might be a little star-struck. His play can be painfully slow, which means more time to hear more. It might cost him a shot over two days. Which is huge. I would certainly want to be playing with Tiger. For any pro, the bigger the gallery the better. Big crowds=more balls in play.

Alan Shipnuck, senior writer, Sports Illustrated: Everyone here seems to think it will be peaches and cream playing with TW. A couple early bogies and Choi and/or Kuchar will begin to feel the weight of all those extra eyeballs. The Masters is more mellow than the other majors but there will be plenty of distractions and irritations. Tiger's playing partners — and the guys in the groups around him — may wind up craving their old anonymity.

Farrell Evans, writer-reporter, Sports Illustrated: It's probably easier to play with Tiger than to have to deal with the swarms of people who move behind and ahead of his group. The Pinkerton guards are there, and it's a very controlled environment. If Tiger gets the fist pumps going, then it can be a problem, but he says he's going to scale back on that to gel with his newfound temper control. I expect Kuchar to respond positively to the moment. Remember the first time he played Augusta with his Dad in 1998? He loved the attention. As for Choi, though he is a Christian, he comes as close as anyone on tour to carrying a Buddhist aura on and off the course. He won't blink at the roars and emotional ups and downs of the Tiger gallery.

Joe Posnanski, senior writer, Sports Illustrated: Seems to me this is not as big an issue at the Masters. Press behind the ropes. Limited tickets. I don't see it as much of a problem. I think playing with Tiger in the first round could even be an advantage, especially for someone like Choi, because there's going to be a lot of energy and the pressure is really on Tiger. The tough time, I think, is playing with Tiger on Saturday. And, of course, on Sunday, though I'm sure both of those guys would take that pairing right now.

Cameron Morfit, senior writer, Golf Magazine: I agree with Farrell that it will be easier to play with Tiger than in front of or behind him. I actually think Kuchar will play well at this Masters. He's had a decent year. Same goes for Choi, whose caddie Andy Prodger told me it's Tiger who got paired with them, not the other way around. I am not assuming Woods will beat both or even either of them given the rust he's bound to have. If Tiger's first round back from this thing were at Bethpage Black, Choi and Kuchar would be in for a long day, but it won't get terribly rowdy at genteel Augusta.

John Garrity, contributing writer, Sports Illustrated: Here's another reason why Choi and Kuchar won't find it to be that chaotic: Masters spectators are more evenly distributed. The majority of longtime badge holders plant themselves in greenside chairs on the front nine, so there isn't that great churn of fans running to the next green that you see at the U.S. Open. Furthermore, both of Tiger's partners are Masters veterans, so the sheer number of onlookers won't be a novelty. If I had game, I'd definitely want to share Tiger's spotlight and be a part of — fanfare, please — HISTORY! Think of the stories they'll get to tell their grandkids.

Rick Lipsey, writer-reporter, Sports Illustrated: I'd take whatever group they give me, like Poulter said, and be thrilled to have it. If a grouping can make or break your Masters, you've got no chance to win anyway.

Couples says he’ll play practice round with Woods

On Tuesday, the focus shifted back to the magic of the Masters

AUGUSTA, Ga. — It's hot here, hot and sunny. Summery. The players are talking about how fast the course might get — greens and fairways both — come Thursday. The grass is growing like crazy. The club can water or not. These are perfect conditions for growing grass, which means perfect conditions for mowing it down. Welcome back to golf.

What a relief. Monday at the Masters was all about the nonsense: the wait for Tiger's press conference, the press conference, then the analysis of the press conference. Tuesday was all about the golf. That is, the golf course, and the players upon it. The golf course is Augusta National, the ultimate magic carpet ride. The golfers upon it are Angel Cabrera, who grew up in Argentina without running water. And Matteo Manassero, of Italy, who got here by winning the British Amateur at the age of 16. And Jack Nicklaus (honorary), whose father handed down to him the legend of Bobby Jones, the visionary behind the club. And Phil Mickelson, who has two green coats in the closet and his eye on a third.

