Phil to cut back schedule, play tournament venues that 'suit him'

Mickelson to reduce playing schedule this season

Phil cutting back schedule

October 05, 2018
By Cameron Morfit, PGATOUR.COM
Phil Mickelson interview after Round 2 of Safeway

NAPA, Calif. – Phil Mickelson is contending again. He’s also mentally exhausted.
Mickelson had just shot a second-round 69 to reach 10 under at the Safeway Open at Silverado Resort & Spa, tied for the lead with Ryan Moore (67), when he admitted he’s playing more golf than he would like and will noticeably cut back his schedule this season.
“I love what I do,” Mickelson said. “But now, as opposed to playing the tournaments you’re expected to play in or whatever, now I’m going to play in the tournaments that I like, that are best for me, even if it doesn’t make sense or people have a problem with it.
“I’m going to have to start limiting the number of tournaments that I play,” Mickelson added, “so that I can play those at a higher level, because I’m getting a little bit more mental fatigue and not able to focus and see the shot as clearly as I’d like for so many weeks in a row.”
Broadly speaking, it was a great 2018 for Mickelson, who broke a winless drought of over five years when he captured the World Golf Championships-Mexico Championship in March. He made the U.S. Ryder Cup team, continuing a remarkable run of excellence that has seen him play on every U.S. Presidents and Ryder Cup team since 1993.
But it all caught up to him at the end of the season, as he finished last at the 30-man TOUR Championship at East Lake and never found any semblance of form at the Ryder Cup in France last week, going 0-2. Now making his eighth start in the last 10 weeks, he came to Silverado fully expecting to miss the cut but has been pleasantly surprised.
“My expectations are starting to come up,” he said. “I don’t want to get overly confident here because I know I don’t have my best stuff right now.”
The 43-time PGA TOUR winner admits he is surprised not to have hit any drives out of bounds at Silverado, and after making three bogeys on his first nine holes Friday morning, he roared back with a 32 on the front nine, his second of the day, for a solid, 3-under 69.

How is he doing it? He isn’t sure. Mickelson played just one practice round, the Wednesday pro-am with celebrity chef Thomas Keller, and to conserve energy he is forgoing any driving range work this week, even though his coach, Andrew Getson, is here.
Mickelson, a pro since 1992, will be even more careful not to become over-golfed going forward.
“I’ve learned from this,” he said. “At 48, it’s not a smart thing to do. I won’t do it anymore. I won’t do it again, playing this much golf. I’ll pace myself much more.
“I’m able to play at a high level,” he added, “but it’s so difficult without physical and mental sharpness, to play at a high level. It doesn’t come easy anymore. I need to recover. … As I looked at my schedule next year, and the way some of the tournaments are, yeah, there will be some that I miss that people will be upset about, but I’m not going to worry about it.”

Wow, 20 comments and not one complimentary to Phil.  I don't think the golfing public is enamored with his comments.

http://www.golfwrx.com/530944/phil-mickelson-playing-courses-like-le-golf-national-is-a-waste-of-my-time/?utm_source=Front&utm_medium=Featured_Latest&utm_campaign=GolfWRX_OnSite&utm_content=unused

Well, I guess this is the 'end' of Phil as most knew him...watched some tournaments in Asia that I remember Phil playing (and winning) and then a few more in the US and no Phil.  So he's cutting back his schedule, and the question remains, how effective will he practice between the times he does play? It will be so lack-luster to the fans that it will be so long between seeing Phil play and if he shows up and plays awful, it will be horrendous.  As everyone always says, tournament reps are different than practice reps.  So will he just show up 'rusty' at each and every outing that he decides to show up at? I think poor showing with cutback in schedule will cause him to seriously curtail his outings until the point he doesn't play anymore.....will he play Champions Tour when eligible?  Those guys are no slouches either.... I don't think you show up at Champions Tour thinking, 'OK, now I can dominate these guys'. Just ask look at some of the recent ones that turned-50 and show up.

I think the whole point of cutting back in Phils mind is to be more competitive when he does play. He admitted he played too much this past season and it was tough to recover physically. That is an obvious conclusion since his last top 10 was in May. He proved at the beginning of the season he still had it. He was in contention a lot and finally won in March. Let's face it the guy is getting old. I'm hopefull this new schedule whatever it will be will work out and produce a victory or 2.

Tiger is back, so the haters are out posting again. At this stage of the game, I think he should do whatever suits him.

Is Phil going to play the Champions Tournament, 1st one of the season? Only have a handful of competitors to beat (?16-18?) to win another one, or go up against 145 in a regular tournament.

I heard him say years ago that the winds in Hawaii adversely affected his swing for future tournaments.

This week's Sentry Tournament of Champions, the PGA Tour's opening event for 2019:

Winner's from the 2017-18 season are eligible to compete and 34 of the 37 qualifiers will be in the field on the Plantation Course at Kapalua Resort on Maui. Those not attending are: Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson and Justin Rose.


Another small field event Phil skips that could be nice for more 'needed wins' that he's so clammering about.

At this point he said he's only playing courses he likes and is cutting back. If he wins a regular tournament GREAT but it's all about the majors. Another major is the only thing that will elevate his status in the game.