Midweek Musings

Our typical Wednesday morning post should be back for the entirety of the winter, now that the Wednesday Game is officially in hibernation.  

Tiger, The Presser - He just gives nothing, though to his credit he at least admitted that fact.  Geoff performs his own Fisking of Tiger's thoughts, so let's follow his lead, using his own proprietary snark where appropriate, beginning with this curious bit:

I'll put it to you this way: As far as playing at the Tour level, I don't know when that's going to happen. Now, I'll play a round here or there, a little hit and giggle, I can do something like that. I certainly like -- you know, the USGA suggested Play It Forward. I really like that idea now. I don't like the tees on the back. I like Play It Forward. Come on, let's move it up, let's move it up. To see some of my shots fall out of the sky a lot shorter than they used to is a little eye-opening, but at least I'm able to do it again. That's something that for a while there it didn't look like I was going to. Now I'm able to participate in the sport of golf, now to what level, I do not know that. I'll keep you abreast, all of you abreast as progress continues to go on, whether I'll be out here and at what level and when.

OK, on the one hand, what he's describing here is what most of us likely assumed after we saw the 3-second video.  He's obviously improved to the point that he can make a gentle full swing, and that seems like pretty good news.  But can he hit 125-mph clubhead speed?  Of course not, and it'll be a while before he'll know if he can build back to that.

What I don't get is that lede we had yesterday in which he described his Hogan-like schedule of three appearances a year.  It just seems an odd head fake...

So, what else did he share?  He's been using this ploy at the very least since the fire hydrant:

Q. Tiger, I'm wondering what you remember of the accident. Obviously we all saw the result and it looked so horrifying and scary, and I have a follow up to that.

TIGER WOODS: Yeah, all those answers have been answered in the investigation, so you can read about all that there in the post report.

All those answers have been answered?  We still don't know the most basic facts about the accident, which begs the question of whether we should.  I would argue the answer is yes, since this happened on public roads and involves behavior that has to have threatened others using said roads but, if the last two years has taught us anything, it's that accountability is only for the peons...

I'm calling an audible and skipping down this interesting point of entry from Dylan Dethier:

Q. When it comes to the day of the crash, clearly that's something that you're hoping to keep private. Is that something that you feel is sort of your business and not the rest of ours, for lack of a better phrase?

TIGER WOODS: Well, I kind of feel that way with most of my life. Doesn't really work out that way. I understand that it's -- I had friends that insulated me from a lot of the things that were said outside. I didn't have my phone, I didn't have access -- well, I did have access to a TV and I was just watching sports. But I refused to turn on the local channels and news and stuff like that, I didn't want to go down that road. I wasn't mentally ready for that road yet. A lot of things in my body hurt at that time and whether I was on medication or not, it still hurt. And just trying to imagine me coming off of that stuff, how much it was going to hurt, I didn't want to have my mind go there yet, it wasn't ready.

Yeah, people are going to poke and prod and want to know more about my business, I understand that. Just as long as they don't go into -- they can poke and prod at me all they want, just stay away from my family.

Of course that first sentence should be in all-bold, because the last telling detail he shared was probably, "Hello, world!".

My frustration here is with the local police department and other public officials.  When a dangerous incident happens on the streets, the public would seem to have a compelling interest in the facts.  There is simply no expectation of privacy on public streets, unless you're Tiger Woods.

Q. Did you just commit to the par 3?

TIGER WOODS: No. I committed to I can play courses of that length. Now, if the Tour wants to not have golf courses lengthened, they shorten up that much to make it more difficult, that's fine by me, I have no problem with that. If they want to go back to wooden shafts and feathery balls, okay, I'm cool.

OK, that was cute....  I'll have to check whether Hogan ever played in the Par-3, though preliminary Googling leaves the issue in doubt.  The Par-3 was first played in 1960 and Hogan last played in the 1967 Masters, so it's possible...  Though I'll guarantee there was no 6-year old in a kiddie bib carrying his bag.

