Peter Uihlein has pretty much stunk it up on the golf course to start the new season.
He missed the cut at the Safeway, was 69th in a field of 78 at the posh CIMB in Malaysia then sluffed off again at the CJ Cup in South Korea where he was an unspectacular 55th in the limited field of 78.
Pretty awful stuff for the kid who won on the European Tour, the Web.com and the Challenge Tour. He took the Brook Koepka route to the PGA Tour and brought a lot of promise with him.
His season last year was okay, but again, unspectacular.
Thursday he admitted to took a hard look at himself and told the truth.
I was really bad the first few tournaments this year, at least starting off. Got really lazy and complacent,” Uihlein said after shooting an eight-under par 63 to take the first round lead at the Shriners Hospitals for Children event. “I wasn’t mentally sharp enough for what I needed to be able to compete out there.”
Sometimes you can blame that sort of thing on a privileged upbringing — he’s the son of former Acushnet (Titleist) Chairman Wally Uihlein.
Peter put in some serious practice time after his Asian swing misery and even switched putters in attempt to make things happen.
“I tried to put my head down and get back to work. And like I said earlier about mental approach as well, I needed to adjust that a little bit and get back to being a lot sharper.”
He was pretty sharp with nine birdies at TPC Summerlin Thursday and his eight-under 63 was good enough for a one-shot lead over Web.com graduate Seth Reeves.
Reeves was looking really good, he was six-under through his first 10 holes but cooled off and finished seven-under. He’s a former Georgia Tech player who finished 24th on the Web.com money list last season to earn his tour card.
Jordan Spieth and Bryson DeChambeau are making their first start since the Ryder Cup fiasco and both turned in five-under par 66s.
Two other Ryder Cuppers overcame slow starts. Rickie Fowler rallied to shoot 68, same for Tony Finau, who had a ho-hum round but managed to finish in red numbers with 69.