Coming to Augusta is not like going back to the Indy 500 every year, or to the Kentucky Derby. Things change here. Caddies are now allowed to walk the course inside the ropes even if they are not accompanied by their players. They can do as they do at other tournaments, pace distances, roll putts, check hole locations. Billy Payne, Augusta National chairman and agent of (incremental) change, is taking a page from the Clifford Roberts playbook: solicit and consider player opinions. Players want their caddies to have access to the course, and now they do. Dave McNeely, a veteran caddie from Northern Ireland, is carrying for a young player from England, Chris Wood, "who tends to get a wee bit squirrelly at times," the looper said on Tuesday as he tossed make-believe pitch shots from the right side of the ninth green with his player nowhere in sight. That was something he never did before.

Bernhard Langer began his workday with a nine-hole practice round at 4 p.m. and Jack Nicklaus had a 5 p.m. press conference. Pro moves. Why? Because Tuesday night is when the Champions Dinner is held, at one long table on the second floor of the clubhouse. Langer wrapped up at six, and Big Jack a little before that, so they could go straight to dinner without going off-campus first. A rule-of-thumb here is to avoid Washington Road outside the front gates as much as possible. Nicklaus was told that Cabrera would be serving that great Argentinean treat, blood sausage. "I hope he enjoys it," Nicklaus said.

Woods played his practice round early, as he always does. He was off at eight bells, which means he had to make a return trip for the Champions Dinner. Guys don't miss that dinner. Sam Snead came back year after year, even when he was done playing in the tournament. He'd have the Tuesday night dinner, play in the Par-3 tournament on Wednesday, hit the ceremonial opening shot on Thursday, then get in his Cadillac and drive home, stopping on Washington Road, he once told me, "to sell my badge for $5,000." I think he was joking.

One of the nice things about Tuesday was that no one was talking about Tiger's sexting and other off-course activities. That story is so 2009. Jack passed on it several times and so did Mickelson and David Duval, among others. Tiger fatigue has set in. Not Tiger the golfer. Oh, no. People are eager to see the magic again. It's the other stuff that, at least within the cozy confines of Augusta National, seemed to disappear on Tuesday. Chang-won Han talked about staying in the Crow's Nest, the clubhouse attic room reserved for amateurs. He's 18, from Korea, and he's the Asian Amateur Champion. Every year, amateurs talk about the peculiar pleasures of the Crow's Nest. The tab's $20-a-night, or something like that.

No amateur has ever won here and first timers generally have a lot to figure out at Augusta National, the most American of golf courses, but one that requires a keen sense of the lines of attack. Fuzzy Zoeller won in his first time out here in '79, but the chances of a Masters rookie winning seems remote right now, if the course plays super firm and fast. It will just take too much guile, no matter how much looper McNeely can tell his first-timer about how to play the pitch shots from the right side of nine. If you're talking Augusta savvy, you're talking Phil, Tiger, Padraig Harrington. Phil was talking about Fred. Fifty-year-old Fred Couples, playing golf in his tennis shoes and with his long putter, still fitting, pretty much, into the green coat he won back in '92, when his ball stayed on the bank at 12 in the final round. That's the kind of thing people were talking about at Augusta National on Tuesday. How that ball stayed on the bank.

"I think Fred's got an incredible chance to win this week, because he's playing some of the best golf of his career," Mickelson said. "And he's been winning. He's coming into this tournament with championship trophies under his belt, holding those big glass crystal things, as well as huge checks. So having that confidence of winning, I think, brings an added element to his game. His hits the ball as long as anybody out on Tour still and he's putting better than he's ever putted and he knows this golf course as well as anybody. I expect him to have a great week, I really do."

Fred should have a great week, and we should, too. You got to love what Phil was saying. He was talking about Fred, and he was talkink about golf. What a relief, and what a delight.

Couples says he’ll play practice round with Woods

Woods addresses questions on personal life, drugs and more at Augusta National

AUGUSTA, Ga. — In his first press conference since revelations of infidelity sent him into hiding and knocked him from his perch as sports' most beloved athlete, Tiger Woods on Monday acknowledged that he needed to become a better man, and that he looked forward to playing golf with peace of mind.

