Tiger Woods’ Sunday Heater At The PGA Was Golf At Its Best.
There’s nothing better in golf than when Tiger (“THE BIG CAT”), is throwing darts at flagsticks and the PGA was an exhilarating reminder of that.
When Tiger Woods is on a heater, and he was on Sunday at the PGA Championship, the tension and anticipation are at their highest. There’s nothing like it in golf, especially now that it comes after four back surgeries thought to have ended his career. The modern tracer technology has added to that anticipation. We can see a ball tracking, generally in the right or wrong direction. But we never know how good it is until it lands. So those few seconds after Tiger hits an approach shot into the air are as good as it gets, when you feel the things you’re supposed to feel watching sports.
Tiger’s approaches were all headed in the right direction on Sunday. The ball came off the club, the tracer lit up the screen, and you’d inch up waiting for the explosion of noise up around the green.
There are only 241 days of MegaTigerHype left until the 2019 Masters, which means 241 days for everyone on the PGA Tour to understand just how fully the sport they play.
They don’t play golf. They play Tiger. Put another way, America’s chosen prism reads Sunday’s PGA Championship as the day Brooks Koepka did well to almost match Woods, even though by the mathematics he actually beat him.
But you can’t hype Brooks Koepka, not yet. He is the younger Mike Trout still building his stage. Tiger is his own concert tour, and his own massive audience of golf fans, psychoanalysts and self-satisfied scolds.
And there is still big money in all those things.
It’s one thing to know something intellectually, of course – the old stove-is-hot lesson – but to see it and hear it is another thing. Golf is Tiger Woods, and the noise from Sunday confirmed that. Brooks Koepka is the new, young, not quite beloved Tiger, while Tiger is the avuncular, easier-mannered Nicklausian Tiger, and most of golfing America prefers what it’s used to seeing back in the good old days.
Tiger essentially did a medley of Tiger’s greatest hits on Sunday, and the album will sell millions. And after all, nobody breaks wallet locks quite like Tiger Woods.
Golf may be for the young athletically, but the audience is old and the audience wants to be told that what it believed 15 years ago is still true, no matter how youthfully the culture actually swings.
In that way, The Eldrick’s performance at the PGA Championship allows 40-Plus America to say, “See? See what I’ve been telling you?” And it also allows 20-Plus America to respond as it always does, by being in its room watching something else.
This, then, the real Tiger-ssance – the great instrument of change in golf getting his next star turn as the beating, money-churning heart of the establishment. He was the face of the next generation, but the next generation has been replaced by a new next generation, and that next generation has not yet decided what it feels about golf, let alone Brooks Koepka.
Tiger Woods never led like he did on the closing nine at the Open last month, but he drew within a shot of the top-spot Sunday with heart and fight at sun-baked Bellerive Country Club in the final round of the 100th PGA Championship.
It was a performance for the ages.
Trailing Brooks Koepka by four, the 42-year-old Woods fashioned eight birdies and a 6-under-par 64 to capture solo second for the first time since the 2009 TOUR Championship.
Not only did it equal the low round of the day, it matched his best showing of the season, Woods sharing second at the Valspar Championship in March.
He posted 70-66-66-64 to finish at 14-under 266, two behind Koepka, who ended with a 66.
Playing in his 80th major, Woods established career-bests for lowest last round and best 72-hole total.
“This has been a building process,” said Woods, who has registered five top-10’s in 14 starts. “I didn’t know when I was going to start this year and how many tournaments I was going to play, how well I was going to play. I didn’t know what swing I was going to use, either.”
Koepka became the first player since Woods in 2000 to claim the U.S. Open and PGA Championship in the same year.
Woods accomplished it despite a bogey-double-bogey start on Thursday. He was 17-under the rest of the way.
This was different than Valspar. Playing in golf’s final major in a 90-degree pressure-cooker, Woods showed once again why he has chalked up 79 PGA Tour victories and 14 major crowns, both second all-time. He loves competition and never quits.