This one, in which he seemingly supports the home team (the actual query is what he would advise a player to do) , actually comes with some world-class passive aggression:

TIGER WOODS: It's going to be his decision, period. I've decided for myself that I'm supporting the PGA TOUR, that's where my legacy is. I've been fortunate enough to have won 82 events on this tour and 15 major championships and been a part of the World Golf Championships, the start of them and the end of them. So I have an allegiance to the PGA TOUR.

And I understand that some of the comparisons is very similar to when Arnold and Jack broke off from the PGA of America to start the Tour. I don't see it that way. I think the Tour has done a fantastic job, Jay's done an unbelievable job during a very difficult time during the pandemic when there was ample opportunities for players to leave, but we were the first sporting tour to start.

So with that, yes, did we have some protocol issues at times? Yes, we had to learn on the fly, but Jay and the staff had done an incredible job of that. I think the Tour is in great hands, they're doing fantastic, and prize money's going up. It's just not guaranteed money like most sports are. It's just like tennis, you have to go out there and earn it.

The end of the WGCs, Tiger?  Are you allowed to say that out loud?

 Lastly, in which he goes to great pains to detail a scene that we all know never took place:

TIGER WOODS: You made a great point. Am I going to put my family through it again, am I going to put myself out there again. We had a talk within the family, all of us sat down and said if this leg cooperates and I get to a point where I can play the Tour, is it okay with you guys if I try and do it. The consensus was yes.

Now, internally, I haven't reached that point. I haven't proven it to myself that I can do it. I can show up here and I can host an event, I can play a par-3 course, I can hit a few shots, I can chip and putt, but we're talking about going out there and playing against the world's best on the most difficult golf courses under the most difficult conditions. I'm so far from that.

Now, I have a long way to go to get to that point. Now, I haven't decided whether or not I want to get to that point. I've got to get my leg to a point where that decision can be made. And we'll see what happens when I get to that point, but I've got a long way to go with this leg.

You don't mind if I play in the Masters, do you Erica?  Yeah, right!

Maybe the most curious piece is this from Adam Shupak:

Schupak: Why Tiger Woods should play the PNC Championship

It may sound crazy, though organizers of the event are holding a spot for Woods should he come to his senses. Tiger may deem it too soon but hear me out. While Tiger lowered expectations about a comeback, saying he “has so far to go,” and “is not even at the halfway point” in his recovery, he sees a future in the game and did say, “I’ll play a round here or there, a little hit and giggle, I can do something like that.”

If that isn’t the PNC Championship, a 36-hole team event that pairs 20 winners of prestigious titles alongside a family member in a scramble competition, I don’t know what is.

Adam makes a pretty good case for it:

The PNC Championship can be one big teachable moment, not just for Charlie but for Tiger to prove to himself that he can not only accept his current station in life with a right leg that may never be what it used to be, but enjoy his new role in the game, even if that role is as a ceremonial golfer.

Just sitting next to his son in a cart, chipping and putting and doing some version of the thing he loves most is a victory of sorts, and a milepost on his way to eventually playing on the PGA Tour again and as he so eloquently put it, “clicking off a tourney here or there.”

Both father and son can probably use playing in the PNC Championship more than either of them really know.

I think he played last year for the right reason, that Charlie want to do it.  I suspect that this is just a little too early, but that the 2022 version of the event might well serve as a coming-out party.

But I also think that Adam, like most folks, don't understand the Tiger that they see faking sincerity on the podium.  Remember always that he has no concern for the public, including his die-hard fans, unless and until a commercial obligation requires him to show up in public.  So, I assume we'll see hi next at Riviera, and I shan't miss him in the interim.

The Ugly Aussie - There have been many golfers that have given of themselves to support my blogging and, for instance, I never wrote that thank-you note to Robert Allenby, which is long overdue.  But is there a player or other person in our game that's inspired more low-impact snark than Greg Norman?  I mean, there's a greatest hits blog post just begging to be written....

With Tiger's seeming support for Ponte Vedra Beach, I'll just dig this one bit out of the Wayback Machine, in this case from 2013:

Greg Norman is clearly a fan of stirring the pot with his quotes and this one about Tiger Woods on Golf.com is no different.