"When you're living a life when you're lying all the time, that's not fun," Woods said Monday in a 35-minute question-and-answer session with more than 200 journalists in the interview room at Augusta National Golf Club, where Woods will return to competition at the Masters on Thursday. "It's fun again."

Leaning forward in his chair, wearing a thin goatee, and looking each questioner in the eye, Woods took on a bevy of queries, many about the morning of Nov. 27, when he crashed his Cadillac Escalade and set off a barrage of stories about his infidelity. Woods appeared calm as he spoke of his life over the last five months, but he revealed little in the way of details. He said the accident left him with a sore neck and a busted lip that required five stitches, and that he remained silent for several weeks because he was following his lawyer's advice.

Woods spent 45 days in rehabilitation — he would not say for what — and said his actions had caused pain and damage to his family. Of his two young children, Woods said, "One day, I'm going to have to explain all this to them."

The 34-year-old Woods also firmly denied that he had ever taken performance-enhancing drugs, despite being treated by a Canadian doctor, Anthony Galea, who is under federal investigation for supplying human growth hormone to athletes. Woods said federal agents had contacted his agent, "but they haven't asked for my time."

"He [Galea] did come to my house. He never gave me HGH or any PEDs," Woods said. "I've never taken that my entire life. I've never taken any illegal drug, ever, for that matter. I had PRP, platelet enriched plasma treatments."

The treatment, Woods said, was for both the torn ACL in his left knee in 2008 and for a torn Achilles tendon in his right leg, which he sustained at the end of that year while running."I had PRP injections throughout the year," he said. "I kept re-tearing it throughout the year and throughout the summer. I used tape most of the year to play. I also went to hyperbaric chambers after the injections. It does help you heal faster."

Woods was asked about reports that he had taken Ambien and Vicodin. He said that he had taken both medications, but that he was not addicted and had not received treatment for the drugs. He said the Vicodin was for his knee, and that he started taking Ambien in 2006 when his father grew sick with cancer and died. When asked whether the drugs played a role in his car crash, Woods said: "Well, the police investigated the accident and they cited me 166 bucks and it's a closed case."

Woods was also tight-lipped when asked about his wife, Elin. He said she was not coming to Augusta, and when the reporter pressed him, asking if he should have returned so soon, he did not directly answer the question.

"Well, I'm excited to play this week," he said.

Woods also apologized to his peers for the endless questions they have faced since he stepped away from golf last November. He said he planned on being more respectful of the game, with fewer outbursts on the course, whether they be positive or negative.

Little by little, Woods has re-entered the game in which he became an icon before revelations of infidelities surfaced in the wake of a car accident in the early morning hours of Nov. 27. On Feb. 19, after being out of the public eye for almost three months, Woods emerged at the PGA Tour headquarters in Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., and publicly apologized for his transgressions and revealed that he was undergoing therapy.

"I was unfaithful, I had affairs, I cheated," Woods said then. "What I did was not acceptable, and I am the only person to blame. I brought this shame on myself."

Last month, after revealing that he would return to professional golf at the Masters, Woods held a pair of five-minute interviews with ESPN and the Golf Channel. He admitted to being nervous about how the fans would receive him. After playing a pair of practice rounds at Augusta National in recent weeks, Woods played again on Sunday with his friend Mark O'Meara, the 1998 Masters champion.

On Monday morning, Woods took to the course yet again, this time with 1992 Masters champion Fred Couples. It was his first time playing in front of fans since last November's Australian Masters, which he won. Woods was greeted warmly on the first tee by a group of a few hundred fans, and that number swelled into the thousands as he continued his round. He nearly pulled his opening tee shot into the ninth fairway. Unbowed, he teed up again and hit his second drive down the middle.

Several people in the gallery cheered Woods, who engaged them with waves and smiles.

The galleries couldn't be nicer," he said. "The encouragement that I got, it blew me away to be honest with you, it really did. ... Today was just something that really touched my heart pretty good."

