Janzen Looking to Recapture Old Magic

[March 07, 2008]  PALM HARBOR, Fla. (AP) -- Lee Janzen is coming up on the 10-year anniversary of one of his biggest victories, a steady performance in the final round at The Olympic Club in San Francisco that brought him his second U.S. Open title.

That also was his last victory, and there are times it seems longer than a decade ago.

Janzen has been mired in a slump so bad that he lost his PGA Tour card two years ago, hasn't finished in the top 125 on the money list the last three years and now is having to rely on sponsor exemptions.

A start like Thursday brought some hope, even if he didn't finish his first round of the PODS Championship.

Playing on a sponsor's exemption, in a stretch of competing three out of four weeks, Janzen holed a 65-foot putt from the fringe on the third hole, never came seriously close to making a bogey and found himself at 5-under par through 15 holes when play was suspended by darkness following a 2 1/2-hour storm delay.

"I've worked on my game for quite a while," Janzen said. "Eventually, you have to shoot better scores."

He still hasn't posted a score on the Copperhead course at Innisbrook. Because of the rain that softened the greens even more, no one from the afternoon wave of players finished. They were to return at 7:30 a.m. Friday to see if anyone could catch Bart Bryant, who opened with a 65 for the clubhouse lead.

John Senden, a runner-up last year, was at 4 under. Steve Stricker missed three putts inside 12 feet and still was rallying from a slow start to reach 3 under. The delay might have affected Ernie Els the most. He bogeyed his first two holes when play resumed, then finished with a birdie to get back to even par.

John Daly was at 3 over, unable to make a birdie no matter who he used as a caddie. Daly was 2 over through three holes when play was stopped by rain for the first time on the PGA Tour this year. He headed for the Hooters hospitality tent, ran into Tampa Bay Buccaneers coach Jon Gruden, and Gruden wound up on the bag until dark.

That was just another sideshow in the unpredictable world of Daly.

Janzen has been living a nightmare, but he hopes there are signs of turning things around.

"I shoot good scores on Mondays and Tuesdays and weeks off," he said. "It's just a matter of feeling the same way when you get into a tournament."

He felt extremely confident heading to the Mayacoba Classic in Mexico two weeks ago, making eight birdies in 13 holes during a friendly match early in the week. Then he missed the cut.

"The good news was I didn't leave there totally dejected," Janzen said.

Bryant didn't allow himself to get dejected after a few errant shots early in his round Thursday, especially when he saved par both times that him his score at even par and his spirits in good shape. When he started hitting it better, he made putts. And before he knew it, he was at 4 under with three holes to play.

Then came birdies at the 16th and 18th holes, two of the toughest at Innisbrook.

"I felt like I got my bad stuff out of the way and I was still even par," Bryant said. "I think that gave me a little confidence."

Kenny Perry hobbled around on a hip that felt like it was shooting volts down his leg, but he managed seven birdies in a round of 66, tied with Jeff Maggert and Stewart Cink.

Cink was playing for the first time since losing to Tiger Woods at the Accenture Match Play Championship, and while he suffered the worst beating in the 10-year history of the final match (8 and 7), he figured this was a continuation of good play.

"I had a lot of confidence after Match Play," Cink said. "Even losing the last match, I was happy to be in the last match."

Rain earlier in the week took some of the bite out of the Copperhead Course at Innisbrook, regarded as one of the toughest tour tracks in Florida, and rarely has it played this easy.

Even so, it is a course that requires more brain than brawn.

"You can't hit too many shots without putting thought into them," Jonathan Byrd said after a 67.

The good news for Bryant is that he's hitting shots without feeling too much pain. It seems every time he recovers from one surgery, another body part starts hurting, which was the case last year. Bryant said his right hip was in such bad shape that he took two months off during the summer. When he returned, his right elbow was acting up again, and he couldn't practice the last three months of the season.

"No practice, just playing," the 45-year-old said. "This year, I've been able to start hitting balls. My health has been good."

The results are slowly coming along. It was only three years ago that Bryant's career turned the corner with victories in the Memorial and the Tour Championship, the latter a six-shot victory over Woods.

Last week at the Honda Classic, he was among the leaders on Friday until taking a quadruple-bogey on the sixth hole that sent him back to the pack. Those big numbers can happen at PGA National, and Bryant wasn't too bothered.

"It showed my game is in the kind of shape that I can get up there at the top," he said.

[Associated Press]

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