TIGER JUST GLAD TO BE PROWLING BACK AT EAST LAKE
Woods proud to be back at East Lake for FedEx Cup finale
ATLANTA: Tiger Woods is facing long odds of capturing the FedEx Cup and the US$10mil (RM41mil) bonus.
That’s all relative this year. Just having his own parking spot at East Lake, being back at the Tour Championship for the first time since 2013, even feeling lost during a practice round because the nines were flipped, were all reminders that his greatest accomplishment this year was being part of the 30-man field.
“I think the season itself has been amazing, to be able to have played this well,” Woods said on Wednesday.
“I didn’t know how many tournaments I’d play in and next thing you know, here I am in the Tour Championship.
“To have come back from where I’ve come back from and to get here has been a pretty tall order.”
He didn’t make it in 2014 because of his first back surgery and his ill-advised attempt to return too early.
He missed the entire FedEx Cup playoffs in 2015 when he couldn’t chip the ball onto the green from 20 feet away early in the season and then his back started acting up late in the season.
He missed all of 2016 while recovering from two more back surgeries and all but one US PGA Tour event in 2017 because of a fourth back surgery.
Never mind that Woods is at No. 20 in the FedEx Cup standings, having started no worse than No. 3 in his four previous FedEx Cup finales.
This is one tournament where it’s more about the start than the finish.
“It’s great to have accomplished one of the goals I set out at the beginning of the year: to make it back to East Lake to be part of the Tour Championship and part of these top 30 guys,” he said.
“I’ve exceeded a lot of my expectations and goals because so much of it was an unknown.” — AP