Watson OK after up-and-down ride

Bubba Watson’s game often resembles his personality: A little of this, a little of that. You are never quite sure what you are going to get, but it always will be worth watching.

One minute, Watson is a golfing artist, shaping shots into commas, punctuating his power game with 350-yard drives and playing angles that few others will attempt. A wonder to behold.

But the reward also comes with risk. When Watson’s focus wavers, his game follows suit.

The manic methodology, which has helped garner two Masters titles, even has its own name — Bubbagolf. But the man himself is quick to point out that “the scorecard has no pictures,” which is golf-speak for all that matters is the final score, not the beauty and/or carnage that created it.

Case in point: Watson weaved a 3-under-par 69 yesterday in the second round of the Memorial Tournament, good enough for second place behind Englishman Paul Casey. But the score alone does not reveal either the shock or the “aw, bleep” of the day, when Watson’s second nine holes went par, birdie, bogey, birdie, bogey, eagle, par, bogey, bogey. Mercurial, to say the least. “I can’t look at the bogeys. I’ve got to look at where I am,” Watson said.

Where is he? Only in the best 54-hole position of his nine appearances at Muirfield Village Golf Club.

“If you tell me it’s my best two days around this golf course, I’ll take it,” he said. “So I don’t really see it as a bad day. You shoot in the 60s at Muirfield, you’re pretty happy.”

Watson mentioned two swings he would like to take back: his tee shot at No. 14 that came to rest on the cart path, and his approach shot at No. 18 that sailed left. Both led to bogeys.

Otherwise, his mistakes were more about distance control than misses left or right. And he can live with that.

“The bogey I had on the front (No. 8), I hit a 9-iron from 183 (yards) that flew over the green to a bad lie,” he said.

A 9-iron from 183 that goes long? That’s Bubbagolf. Then there was Watson’s eagle at No. 15. The left-hander hit a 4-wood off the tee at the par-5, then lasered a 4-iron 242 yards — egads! — to kick-in distance.

But Watson’s round mostly was about remaining patient through the highs and lows. In golf, it is called grinding — digging in to post a decent score even when your game is a little off.

Hunter Mahan, who knows Watson well, explained the mindset necessary to grind out good scores when everything about golf kicks you in the shins.

“That’s all it is: a grind. That’s golf,” said Mahan, who grinded his way to a 70 that put him tied for sixth entering today’s third round. “And you better embrace it because it’s four days of 5-hour rounds.”

So much thinking goes into a single round of golf, much less four in a row, that “what you’re trying to do is simplify the game by hitting shots and then attaching a score at the end of the round,” Mahan said.

Watson has improved at breaking his round into single shots, executed with precision. No looking ahead. No regretting the previous swing.

“You have to be 100 percent in the moment,” Mahan said.

Watson was in the moment yesterday. And it was 100 percent entertaining to watch.