He has a look that can go right through you. Ice blue eyes. A smile or not, depending on what he’s discussing. His walk is a glide, almost like he’s skating. He could be an Iceberg instead of an Aberg.
Sunday, Ludvig Aberg hopes to freeze out the competition at TPC Sawgrass and walk away with one of the biggest prizes of the year: The trophy for The Players Championship.
There’s absolutely no reason he couldn’t do it, either.
First of all, unlike many who have played TPC Sawgrass in competition, he actually likes the course. Many PGA Tour pros have hated it for years. They hate it because it makes them feel uncomfortable, which is just what Pete Dye had in mind when he was designing it.
Aberg loves it. He played it in the Junior Players. And it must have been at least “like” at first sight.
“I've seen the golf course in probably every wind possible, which I know this week we're going to have some different winds,” he said about a course that is more often cursed than praised. “Sawgrass is also a golf course where you have to execute golf shots, and I love the golf course because it's right in front of you. It's very straightforward, but you still have to do it.”
At last, a professional who understands Pete Dye!
On Sunday of Players week, Aberg will be paired with Michael Thorbjornsen, who sounds like he’d be Swedish or Danish, but he’s from Massachusetts. The two know each other from college golf.
“At some point when we were both in college it felt like we played every single tournament together,” Aberg said. “He's a great guy, good player, and he'll be coming out excited tomorrow to play. He'll be coming out hot, and I'm going to have to respond and play some good golf.”
Now, the question always is, does someone who plays a PGA Tour course have a big advantage when tournament week comes around? Sometimes yes, sometimes no. Yes, because they know the course. No, because the conditions and setup for a PGA Tour event are always more severe than during the other 51 weeks of the year.
Aberg thinks he is ready for Sunday’s pressure and a possible positive result, but he’ll be nervous even if he doesn’t look like it.
“I'll definitely be nervous. I've been nervous the last three days,” he admitted. “I've been nervous every time I step on 17 tee box as well. So, I think it's a part of it. I think whoever says they don't get nervous is not really true to themselves.”
Fred Couples once told me that he was nervous before he played, but he called it a “good nervous.” Like he was ready to go. There are only a few professionals who will talk about pregame jitters. But you have to figure everyone has them. It’s how do they harness it? That’s the secret. How do they take all that jingly-jangly feeling and turn it into a positive?
Aberg certainly hopes he is able to do it. He wants to win The Players as much as the next guy.
“I feel like this is a really cool tournament. Even before I moved here when I played the event I absolutely loved it,” he admitted on Saturday. “So, it's definitely one of them that I really enjoy, and winning here tomorrow would mean a lot to me, for sure.”