TIGER SINKS 3 IN THE DRINK
90 seconds, 3 shots, all in the water
Tiger Woods, at the Congressional Country Club on Monday to promote his Quicken Loans National tournament next month, took three swings at the 10th hole, a 102-yard shot over water. They all ended up in the pond. “Boy, was that stiff,” Woods says after the first shot. “Holy cow.”
There is only one issue in golf that truly interests the vast majority of Americans who don’t play the game and won’t watch it unless one certain player appears on their television screen on Sunday afternoon.
Will Tiger Woods ever return as any semblance of his former self, and if so, when?
For months now, there has been no definitive answer to that question, and for a while Monday at the Quicken Loans National media event, it appeared that another day would go by without any real sign, one way or the other, about when, if ever, we’ll see Woods back on the PGA Tour as a truly competitive presence.
Then, Woods stepped to the tee at the par-3 10th hole at Congressional Country Club. It wasn’t the real tee, the 218-yard stretch over water that was used for the 2011 U.S. Open. This was much shorter, just 102 yards over the pond to the green, designed for an easy swing with a wedge so Tiger could hit a couple of shots close to the hole for the cameras to help promote the upcoming tournament that benefits his foundation. That was the plan. No one who was in attendance will ever forget what happened next.
In a span of 50 seconds, Tiger hit three balls. As soon as the first flew into the air, Tiger, who was wearing a mic, spoke up. “That’s in the water,” and sure enough, it fell into the pond with a splash, stunningly well short of land.
“Did you like that one?” Woods said to the crowd. “Can I have another one? Boy was that stiff. Holy cow.”
Word was Tiger had flown in earlier on this cool morning and hadn’t practiced, and there was no doubt he was walking and
moving gingerly, but still: A measly 102 yards with a wedge in his hands? One would think Tiger could roll out of bed and hit that green 100 times out of 100.
Onto his second shot. This one flew a little farther before it hit by the water’s edge at the bank in front of the green then disappeared.
“All right, that’s good for me,” Tiger said. Organizers, though, were ready for one more try, as another ball was tossed his way. “One more? Ah, come on.”
So Tiger set up for another. “All right, come on, Tiger,” he said under his breath, faintly audible over the microphone.
The third try actually made it over the pond. That’s the good news. The ball hit on the bank, where there was no hope it would remain. It rolled for a moment and slipped into the water.
“See, need warm-up,” Tiger said as sponsors and organizers laughed a bit nervously and ap- plauded robustly.
It was so utterly bizarre to watch Tiger be so bad that some wondered if he did it on purpose. That actually would have made some sense.
If Tiger was really trying, and I think it’s safe to say he was, it was a remarkable display of futility from one of the two greatest golfers in history, and made no sense at all.
Three terrible wedges struck on a chilly spring morning by a 40-year-old who had three operations on the same spot in his back over a 19-month span and hasn’t played competitively since August does not necessarily signal the end of a career. It would be foolhardy to declare Tiger finished until he says so himself, and he’s not close to doing that now.
Not when he says he is “pro- gressing nicely.” And not when he talks about the questions he keeps receiving: “The overriding question I keep hearing is when are you coming back, when are you playing,” he said. “I get it all the time. If I knew I’d tell you.”
Minutes later, a possible clue emerged. As Tiger mused that he wasn’t sure when he would return, he said it could be “next week or a year from now.”
A year from now? That got everyone’s attention.
Then he grabbed a club and hit those three shots into the water. That got everyone’s attention, too.