Cink's tweaks seem to be working

Now, he's the world's 10th-ranked golfer, was last year's leading money winner and took home the Vardon Trophy for having the lowest scoring average.

Cink, who like Kuchar is a Georgia Tech grad, was in a similar place last year.

He hadn't come close to losing his card, but his game wasn't what he wanted it to be. At 37, he reasoned he had a small window, five or six more years, to contend. Did he want to go work on his game and possibly improve the chances of seeing a lot of red numbers again, or did he want to keep doing what he was doing and hope that good results would pop up from time to time?

The decision was easy.

"I don't want to fade," he said. "I don't feel like it's time to fade."

The small changes, mostly involving his setup, seem to be working. He has made six cuts, with three top-25 finishes in seven tournaments. He's a few dollars short of $400,000 earned. He said the swing was OK during the first two nine-hole practice rounds Monday and Tuesday at Augusta National.

Cink feels comfortable, though his swing sometimes gets caught between old and new. He has heard comments that his swing looks different, which is good. Kuchar said that is a key for anyone looking to change his game.

"You want to get something correct, and you know it's correct if it's working straightaway," Kuchar said. "If you have to work really hard at it, it's probably not good information."

Always a streaky putter -- Cink says his stats are average, although he never spends any time in the average zone -- the ball is starting to drop again. He averages 29.4 putts per round (106th on tour), but needed only 54 to get around the last two rounds at Bay Hill, his previous event.

"I've seen a spark here and there," he said. "It's fun to play again."

He's a few days from the anniversary of when he began to think about his future. He shot an 8-over-par 152 and missed the cut at last year's Masters, acknowledging recently that he was struggling with his game.

"Shots around the green, bunker shots, places where I should clean up, I didn't have any confidence," the Duluth resident said. "You have to have the utmost confidence in a place like Augusta National. It can call you out if you aren't having a good day.

"It called me out. It identified a weakness that turned out to be a benefit. I was ignoring that weakness. It forced me to say I need to address this."

Cink decided he was too old to rebuild his swing, as other younger golfers, including Tiger Woods, have done. He wanted to make tweaks to certain things. Still, he knew that it would take a lot of work.

He and coach Butch Harmon mutually decided to part ways after eight years. Cink said they still are friends and that it mostly was a scheduling thing. Cink thought he needed someone who had more time than the busy Harmon could give.

He began by trying to improve his putting, which has long been his biggest weakness. He turned to Pat O'Brien, who also works with Zach Johnson, John Rollins and K.J. Choi. Cink said he enjoyed their rapport so much that he asked O'Brien to look at his full swing.

"We come up with ideas and banter back and forth," he said.

The changes are focused mostly on his stance and set up. In the past, he said would lean on his right hip at address, causing everything to flare out on the backswing.

"Basically, too many things had to go right for me to hit a lot of good shots in a row," he said.

Now, with a more neutral stance and set up, he says he can more easily maneuver the ball in either direction, which will be important during the Masters.

"What I'm trying to do is take out the chances," he said. "I don't want to be a chance golfer. I want it to be a fluke if something bad happens."

You want to get something correct and you know it's correct if it's working straightaway. If you have to work really hard at it it's probably not good information.