After sensational coverage for most of the last five months, Woods will now attempt to piece together what was once golf's most feared phenomenon. He won 14 major championships from 1997 through 2008, but it is impossible to know how soon he will return to that dominance, or if he ever will again. In 2006, following a two-month absence after his father's death, Woods returned to the United States Open at Winged Foot and missed the cut.

But these circumstances are as unique as any. The biggest name in sports has been laid bare. This week, at the tournament that has defined him more than any other, Woods will start anew.

Couples says he’ll play practice round with Woods

Channeling Tiger Woods to get some more answers

AUGUSTA, Ga. — I had never been to a press conference like it, one that promised so much and delivered so little. The senses were on high alert: the hard serrated edges of the little square ticket you had to hand over to the three people checking for interlopers. I was in my second-row seat in the Press Building interview room by 1:20 p.m. The scheduled tee time was 2. At 1:27, an Augusta member gently told Mike Kern of The Philadelphia Daily News to keep the aisle clear — Tiger would be coming by.

And, 35 minutes later, Woods did, making a semi-grand entrance, right through the reporters, as if he were at his own wedding or something. (Typically for his press conferences, he just slips in through a side door.) Woods worked his way to the room's small stage, to face another packed house, this one gathered not to hear the ins and outs of another of his Masters wins (he has four) but to explain the state of his affairs. The great time-management expert gave Ron Sirak of Golf World a little tap on the shoulder on his way in — I'd never seen him make that move before — and space-wise Kern was accommodating. Woods had the wide berth he needed.

Question-wise, Kern had a good one up his short-sleeved shirt: Tiger, if you get to 19 majors, do you think golf fans will look at the record differently from the way they look at Jack Nicklaus's 18 majors? But Kern — like me, like most of us — never got his question in. The odds were against us. There were about 180 reporters. Woods took about 45 questions from about 25 different reporters in a session that lasted 30 minutes. Really, it was pretty much a continuation of his brief sessions with Golf Channel and ESPN last month.

At least I got a good look at him, live and in person. He looked ... about the same. He was slightly pale. He was perspiring, having just left a practice session under the warm spring sun, and he wore his Nike hat all through the interview. His upper arms continued to bulge through the snug sleeves of his pink, white, beige and blue striped shirt. The left-side of his upper lip drooped noticeably over his front left tooth. Maybe that's a function of the five stitches his lip received after he ran over a fire hydrant in Isleworth in November.

Doug Ferguson, AP's golf writer, elicited that piece of information, about the stitches. Tip your hat to the man. Tiger Woods is an expert in the art of answering reporter questions while revealing as little as he possibly can. On Monday, he pretty much picked up where he left off. To talk about his surgically repaired left knee, he said it feels great but he can now tell when fronts are about to come through, courtesy of the knee. That's one of the things he does, gets you to change your focus. You were asking about the knee, but now you're thinking about biological weather forecasting. Ferguson got Woods to own-up to five stitches (I had never before seen a stitch count) likely because he started his next, unrelated question by mentioning that number. Tiger inadvertently gave us a tidbit of news, the very thing he didn't want to do.

I had my various questions prepared — different ones, depending on when in the proceedings I was called, if I was called.

And here they are. The questions (Q), the rationale behind the questions (R) and, channeling Tiger, his possible answers (T).

Q) Can Fred win?
R) Tiger played 18 holes with Fred Couples on Monday morning. He would know. Not can he contend, but can he win?
T) Truthfully, yeah, he could. Can Fred win? As long as he hits it? The way he's been putting in those senior events? Truthfully, yeah, he could. But, you know, there are some people he's got to beat. Phil. Paddy. Stricky. I might have a shot. He's 50. But can he win? Yeah.

Q) When you were visiting with President Obama in the White House, did it ever occur to you that if he knew about your other life you'd never be there?
R) We know now that Tiger's ability to compartmentalize is off the charts. You wonder if there are limits.
T) Truthfully, I never thought about it that way. I never figured I'd be caught. That was my mind-set then.