Backed by the raucous sellout crowd, Woods put on a dazzling weekend display, but gave the poised and powerful Koepka too much of a head start Sunday.
Fully embracing the moment, even hand-slapping spectators in the trees after an errant tee shot, Woods battled from beginning to end. Dressed in his traditional Sunday red shirt, he pulled an iron off the tee at the par-4 first hole and caught a fairway bunker. Undaunted, Woods stuffed his approach seven feet behind the pin and lipped out.
He did even better at the second and third. Woods wedged his second shot four feet at No. 2 and almost aced No. 3, polishing off the short birdie putts.
Woods made clutch par-saves at the fourth and fifth, but bogeyed the long par-3 sixth, finding the back-left bunker. He stayed within reach of the lead with another stellar par-save at the seventh, dropping a testy six-foot putt. At the par-5 eighth, Woods flagged his third shot from the front bunker for an easy birdie.
Then he brought down the house.
@TigerWoods
Woods pulled an iron off the tee at the par-4 ninth, the ball coming to rest on a cart path. After receiving a free drop on hard pan, he hooked a 9-iron around the trees to 15 feet and buried the putt.
“Everybody on the golf course heard it,” Koepka said. He’s the greatest player to ever play the game, and to have the comeback that he’s having is incredible.”
Playing two groups ahead of Koepka and Adam Scott, Woods turned in 3-under 32, despite missing every fairway. He one-putted the last eight greens.
“I didn’t drive it good all day,” said Woods, who had a two-way miss going during his pre-round range session and practically willed himself around the course. “I knew this was going to be a struggle to try and piece together a round and I did.”
One back at the turn, Woods stuffed a short iron five feet from the hole at the par-4 12th, then lofted a towering 8-iron to 10 feet at the 188-yard par-3 13th, converting for birdies.
Following a momentum-crushing bogey at the par-4 14th, where he caught most of the cup from 12 feet, Woods crushed a drive at the par-4 15th and hoisted a 9-iron two feet from the hole.
He had a chance to catch Koepka with an uphill 20-foot birdie attempt at the par-4 16th, but came up short. Woods blocked a bad drive into the trees at the long par-5 17th and was fortunate to avoid a creek. He wound up sinking an eight-foot putt to save par.
Woods finished like a champion. He busted a 320-yard drive at 18 and knocked his approach 20 feet from the hole. When his birdie putt disappeared – only his 23rd of the round, Woods gave it a triple-fist pump and received a thunderous ovation.
“These fans were so positive all week,” said Woods. “I can’t thank them enough for what they were saying out there and what it meant to me as a player, just coming back and trying to win a major championship again.”
“The energy in the crowd, that was as big a crowd as I’ve seen and to play in front of, he just kind of ho-hummed a 64,” said playing partner Gary Woodland.
Woods now has 31 runner-up finishes on the PGA Tour, with eight coming in majors.
After undergoing his fourth back surgery in April of 2017, Woods thought his career might be done. He slipped to No. 656 in the Official World Golf Ranking and many wrote him off.
Woods is now 26.
He also climbed to No. 20 on the FedEx Cup points list and No. 11 in the Ryder Cup standings.
“I’m very pleased at what I’ve done so far and now to be a part of the Ryder Cup conversation, going from where I’ve come from to now in the last year, it’s been pretty cool,” said Woods.
He returns to competition on Aug. 23 at the Northern Trust, the first leg of the FedExCup Playoffs.
Woods Tied For 6th Heading Into Sunday
He earned the early back-nine lead in the final round of the Open Championship at Carnoustie last month, eventually tying for sixth. Now Woods has a chance in the 100th PGA Championship at Bellerive Country Club after a pair of 4-under 66s.
“I’ve got a shot tomorrow,” the 42-year-old Woods said Saturday after playing 29 holes in 90-degree heat and stifling humidity.
It was the first time since the 2005 Masters that he has posted back-to-back rounds of 66 or lower in a major championship.
