Tiger Woods is charging again at The Players but he’ll need a miracle to win

Tiger is pouring in birdies again at TPC Sawgrass and making a potential blowout Sunday at The Players exciting.

Let’s start with the obvious: this is fun. Tiger Woods is prancing around TPC Sawgrass on the weekend and inside the top five at The Players Championship. He is nuking the ball with his driver, twirling to-and-fro, and pouring in putt after putt to either convert birdies or save pars.

Following Saturday’s vintage 65, the low round of the day at Sawgrass that launched him 60 spots up the leaderboard, Tiger went back to work again on Sunday. Woods made three straight birdies in the heart of his front nine that again whipped those on the ground and those watching at home and on Twitter into a frenzy. The burst came on holes three through five and featured a putt of 15 feet, a stuffed wedge to five feet, and another lengthy putt from almost 20 feet. Here’s the wedge work:

It was this last putt at the 5th hole that pushed him into a momentary tie for third at 11-under. Right before he put it in the center, NBC walking analyst and former caddie Jim Bones Mackay said, “If there’s such a thing as a wheelhouse 25-footer, this is it.” He was guesstimating the distance but he was not off on the read and result.

Tiger’s putter is the biggest difference between this weekend charge and the quiet middling result last week in Charlotte. His putter has been strong all season but not making up ground like it has these last two days. Even when the putts are not for highlight birdies, they are for some clutch par from a 50/50 distance.

Woods added a birdie at the par-5 9th hole to officially go out in 32. At 12-under, he was in a tie for 3rd place at the moment.

Now we’ll get to the less fun part: Tiger will need a miracle on the back nine just to contend late Sunday. He, and the rest of the field, have a Webb Simpson problem. Simpson started the day seven strokes clear of second-place and 11 shots clear of Tiger. He’s not been as red hot on the front nine in the final round but he doesn’t need to be. An even-par round of 72 would probably be more than enough to win.

The path for Tiger just to really be in contention, not even win, is something like a back nine 30 and a complete collapse from Simpson. The 30 is super low number but doable. We saw Justin Rose birdie six out of the first seven holes there this morning and a bogey at the last swung him from a back nine 30 to a 31.

Tiger would then also need Simpson to dump a few in the many water hazards that line almost all these holes at TPC Sawgrass, including that nerve-wracking island 17th hole. It’s almost never fun to root for someone to implode like that, but that’s what you’re going to need for Tiger to get close at the end. Even if that doesn’t happen, it’s still been delightful to watch him stalking and charging all over the place this weekend at one of the game’s biggest events.

UPDATES:

• Tiger’s first birdie on the back nine came at the hole where he absolutely had to have one if he wanted to post a special number. He missed a putt inside 10 feet at the 10th, which he turned into a juicy birdie chance. A red number at the par-5 11th was mandatory, and he tapped in for birdie there after just burning the edge with his eagle putt.

• We’re still showing some restraint here, but Tiger is tied for freaking second late on Sunday at The Players Championship! A birdie at the short par-4 12th, which is a driveable par-4, pushed him to 14-under for the week and in a tie with Danny Lee. He’s still five shots behind Webb, but maybe seeing Tiger’s name up there in second will make things even more nervy down the stretch.

• The desperate push to put a scare in leader might have come to an end at the 14th hole. That’s the one hole that has tormented Tiger throughout his career, but it’s usually the tee sheet that he always blows wide right or in the water on the left. This time, he smoked his drive dead center and just hit an approach shot that spun off the green. A failure to get up-and-down followed by a birdie from Webb back at the 11th resulted in a quick two-shot swing. Tiger is six shots off the lead with four holes to play. Now it’s really all on Webb to make a mess.