Q) This whole window into your private life, it might never have been opened had the National Enquirer not followed Rachel Uchitel in Australia in November. What are your feelings about how this episode became public in the first place?
R) I'd like to know if Woods is angry, at peace, or somewhere in between.
T) Truthfully? I think what the Enquirer did was an abuse of our rights to free speech. On the other hand, maybe they did me a favor. But I doubt it.

Q) If you're a different person now, with your therapy and being exposed as you have, would you, almost by necessity, have to be a different golfer now as well?
R) Trying to figure out where his head is as a golfer.
T) Truthfully? I can be a better golfer than ever by being a better person. A different golfer? Yes. Better. Less emotional. More clinically ruthless.

Q) Did your agent, Mark Steinberg of IMG, know anything about your affairs?
R) Trying to figure out whether Steinberg will continue to run Tiger's business life, particularly if Tiger and Elin stay married.
T) Truthfully? He did, in a very limited way, and he tried to advise me about the risks of my behavior, but I wasn't listening to him or anybody else. What I've been trying to say all along is this thing — this other life I led — is all on me. And from the depth of this very deep humiliation I am going to dig my way out the only way I really know how to. Not by answering a bunch of questions, but by going low, lower than anybody else. Really, that's who I am. That's what I do. I play golf. Truthfully, I'm not worth all this fuss. All I am is a golfer.

CBS says five minutes with Woods not enough

Outside the gates of Augusta National on Washington Road, all is quiet

AUGUSTA, Ga. — John Daly was stationed in the Windsor Jewelers parking lot, selling merchandise from his massive motor home, as Tiger Woods played a practice round with Fred Couples inside the gates of Augusta National on Monday morning.

An author named Will Jordan walked down the sidewalk wearing a sandwich board and holding a sign that read "The Incarnation of Cat Man Billy" and "The Lord of Cats Loves Tiger and Cat Man Billy," respectively. It was already so hot he was sweating through his shirt and shorts.

But otherwise all was quiet on Washington Road as Masters patrons and sports fans everywhere awaited Tiger's 2 p.m. press conference, the first time he’s faced a roomful of reporters since he crashed his SUV in the early hours the day after Thanksgiving. The Masters will also be his first competition in nearly five months.

One reason for that is patrons no longer enter the club on Washington but instead go down Berckmans Road. Still, where were the tabloid media that feasted on the Tiger scandal for the last four and a half months?

"The Richmond County sheriff supervisor over there told me they weren't going to let any of that happen out here," said David Rawls, Daly's caddie, as he stood outside his boss's motor home, parked under a giant billboard of Phil Mickelson. "It's been real quiet. Usually you can't even get up Washington Road. I think it'll pick up this afternoon or Tuesday and Wednesday."

Daly, wearing jeans and a T-shirt and smoking a cigarette, sold his wares to the occasional passer-by, but there was no line. The market for practice round badges was as robust as ever, with prices as high as $450 for Wednesday.Jordan, the "Cat Man" author from Wakefield, R.I., by way of Cheyenne, Wyo., was experiencing his first Masters, and was surprised at how tame the scene was.

"I knew it was pristine," he said. "I guess it's that way because everything is kept far away. I can give you a copy of the book, I just can't sell anything out here. I checked with the sheriff first thing: 'Don't solicit.'"

A Fox News cameraman was set up nearby, across the road from Gate 3, the players' entrance to Magnolia Lane."This is the only thing I can get that looks like the Masters," he said.

A fully credentialed AP photographer snapped pictures behind him.

High school kids hawked badge holders, and children younger than that sold drinks for $1. Five equipment trailers were set up in the parking lot of Whole Life Ministries, which was charging $20 for parking.

Where were the paparazzi?

I asked a uniformed officer standing beside his Richmond County Sheriff squad car. He wasn't talking.

Woods arrives at Augusta National

Woods arrives at Augusta National

AUGUSTA, Ga. (AP) — Tiger Woods arrived without warning on a lazy Sunday afternoon at Augusta National, as quiet as it will get for him the rest of the week at the Masters.

