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Michelle Wie tries to make PGA history
(AP)
Updated: 2006-01-12 09:34
HONOLULU - Michelle Wie tries to soak up as much information as she can
during her practice rounds on the PGA Tour, and there was plenty of opportunity
to learn Tuesday morning at the Sony Open.
 With her buddy Ernie Els missing, the 16-year-old played
with two guys closer to her age.
One of them was 23-year-old Sean O'Hair who, like Wie, turned pro before he
got out of high school. But that's where the similarities end. O'Hair's father
treated him like a commodity and punished him for failing. Sponsor's exemption
didn't exist in his world, and he didn't make his first PGA Tour appearance
until he got his card.
The other was Justin Rose, 25, who went through some tough times of his own.
He turned pro at age 17, right after he pitched in for birdie on the last
hole at Royal Birkdale to tie for fourth in the 1998 British Open. The next two
years were a blur, as Rose missed the cut in his first 21 tournaments.
Wie is only 0-for-1 as a pro.
This will be her fourth crack trying to make the cut in a PGA Tour event,
something no female has done since Babe Zaharias in 1945.
Rose doesn't doubt she is capable, but his advice for the 6-foot teen is to
think big.
"When I began to miss a couple of cuts, my focus turned into making the cut,
rather than going into a tournament playing it for what it is — playing to win,
really, which is what I'm sure she does in LPGA events," Rose said. "I know
she's incredibly strong mentally. I'm sure she goes into a tournament believing
she can do more than make the cut.
"But it's amazing how the cut creeps into your mind."
That will be all the talk when the Sony Open gets under way Thursday at windy
Waialae, the first full-field event of the PGA Tour season with 143 men and a
junior in high school who wears big earrings and navy blue fingernail polish.
"You limit yourself by thinking, 'Let's just make the cut.' She's plenty good
enough to make the cut," Rose said. "Sometimes, making the cut might be a little
too much in her mind. But I'm strictly guessing."
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