Norman got to talking about winning and what it's all about and unleashed this gem"

"A lot of people ask how I'd stack up against today's players if I had use of modern equipment. Listen, it's not about the gear. Winning is about what's in your heart and in your head. Equipment dictates how to play the game in an era, but the physical and mental skills are the same. And I had them. I never feared anything or anyone on the course, and I wasn't afraid to fail. So I think I'd do pretty well against Snead, Hogan, Tiger and Phil -- whoever. Tiger's a tough guy, but I was a tough guy on the course, too. I probably would have beat him."

Yes, the man that couldn't beat Larry Mize, Paul Azinger, Bob Tway, Fuzzy Zoeller, Mark Calcaveccia and Robert Damron would stare down Hogan and Tiger.  Noted!

Obviously Mr.  Norman has taken incoming over hopping in bed with the noxious Saudis, though he'd have an arguable claim of selective prosecution.  Shockingly, putting his good name behind their culture had perhaps not silenced the critics:

In an article published in the Financial Times, the former World No. 1 insisted he’s not being used by the group to clean up its image.

“No, I have not been used for sportswashing because I’ve been to Saudi Arabia, and I’ve seen the changes that have taken place,” Norman told the Financial Times.

The word infantile has appropriately been used to describe Shark in recent years, just his penchant for sharing his naked torso could gainfully employ a team of Viennese psychiatrists.  But this latest is straight from the vernacular of third-graders at recess:

Norman also equated racial issues in the United States with social issues in Saudi Arabia.

“Every country has done horrendous things in the past … just look at America with racism, for example, it’s just so embedded here, it’s just ugly,” he said.

That's what this debate needs, hackneyed allegations of racism from the whitest man on the planet.  The man has chosen to live in the United States for decades, but now that he's taken the slightest criticism he'll just s**t his bed.  

Just please shut the f*** up and go back to your rich fantasy life where you're relevant in the game of golf.

Ode To Lee -  Mike Bamberger has a typically poignant memory of the late Lee Elder, which touches on an important point I made yesterday:

Fred Ridley, Augusta National’s radical chairman, brought Mr. Elder in from the cold. At the one-

off November Masters in 2020, and again at the 2021 Masters, Ridley brought Mr. Elder back into public life. Into our lives.

Ridley’s goal, first and foremost, was to honor the first Black golfer to play in the Masters, which Mr. Elder became in 1975. That is, appallingly late. It’s an invitational. There were years, in the 1950s and ‘60s and early 1970s, when Charlie Sifford and Pete Brown could have and should have been invited.

In April, Mr. Elder, blind in one eye, struggling in every physical way, stood on Augusta National’s celebrated first tee, before the first round got underway, alongside Gary Player and Jack Nicklaus. Lee was an honorary starter and it didn’t matter that he couldn’t make a swing.

For years, Nicklaus and Player and Arnold Palmer owned that little Thursday morning ritual. Now there was a new Big Three.

Should they have invited a black golfer in the 50's or 60's?  Perhaps, there's no one correct opinion on that subject.  But I do think what gets overlooked in these debates, never more so than in the area of affirmative action, is the importance of folks earning their success.   

Certainly the Grand Poobahs of Augusta National can defend themselves, but what exactly were their obligations?  I don't want to belabor the point, but the guy I saw at Augusta in 2020 and 2021 belonged in the spotlight and was comfortable there, because he had survived the crucible of earning his invite, and I was happy to have him celebrated as more than a token.

Thing is, I think Elder got it:

Jelly Hansberry was asked Sunday night if Mr. Elder was bitter, in those years, in the 1960s, when he was playing rough courses for modest purses at Black tournaments, while his white contemporaries were playing for big bucks on manicured courses in front of big crowds.

“Nah,” Jelly said. “Not a bit. For one thing, he was having a good time. But also, he knew. He knew he’d have to get better.” Professional golf’s age-old thing. Shoot lower scores on harder courses in tournaments with deeper fields.

And that’s exactly what Mr. Elder did.

Which to me is the ultimate happy ending.... But do read Mike's full piece, as you'll appreciate the man even more.

Catch you down the road.