TIGER WATCH
Travelers Championship officials hope Tiger Woods will appear.
When it comes to Tiger Woods, golf’s best known and most polarizing figure, one phrase is always in play:
Anybody’s guess.
This month, that’s especially true when it comes to the long-held hope of convincing Woods to give the Travelers Championship a try. Is this the year?
“I will say, we talk to Tiger every year,” said Nathan Grube, the Travelers tournament director. “We have a great relationship with Joey [LaCava], his caddie, he’s a Connecticut guy, and his agent. But if there is one player who keeps his schedule to himself better than the average player, it’s Tiger.”
It’s not uncommon, for instance, for Woods to wait until the Friday before a tournament — the PGA deadline — to tell organizers he plans to play. So the Travelers, which is slated to go June 25-28, without spectators and within the PGA and state social health safety guidelines, could learn as late as June 19 if this would be the year Tiger comes to the TPC for the first time.
It may make sense, but analysts are far apart as to whether it will happen. “Honestly, I would be stunned if he
doesn’t play at River Highlands,” said Michael Eaves of ESPN. “He has been off so long. I don’t think he’s going to play at Hilton Head (June 18-21). If he skips the Travelers, that’s three weeks off from competitive golf while others will be competing. It’s going to have a strong field, which he likes to see.”
Said Brian Wacker of Golf Digest magazine: “I’d put the chances of Tiger playing Travelers somewhere around ‘non-existent.’ He’s an enormous creature of habit and I don’t see that changing at 44 years old, especially when he needs to manage his surgically repaired body in a year in which the end of the calendar is packed with majors and other big tournaments.
“It’s a shame, too, because it would seem to fit his schedule, it’s a course I think he’d like and do well on and it’s a tournament players seem to universally love, which explains why it always gets a strong field.”
Generally, Woods’ strategy, especially as he has been fighting various injuries, has been to pick his spots, give himself the best chance to be healthy for the major championships and selected non-majors. He will not play in the first PGA event of