For a while, it looked as though nothing had changed.

He greeted two reporters whom he had not seen in five months with a playful jab. When he strolled onto the new practice range, no one stopped what they were doing. He chatted with Paul Casey before hitting balls, Jim Furyk when he was done. But when he was looking for a game and ran into Mark O'Meara, the enormity of the week began to sink in.

They have never shared such a long embrace before playing nine practice holes.

"I haven't seen him since July," said O'Meara, whom Woods once leaned on as a 20-year-old rookie trying to find his way.

"Listen, I love the kid. I understand what happened and it's not a good thing that has happened," O'Meara said. "It doesn't take away from the fact that he's my friend and I care for him. It's like I told him out there, 'This is the place where you belong. This is what you love to do.' And he does. He loves to compete and play. So it's good to have him back.

"The game needs him back, and it's good for him to be back."

Woods has not been seen in public, except for a televised apology, since his middle-of-the-night car accident Nov. 27 that set off explosive revelations of a sordid life hardly anyone knew existed. More than a four-time Masters champion and the No. 1 player in golf, he now is famous worldwide for a sex scandal that made him a regular in tabloids.

Woods played the back nine, then met with Masters chairman Billy Payne before leaving the club.

It all changes when he returns.

The gates open at 8 a.m., sending some 30,000 people onto the grounds at Augusta National. For Woods, the toughest part of the week might be at 2 p.m. Monday when he holds his first press conference.

Interest is so high that the club has limited seating to one reporter for each news outlet, with only a few exceptions.

"He'll figure it out," O'Meara said. "He's pretty tough."

O'Meara was surprised to see Woods on Sunday at the Masters, and he wasn't alone. There was no commotion on the range when he arrived, and Casey was stunned to see Woods standing behind him.

"It's where I'm used to seeing him," Casey said, choosing to keep their conversation private. "All of a sudden he appeared behind me. He was all business as usual - hit 10 balls and go play."

Most of the players have not seen him since he won the Australian Masters on Nov. 15, or played in Shanghai the week before. Furyk had not seen him since they celebrated a Presidents Cup victory on Oct. 11.

"He's probably here a little earlier than normal," Furyk said. "I've never seen him here on a Sunday. Generally, it's nice to have him back and I can't wait until he's out here and I don't have to answer any more questions about him."

Sunday at Augusta National is unlike any other at a major. The course is closed except to employees, media and members. It is the only major where club members can play alongside the best in the world, and past champions are allowed to bring a guest.

"You don't normally get George Lopez playing on the Sunday before the Masters," Casey said.

Lopez, one of several comedians who have lampooned Woods in recent months, was three stations down from him on the range. Lopez was playing Sunday with Mike Weir, who won the Masters in a playoff in 2003.

Reporters and photographers are not allowed on the golf course, and it wasn't long before Woods vanished down the steep hill of the 10th fairway and toward Amen Corner at the far reaches of Augusta National. It was warm and bright, and it was rare to see Woods hitting balls with sunglasses on.

Woods has created a huge void of information by being in seclusion and in therapy from the accident until he spoke to family and friends Feb. 19 at PGA Tour headquarters in Florida.

There will be awkward times for many. Woods was friendly with plenty of players, but not terribly close with any of his peers. He has beaten them routinely over the years while piling up 82 victories worldwide and 14 majors.

Now, it's time to get introduced to a Woods no one knew.

He has been linked to more than a dozen women, although he has confessed to cheating only on his wife. "I have made you question who I am and how I could have done the things I did," Woods said in his 13 1/2-minute statement at Sawgrass on Feb. 19.

As for his golf? Stay tuned.

"He hit the ball pretty good today," O'Meara said. "He's been practicing the last three or four weeks. He's good to go. It's going to be a different thing for him. But if anyone can handle it, he can."

Couples says he’ll play practice round with Woods

Kim, Molder lead after 3 rounds in Houston

HUMBLE, Texas (AP) — Anthony Kim never knew where his tee shots were going. Bryce Molder never got control of his swing.

