Xander Schauffele: Bizarre happenings on the 7th hole Thursday

Xander Schauffele’s bad experiences at Torrey Pines continued on Thursday afternoon after a bizarre incident on the seventh hole.

Schauffele is one of the game’s excellent young stars but for one reason or another, he has not enjoyed his visits to Torrey Pines thus far in his young career. The 27-year-old grew up and went to high school in the nearby San Diego area, a fact that makes his history at this course that much more surprising.

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It’s four out of five missed cuts at Torrey for Xander Schauffele

Schauffele made his sixth PGA start at the Farmers Insurance Open earlier Thursday fully aware of his struggles on a course that should feel like home to him.  In five previous starts at this event, Xander Schauffele has missed the cut in all but one of them.

The San Diego native was asked about his struggles at Torrey Pines earlier in the week and he responded with:

"“As weird as this may sound, I’ve consistently been sick,” the world No. 6 said Tuesday. “It’s just kind of a time of year I’ve been working pretty hard with my team to figure out why this time of year, when it gets cold here, I get sick often and kind of in bad shape."

What happened in his round on Thursday would not have helped him feel much better here than he has in previous years.

Xander Schauffele’s first round takes a bizarre twist

Xander Schauffele had managed to work his away around Torrey’s North Course quite nicely on Thursday and he was sitting at two-under for his round before teeing off on the short Par 4 7th hole on his back nine.

Schauffele’s drive on the 322 Par 4 was long and to the left leaving him with a difficult second shot on a side-hill lie. What happened next was typical of how things have gone at this event for Xander thus far in his PGA career.

After not waiting for playing partner Jordan Spieth to mark his ball on the green Xander went on to hit his second shot, and wouldn’t you know his ball came down on the green at that very spot and ricocheted off Spieth’s ball all the way off the green.

That type of thing could not easily be replicated, but at Torrey Pines, that was just Schauffele’s luck thus far.  He would go on to bogey the 7th before scratching his way back to two-under-par to finish his first round.

Can Xander Schauffele turn things around?

A round of 70 is a solid round of golf, although it came on the North Course and on Thursday the North played almost four strokes easier than the South at Torrey.  With inclement weather expected throughout much of Thursday night and into Friday it’s a fair assumption to think tomorrow’s round on the South will be a difficult task for Xander.

Schauffele will need to show some resolve on Friday if he is to buck the trend and avoid five out of six missed cuts at the event close to home.