Furyk: It was hard being Tiger’s partner
ST LOUIS: Tiger Woods used to be an intimidating presence at the Ryder Cup — to his own teammates, US captain Jim Furyk said on Wednesday.
The aura surrounding the 14-time major champion in his prime affected his playing partners, said Furyk, who believes times have changed and that Woods can only be a positive force on the team at next month’s event in Paris.
“It was hard to partner Tiger with guys 15-20 years ago,” Furyk said on the eve of the PGA Championship at Bellerive. “To live in his shoes for a day was a rude awakening.”
Not that Woods tried to make things difficult for his partners. It was just a reality that his status as one of the greatest golfers ensured a hoopla of distractions wherever he went.
This may help explain why Woods’ has a starkly different Ryder Cup record in the three formats used in the competition.
He has, for a player of his ability, an appalling record in foursomes, a true team format where two players take turns hitting alternate shots.
He has a 4-8-1 (win, loss, halve) record in the format, and is barely any better in four-ball (5-8-0), in which two players play their own ball, and take the best score on each hole.
In singles, however, where he can be the lone wolf, Woods is 4-1-2, hardly a coincidence one would think.
Now a more mellow 42-year-old, he is viewed almost as a father-figure by the young generation of Americans such as Jordan Spieth.
Woods will be in Paris one way or another. He is an assistant captain, and will most likely also be a player on the 12-man team at Le National from Sept 28-30.
He is 20th in the American standings, way outside the top eight who will qualify automatically this Sunday, but a near certainty to get one of Furyk’s four captain’s picks.
Furyk played a fairly straight bat about whether he would select Woods, but perhaps exposed his hand when he said: “It’s fun to see him [Woods] put himself in the mix and being 20th on the points [despite having played] few events is a pretty good spot.”