Ten days ago at Muirfield Village. Padraig Harrington peers out from the left of the fairway, stranded in deep rough. No chance of making green. He hacks out. Struggles to the green with three more shots. Bogey.
Next hole. A six-foot putt slips past the hole. At the 13th, a three-putt from 21 feet. Another bogey. A chip at 14 flies past the green, bouncing over a stream. He scrambles for another bogey. Stuck in a bunker on 17, he fails to escape with par. Five bogeys in the round. His Memorial Tournament is over on Friday.
Yesterday he carded a two-over par 72 at the delayed and rain-affected St Jude Classic in Memphis to leave him four over and missing a cut for the fifth time this year.
Since winning the US PGA title, Harrington's approach to his season has centred around the process of bringing himself to the boil for the Majors. This year, though, it's been hard to discern even a wisp of steam. His 73 at the Irish Open in Baltray that saw him miss the cut represented his 10th successive round that failed to breach par. Back then, Harrington had the luxury of more than five weeks to run into the US Open. Now, as the weekend approaches, it's hard to find even a lick of form to pin his hopes on.
His US Tour averages this year have been modest. He has made seven cuts in 11 PGA tournaments this season and managed three finishes in the top 25, but his scoring average leaves him in 119th place on tour. He has also missed three of his last four cuts.
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Instead of taking in the bigger picture, Harrington has returned to his obsession with the finest brushstrokes. He reckons deconstructing his swing began two years ago. He left the work behind to collect three Majors, but returned fully to the workshop last August.
In contrast to the freewheeling spirit unleashed through his youtube executions of the Happy Gilmore swing that added some novelty yards to his driving, the business of adjusting his competitive swing has been more exacting. He has worked on getting more extension on his follow-through and ensuring his right side comes through on the second half of his swing. He has focused on the angle of his spine and wrists as he comes in to strike the ball. He has added more loft to his driver: 10 degrees one week, nine-and-a-half at the Masters with a longer shaft. He won his three Majors with an eight-degree loft. His obsession with the finest details of his game is the cornerstone that supports his success over the last two years, but it extracts a cost, too.
"Since I won the two majors last year, I got a little bit deeper into it," said Harrington last week, "trying to figure something out. For about two-and-a-half years I've been tinkering with it, but certainly the last eight months I've been heavily focused on it.
"The results have been quite lean, certainly in the last five months. I've got to get back to working on my scoring. I'm comfortable with what I've been doing technically. While I haven't got it in my swing like I would want it, I'm comfortable with what it is and what I need to do to sort it out.
"That can be put on the back-boiler. I can concentrate on my scoring, just getting myself ready for these tournaments, making sure my short game, which is my strength, is as sharp as ever."
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Clearing his mind of all that detail, though, has been a problem. There have been interventions. Ronan Flood, his caddie, his wife Caroline, his sports psychologist Bob Rotella, have tried to prevent him from being consumed by the mechanics of improving his swing, and returning to the pleasures of playing well. "I'd like to turn around as quick as possible," he said. "I'm doing the right things. I've got to stay patient. I've got to be accepting of this. I'm very comfortable where I am and where I'm going. I'm in a far better position than I was this time last year, or even this time at the end of August last year. I'm a far better player now than I was then.
"I just have to be patient, let it happen and wait for the results to turn around. As a player, sometimes you've got to go by the order of things to judge where you're going in your game, not necessarily short-term results."
A happier environment in New York might help him this week. When the US Open last rolled into Bethpage in 2002, Harrington finished eighth. The unvarnished nature of the New York crowds has always appealed to him. Behind the carefully manicured fairways and trimmed rough, he can see the evidence of a roughed-up old parklands track like the courses he grew up on, where a ball hit in the wrong direction won't stop till it finds trouble.
On Thursday he will set off with Tiger Woods and Angel Cabrera, thinking his way to a better place. When he was 16, Harrington borrowed from the Book of Proverbs to explain his outlook to his first coach: "as iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens the other."
The same blade will be whetted again this week.