PGA is back at Southern Hills, and so is Tiger — but Mickelson opts to stay away from tour
The anticipation has been building the last few weeks for the PGA Championship, just like it was for the Masters. And just like the last major, it’s more about who plays than who has a chance to win. There are differences, of course. Social media tracked the private jet of Tiger Woods heading up to Augusta National a week before the Masters, raising hopes he could play just 14 months after a car crash in Los Angeles mangled his right leg and ankle. Sure enough, Woods walked and played well enough to make it to the weekend.
Phil Mickelson hadn’t been heard from in nearly three months.
But that changed Friday night. Mickelson withdrew from the PGA Championship, electing to extend his hiatus from golf following incendiary comments he made about a Saudi-funded rival league he supports and the PGA Tour he accused of greed.
Woods hasn’t declared for certain that he will play another major, though he was in Tulsa, Oklahoma, last week to play — and walk — a practice round, and it would be a surprise if he didn’t play in the tournament, which starts on Thursday. Woods won the PGA Championship at Southern Hills the last time it was there in 2007.
Mickelson authored one of the most stunning victories last year when he won the PGA at Kiawah Island, at age 50 becoming the oldest champion in 161 years of the majors.
Mickelson is the first major champion not to defend his title since Rory McIlroy at St. Andrews in 2015 because of a knee injury from playing soccer.
He is only the third PGA champion not to defend his title in the last 75 years. Woods missed in 2008 while recovering from reconstructive knee surgery, and Ben Hogan couldn’t play in 1949 while recovering from his car getting struck by a bus.
Woods and Mickelson have been such an enormous part of golf for so long they still can overshadow the generation who would seem to have a better chance of hoisting that 27-pound Wanamaker Trophy.
That starts with a pair of Texans who head to the other side of the Red River to chase different versions of the Grand Slam.
Masters champion Scottie Scheffler has a long way to go, and while he rarely thinks about anything beyond the next shot, he likely is aware only three players in the last 20 years have won the first two majors of the year.
Even so, he has everyone’s attention with his four big titles in the last four months that have taken him to No. 1 in the world.
“He’s setting the bar pretty high right now and he’s kind of the guy to chase for all of us,” Will Zalatoris said. “What he’s doing is borderline Tigeresque.
It’s pretty cool to see.”
Jordan Spieth is chasing the career Grand Slam. This is his sixth shot at the Wanamaker Trophy since he picked up the third leg at the 2017 British Open, and it might be his best chance. His swing is getting closer to where he can trust it, and his confidence was boosted by his playoff win at Hilton Head a month ago.
Spieth and Justin Thomas stopped by Southern Hills at the start of the week. Spieth last played it in 2009, when he lost in large playoff for the final four spots of match play in the U.S. Amateur. He shot 75. He was 16.
And so much has changed, especially with Southern Hills.
The most noticeable part of the restoration were the edges of the greens to make shots funnel away from the putting surface. Spieth felt the targets were smaller than they looked. And with a hydronic system beneath the greens that allows for greater control of turf firmness, Spieth is expecting a precise test.
“I think it’s going to be one of the higher scoring PGAs that we have seen,” he said.
Southern Hills is hosting its eighth major since 1958 — three U.S. Opens — and the last five champions are in the World Golf Hall of Fame.
It wasn’t supposed to host the PGA until 2030. This year’s championship had been scheduled for former President Donald Trump’s course in Bedminster, New Jersey. But soon after the violent Jan. 6 insurrection in 2021 at the U.S. Capitol as Congress was certifying the presidential election, the PGA of America voted to move it to Southern Hills.
It avoided what could have felt like a circus. Now it has one of a different variety.