Both saved themselves with their short games Saturday and ended up tied for the third-round lead in the Houston Open.

Kim missed 11 of 14 fairways, but relied on good putting to shoot a 3-under 69 that left him 10 under for the tournament. Molder, the second-round leader, made four bogeys and five birdies for a 71.

"It was a tough day," Molder said. "I just couldn't quite find the club in my swing, and it was just a little off."

Vaughn Taylor (70) and Joe Ogilvie (71) were two strokes back at 8 under after both bogeyed the difficult 18th hole. Houston resident Jeff Maggert (70), Graham DeLaet (71) and Lee Westwood (72) were three strokes behind the leaders.

The players faced only light breezes after wind gusted up to 30 mph during the first two rounds. The mild conditions couldn't help Kim, who was hitting tee shots into trouble all day.

"I don't know what happened today," Kim said. "Just spraying the ball off the tee, just hitting the worst shots I've hit probably this year."

Kim finished second to Camilo Villegas at the Honda Classic, one of three top-25 finishes this year. He hasn't held or shared the third-round lead since last year's Canadian Open, where he finished third.

After three-plus years on the tour, Kim feels as if he's matured enough to make smart decisions, when parts of his game are letting him down.

"I've learned a lot from past experiences," he said. "It gives me confidence that I'm getting the ball up and down from a lot of places I probably shouldn't. That's dangerous, because you don't want to rely on that."

Kim pulled a 300-yard drive on the par-4 12th hole, then flopped a wedge from an awkward stance within a foot with a pond lurking on the other side of the green.

"I told my caddie, 'If I don't hit this perfectly, it's going to go 50 yards in the water,'" Kim said.

He hooked another tee shot on the 17th hole, then wedged out of the rough to three feet. Kim saved par from behind the green at No. 18, chipping down the hill and sinking an 8-footer.

"There were some spots today, I don't know how I got out," he said. "But I was happy to go ahead and hit some lucky shots and good shots, and get away with it."

Molder hit his share of errant tee shots, too, after a solid 66 on Friday. He made three bogeys on the front nine, then birdied two of the first three holes on the back.

He dunked his tee shot in the water on 18, then hit a 6-iron to 14 feet and made the putt for an unexpected par. Molder had seven one-putt greens on the back nine and a total of 26 putts in his round.

"Luckily, my putter kind of held me in there," Molder said. "I always kind of know that if I can just kind of get it going the direction I want it to go, then I'm usually going to be OK."

Molder, a four-time All-American at Georgia Tech, is winless in 88 career PGA Tour starts. He got to play Augusta National once a year when he was in college, but has never played in the Masters.

He'll earn an invitation with his first victory, but said he's not thinking about what will be on the line for him on Sunday.

"I'd be lying if I said it wasn't in the back of my mind, and wouldn't be just a huge thrill," Molder said. "But that's a lot of steps away."

Molder also was tied for the lead after the second round this year at Pebble Beach, and tied for 10th. He admitted that he was nervous on Saturday morning, but he's eager to see how he copes with the pressure on Sunday.

"A day like today can only help," Molder said. "I knew, over the last two days, I was going to face some times where it didn't feel very good, where I was uncomfortable out there and hit some poor shots. All you can do is just be ready for that, handle it as well as you can."

Justin Leonard (67) moved into contention in the morning with two eagles on his front nine. He made a double bogey on the 14th hole, though, and dropped into the logjam at 6 under.

"Just off the golf course, it's a little disappointing," Leonard said. "But at the same time, there are so many good things to pull from today. As the day wears on, I'll see those things a little more clearly."

Leonard, who lives in Dallas, is seeking his first win since the 2008 St. Jude Classic. He has three victories in the Texas Open in San Antonio, but has never won in Houston. He tied for 19th last year, his best finish since a tie for sixth in 2002, the final time the tournament was played at the nearby TPC at the Woodlands.

Seo extends lead at LPGA Kia Classic