Tiger’s world continues to unravel
After meekly bowing out at the U.S. Open, Woods seems lost about what to do next
UNIVERSITY PLACE, WASH. — It is a cruel quirk of circumstance that the next major instalment in Tiger Woods’ touring freak show should await at St Andrews, the one British Open venue where he is sure to be stalked at every turn by the shadow of his former greatness.
From the past century, Woods is the only man besides Bobby Jones and Jack Nicklaus to have won multiple Claret Jugs at the Home of Golf and yet he is fated, on the evidence of a U.S. Open performance so pitiful that he was beaten by every player except four, to suffer every shade of indignity at the place that forged his legend.
The way he is heading, Woods faces a struggle next month simply to keep his opening tee shot within the yawning expanse of St Andrews’ first fairway.
If you want a clear idea of how far Woods has fallen since his zenith, when he won the 2000 U.S. Open by 15 strokes, just compare his combined scores in 2015 with those of 21-year-old phenomenon Jordan Spieth. In the tournaments where both he and Spieth have played, the young Texan stands at a cumulative 63-under par. Woods, by contrast, is 38-over. That is a difference of 101 strokes and the season is not even five months old. What was at first an alarming gap is turning into an unbridgeable chasm.
Woods this year is in a state of perpetual torment, with every strand of his personal and professional unravelling played out to a global audience watching in grim fascination.
His relationship with skier Lindsey Vonn, which seemed on the strength of their public show of affection at Augusta to have settled him, is over. His game offers not the slightest respite, as Woods adjusts his notion of normality to the extent that breaking 80 feels like a Pyrrhic victory.
The question burning within golf is how much longer he can bear it.
In 2002, Pete Sampras resolved in the aftermath of a second-round defeat at Wimbledon to Swiss journeyman George Bastl to bow out from tennis on his own terms. Six weeks later, with a win over Andre Agassi in the U.S. Open final, he was done. When you have scaled the peaks, Sampras thought, what is the point of scrabbling around in the foothills?
This fatalistic logic is yet to occur to Woods. Beyond his mulish obstinacy, he also enjoys far greater physical longevity as a golfer, recognizing that Jack Nicklaus won three of 18 majors beyond the age of 40.
Woods, who turns 40 in December, looks as fit as he ever has, even if there are plenty who believe that his bulked-up physique has compromised the whippy fluidity of the swing that brought him eight major titles in rapid succession under the tutelage of Butch Harmon.
The more glaring problem is that he looks psychologically scrambled. From the six-iron that he dug into the ground on his first hole at Chambers Bay to the three-wood that he coldtopped into a fairway bunker, Woods has worn a befuddled air, bereft of the faintest clue as to how to dig himself out of the dust.