Through 54 holes, Woods is deadlocked with five players at 8-under 202. Brooks Koepka sits atop the packed leaderboard at 12-under 198. Woods is two shots out of second.
A four-time champion, he is 11-under par in his last 52 holes beginning bogey-double-bogey on Thursday.
Unable to complete Friday’s second round because play was stopped due to dangerous weather Woods resumed play Saturday morning at 7 a.m. CT on the par-5 eighth hole. Already 3-under for the round, he wedged to five feet and made the birdie putt.
After turning in 4-under 31, Woods shot even-par 35 on the back. Paired with Rory McIlroy and Justin Thomas, he missed a short putt for par on 10, then recorded a bounce-back birdie at 11 – something he has done most of the year – spinning his approach two feet from the cup.
Tiger is a finalist in the #MetLifeMatchUp where his shot was selected as one of the best recovery shots of the year. If Tiger wins, a donation of $750k will be donated to his charity, TGR Foundation. We ask that you help deserving scholars achieve a brighter future by voting for his shot. The contest runs from August 5th – 15th and you are able to vote up to 20 times per day. We thank you for your support!
It seemed like the majority of the sellout crowd was following Woods’ group. Tee to green, the gallery was 20-deep.
A second straight errant drive led to another bogey at the par-4 12th. Woods slashed his second shot from heavy rough to the front of the green, but three-putted from 101 feet.
He steadied with four pars, then carded his sixth birdie at the par-5 17th, converting a tap-in after two nice shots carried to the front of the green. Wood did well to two-putt the par-4 18th from 88 feet, making a testy five-footer to finish with 66 and moved into a tie for 19th at 4-under, six strokes behind Gary Woodland.
Woods hit eight of 14 fairways, 14 of 18 greens and tallied 29 putts.
After a meal and short rest, he returned to Bellerive for the third round. Paired with former major winners Stewart Cink and Webb Simpson, Woods wasted no time making a move.
He canned a 17-foot birdie at the par-4 first, then nestled a 9-iron from 145 yards within two feet of the pin at the par-4 second to secure his second in a row.
Woods made a terrific save at the par-4 fourth after hooking his drive into the left rough. He slashed his second shot about 90 yards short of the green, then almost dunked a perfectly-judged wedge, the ball stopping a foot from the hole.
At the par-4 fifth, he dropped a stroke, running a lengthy, downhill birdie putt five feet past the cup and caught the left edge coming back.
“I shouldn’t have been that aggressive and it cost me,” Woods said.
On cue, he regained the lost shot by rolling in an 11-foot birdie putt at the 198-yard par-3 sixth, and was just getting started. A sweet approach let to a seven-foot birdie at the par-4 seventh, and Woods made it three-straight by punching a wedge just inside the same distance at the par-5 eighth to pull within two strokes of the lead.
With the enormous crowd continuing to grow, Woods two-putted for par from just off the back fringe at the par-4 ninth to make the turn in 4-under 31.
Woods missed only one green on the back side and gave himself several quality birdie opportunities, but couldn’t capitalize. He carded nine consecutive pars.
At the par-4 10th, Woods delivered another remarkable save. Having bogeyed the tough 502-yard hole twice previously, he blocked a driver into the right rough, gouged his second shot 100 yards from the green, then knocked his third 10 feet from cup. Woods drained it.
“That was a big putt,” he said. “I didn’t want to lose one there.”
Toweling off sweat before almost every swing, Woods had good birdie chances at 11-through-15, but never felt comfortable with the speed. He said the greens got slower as the round progressed.
Between rounds, the putting surfaces were rolled but not cut.
Woods nearly dropped a 40-foot bomb at the par-3 16th, leaving the ball six-inches short of the cup. But his biggest disappointment of the day was a three-putt par at 17, where the tee was moved up 40 yards.
