Couples copes with rough patch
Fred Couples hasn't been enjoying his season, if you can call it that. The 1992 Masters Tournament champion loves playing the early season West Coast events. They give him the kind of confidence and preparation he needs leading into the Florida Swing and his favorite event, the Masters.
Couples was practically missing in action for the five events on the coast he was eligible for, missing the cut in the FBR Classic and missing other events because of calf and back injuries.
He was missing in action during the four-event Florida Swing, again because of back problems.
He also missed the Houston Open the week before the Masters.
Now, a year after his best showing at Augusta National Golf Club since tying for second place in 1998, Couples is unsettled, and so is his game.
The back problems have been with Couples since March 1994, when he tore the outer layer of a disc in his lower back while practicing at Doral.
The 47-year-old had another health concern in late August at the World Golf Championship-Bridgestone Invitational. He had a blood clot in his right arm, just above the elbow, which landed him in the hospital for three days.
"I've had a couple of small things done with my back where I was in a room, but I'd never been in a hospital, and I didn't really enjoy it," Couples said at the Target World Challenge in mid-December. "And then I was talking to the doctor, and I had a few things going on with the back of my head that was caused from this, going up into my heart and chest area. I laughed about it until he sat down with me and told me what could have happened."
The blood clot, which was diagnosed in late August, forced Couples to call it a season. He played in only 17 events and finished 110th on the money list. It was the first time he failed to crack the top 50 in money since 2002.
There was one huge highlight to the year, and it came at Augusta National. Couples played brilliant golf, shooting 71-70-72-71, and tied for third place, two shots behind Phil Mickelson, his final-round playing partner.
He trailed Mickelson by a shot entering the final round, and outplayed the lefty from tee to green, hitting 16 greens - three more than Mickelson, who shot 69. But Couples struggled on the greens, taking 34 putts to Mickelson's 29.
It was a better ball-striking tournament, Couples said, than when he won in 1992.
"I had never played that well at Augusta," Couples said. "I started bombing it off the tee. I was driving it with Phil."
Couples, always a crowd favorite, had the gallery behind him in his bid to become the oldest Masters champion. But a three-putt on the 14th hole dropped him three shots behind Mickelson and doomed his chances.
"I three-putted from four feet," Couples said, referring to No. 14. "That's going to happen. It just happened at a time where it wasn't very good."
Couples said he can still play courses such as Augusta National and Riviera Country Club, where he has won twice, when he's healthy.
"Hitting the ball, I feel like I can maneuver the ball around a course," Couples said. "I just have to be ready and swinging well, and that doesn't happen nearly as much. But I'm not to a spot quite yet where I think age is a factor. Because when I do well, I don't think it's surprising, and I do the same things that I did 10 years or 12 years ago. I hit the ball very solid and very long."
Indeed, in the final round of the 2006 Masters, Couples finished seventh in driving distance with a 288.5-yard average.
Couples, who has worked with physical therapist Tom Boers for years, has come to accept the fact he'll always have a back problem. He just has to control it through exercises and breaks from play.
"I'm 47 and had a back problem for 15 years and it just keeps getting worse, and the guy (Boers) that works on me thinks I'm a freak that I'm able to continue to play," Couples said. "I owe a lot to him. He makes it kind of possible. I've tried a lot of stuff, and nobody can get it to where it feels like I can go two months and feel really, really good."
When Couples is talking about feeling good, he doesn't mean just physically.
"You know, I don't look back - I could be worse," he said. "I could have a wrist problem, and that would be a heck of a lot worse ... I've learned how to play with a sore back or a bad back, and sometimes I do really, really well.
"But it's hard to stand up there and really perform and play with the (Jim) Furyks and (Geoff) Ogilvys and Tigers when you don't feel great."
Reach David Westin at (706) 823-3224 or david.westin@augustachronicle.com.
