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No more Majors for Tiger
Text: Jeremy Harris. Article from the October 2012 issue of Compleat Golfer Magazine.
Jeremy Harris reckons we’ve seen the best of Tiger Woods and it’s all downhill from here.
My friend Pete is a diehard Tiger Woods fan and will follow him to the ends of the earth, or at least the fairway. Pete plays with the same Swoosh-emblazoned irons, uses a very similar driver, wears a very similar peak cap and from time to time has also been known to hit it a country mile, with pinpoint accuracy to Boot. But that’s only from time to time.
My position is not as a Tiger-hater (far from it in fact), but more as a Tiger-pragmatist. He has done more to enthuse players and fans the world over about golf than any other player in the history of the game – with respect to Arnie – and a tournament without Tiger versus one where he’s playing is almost incomparable in terms of advertising expenditure, fan attendance and general excitement (and noise) levels. He single handedly and emphatically showed the world that this was not a game reserved for the privileged or non-black, interestingly without having to use those actual words.
Tiger deepened the age profile of the playing population and was soon followed by people like Rory Mcllroy and Rickie Fowler, and even ladies like Lee-Anne Pace, Azahara Munoz and Paula Creamer – all of a sudden golf was not boring, it was cool and sexy!
But ever since Woods limped off like a wounded soldier at Torrey Pines in 2008, in the process of claiming his 14th Major, I have held the assertion as stated above he will not win another Major. In that very tournament, where the supposedly ridiculously outmatched Rocco Mediate showed the world just how vulnerable Woods was, he had also started to show the revolt between his body and his game and how his body was finally winning, in a sort of self-preservation reflex.
I’m no doctor, but I would venture the opinion that you cannot coil and uncoil your body with such ferocity week in and week out, year in and year out, without something having to give. In June 2008, it was his dodgy left knee that gave out once again. It had required surgery in 1994, 2002, 2007 and twice in 2008, before the US Open and then straight after the Major itself. Six months after the US Open, during an enforced layoff, he ruptured his Achilles tendon in his right leg. Things were just going from bad to worse and subsequent to 2008, Woods had to undergo further surgery on his ailing body, to his knees, his ankles and also his back. This is not the way you build momentum or confidence for winning another Major against an increasingly competitive field of players.
“Tiger strikes me as the kind of person who feeds off public approval and support…”
And while we’re talking about those players, allow me to present the next reason he won’t win another big one. Previously he would walk onto the tee-box and scare the opposition into submission by his sheer presence and the noise of the crowd that would accompany his arrival. Those days are long gone. Nobody is scared any more, nobody is going to get psyched out by his presence or his entourage, and none of the pros in the modern game have any doubts about their own game – they are just as hungry and gritty, and will take you out with a smile on their face whether your name is Tiger Woods or Tiger van der Merwe!
But the main reason Tiger won’t win another Major is that his own personal confidence has been massively dented, and Tiger strikes me as the kind of person who feeds off, and even craves, public approval and support – with it he’s Superman, without it he’s just Clark Kent. He seems to still be harbouring guilt over his marital infidelities that came to light way back in 2009 and appears to be almost wary when making eye contact. He used to be the darling of so many millions of people and businesses around the world, and then suddenly his fans looked the other way, his sponsors dropped him like a Louis Oosthuizen albatross, and the players saw the exposed weakness and lined up to be ‘the next one to beat Tiger’.
But it’s also as if he doesn’t believe he can do it. I’m going to ignore 2011 where he was T4 in the Masters, didn’t play in the US Open or The Open (due to injuries, again) and missed the cut in the PGA Championship. In 2012, he played and completed all four Majors and was tie-third in The Open as his best performance.
Even in the US Open, he seemed to be in with a chance only to waver in his final 36 holes when he ordinarily would have been gearing up to sprint away from the field.
Pete says there are many people who have won Majors in their late 30s and early 40s. He says he’s going to keep on using his ‘Tiger’ irons and driver and putter and cap, and that soon Tiger will come good and win his 15th Major.
I’m sorry Tiger, I don’t think it’s going to happen – but you’ll be amazed how much positive energy you can generate by smiling. Try it, it works! It might win you a Major… maybe.
Jeremy Harris is the sports anchor of the award-winning Breakfast Show on Cape Town radio station 94.5 Kfm. He’s a keen golfer and plays off a six-handicap at his home club, Arabella.
He is the voice of the Sunshine Tour weekly highlights and monthly magazine programmes on SuperSport and is managed by Big Sports Management. Follow him on Twitter @jeremyharris55.
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