ORLANDO, Fla. – A few weeks ago, Rory McIlroy ran into Justin Thomas at the Bear’s Club, where Thomas revealed to McIlroy that he was eyeing a return from back surgery at the Arnold Palmer Invitational.
McIlroy’s reaction: “Oof.”
McIlroy knows Bay Hill Club and Lodge, especially with firm and windy conditions, can make even the best of them look foolish, let alone a guy like Thomas, who is about four months removed from a microdiscectomy to repair a herniated disc in his lower back.
And in Thomas’ case, Arnie’s Place spared no exception.
Thomas broke 80 both days, albeit barely. Back-to-back, 7-over 79s meant him missing the cut by a mile at 14 over, which will likely also leave Thomas last in this 72-man, signature field. He carded double bogey or worse on five holes and ranked nearly last in strokes gained off the tee, approach and putting, losing a combined 18 shots or so in those areas.
One positive: He scrambled his butt off, tops in the field around the greens.
“This is a place that really, really exposes you if you’re not sharp, hit it in the wrong places and don’t have a lot of control,” Thomas said afterward, relatively upbeat considering how his scorecards looked. “Yeah, it was a lot of everything. I had the lefts going, and yeah, just pretty miserable first couple days back, but I guess better to get it out of the way.”
Thomas’ tournament started off with limited excitement, a ho-hum, 2-over 38 on the front nine Thursday, but he carded two birdies, three bogeys and two double bogeys coming in. His second round included three birdies, three bogeys, two doubles and a triple at the par-4 11th.
It was at No. 11, a brutal par-4 which wraps left around a large lake, where Thomas not only yanked his tee ball into the drink but also rinsed his third.
“I’m hitting so many quality shots, but all my misses were on the wrong side,” Thomas said. “Compounding silly, dumb mistakes that you can’t do any week but especially a week like this, I just made a boatload of them.”
Thomas is scheduled to compete in next week’s Players Championship, so rather than head up to Ponte Vedra Beach on Saturday or drive home to Jupiter, Thomas planned to stick around the Orlando area to practice on Saturday. That prep likely won’t come at Bay Hill.
“It doesn’t really make sense to putt on these greens,” Thomas said. “There is zero chance that they are going to be alive Sunday. They are so dead already. That is one good thing about now playing here this weekend because it is going to suck.”
Though Thomas admitted to feeling anxious and “spacey,” unable to concentrate, for much of his first 36 holes back, he was encouraged physically. His body feels great, he says.
His game is just nowhere close.
He used his closing holes on Friday as an attempt to find something. His trunk already halfway slammed, he had nothing to lose at that point, so why not diagnose inside the ropes of competition, where there is no better simulation. It doesn’t seem like Thomas discovered anything substantial, though, and he’ll now head to TPC Sawgrass, another traditionally diabolical layout, with little momentum, if any.
“It would’ve helped if I played remotely decent,” Thomas said. “But I’m trying as hard as I can to give myself a little bit of grace with how long I haven’t played and how difficult this place can be, but at the same time, I expect more out of myself. I don’t think there’s any situation where I feel like I should shoot 14 under par for two days.”
A few responses later, Thomas was even more candid, referencing a moment walking down the 10th fairway, where he expressed to his caddie, Matt Minister, that he felt like he was getting in his playing competitor Hideki Matsuyama’s way.
“He’s grinding, trying to make the cut, and he’s waiting on me,” Thomas said. “I just felt like I was humiliating myself out there.”