Following a nice drive, he reached the green in two, fading a gorgeous 4-iron from 240 yards 20 feet right of the hole. The fans were ready to explode, anticipating a Woods’ putt for eagle. But he ran it four feet by and pulled the come-backer.
“I left pretty much every putt short on the back nine,” said Woods. “The greens were getting fuzzy, they’re getting slow, and I didn’t hit the putts quite hard enough.”
He piped a drive at 18 and flushed a wedge 14 feet below hole but couldn’t convert.
Aside from a few errant drives, Woods’ ball-striking was brilliant. He hit 10 of 14 fairways, 15 of 18 greens and accumulated 30 putts.
“I thought I played really clean cards, really clean rounds,” said Woods. I just wish I could have got myself a couple shots closer to the lead, especially with the way 17 is playing.”
Saturday’s have been his strong-suit all season. He ranks third on the PGA Tour in third round scoring average at 68.64.
Cink savored the round.
“Being in Tiger’s group is always exciting,” he said. “It’s a pretty intense environment out there. It was a lot fun of hearing the crowd, and Tiger’s performing great. It was like turning back the hands of the clock.”
Not surprisingly, Woods was drained. He went through three shirts Saturday.
“I’m tired,” Woods said. “It’s not necessarily physical; it’s mentally grinding that hard for 29 holes in this heat. It was a long day.”
Due to injuries, he is competing in the PGA for the first time since 2015. This marks the first time Woods has been inside the top-10 after 54 holes in consecutive majors since the 2012 Open and PGA Championships.
Koepka will try to become just the fifth player in history to capture the U.S. Open and PGA in the same year. Woods was the last to accomplish the feat in 2000 at Pebble Beach and Valhalla.
On Sunday, Woods starts in the third-to-last group at 2:35 p.m. ET with Woodland. Through three rounds, Woods is a combined 10-under on the front nine and 2-over on the back.
“I need another low round,” he said. “The golf course is playing soft, it’s gettable, you have to make birdies.”
At Carnoustie, Woods began the final round four strokes off the pace. Should he win, Woods would match Walter Hagen and Jack Nicklaus for the most PGA Championship victories with five.
Round 2 Of The PGA Championship Will Resume On Saturday Due To Inclement Weather
It didn’t take long to prove his point.
A late starter Friday with Rory McIlroy and defending champion Justin Thomas, Woods was 3-under through seven holes and tied for 23rd when play was suspended due to dangerous weather. Three hours later, the round was called.
“It was fine,” said the four-time PGA winner. “I felt I was headed in the right direction.”
When play resumes Saturday at 7 a.m. CT, Woods will be hitting his third shot from the fairway on the par-5 eighth hole.
“The good thing is we’re to have the greens prepared before we go back out there to finish up our second round,” he said. “It would have been quite different if we had to go back out there this afternoon and finish it up. But the greens will be freshly cut, so it will be just like it was when we played on Thursday.”
Tiger is a finalist in the #MetLifeMatchUp where his shot was selected as one of the best recovery shots of the year. If Tiger wins, a donation of $750k will be donated to his charity, TGR Foundation. We ask that you help deserving scholars achieve a brighter future by voting for his shot. The contest runs from August 5th – 15th and you are able to vote up to 20 times per day. We thank you for your support!
When everyone completes the second round, the field will be cut to the top 70 and ties. Players will be paired in threesomes for the third round and the first and 10th tees will be utilized.
Weather permitting, Woods could play 29 holes.
“Tomorrow is going to be a long day for a lot of us,” he said.
Gary Woodland (64-66) is the clubhouse leader with a tournament record 36-hole score of 10-under 130.
After grinding out an even-par 70 Thursday, Woods got off to a fast start Friday. He made a 14-foot birdie putt at the par-4 second, a four-footer at the par-3 third, and added another from inside 10 feet at the par-3 fifth.
Woods drew the biggest roars of the round when he rolled in a 15-foot, par-saving putt at the sixth after missing the green. He also lipped out a birdie-chip at the par-4 seventh, his last hole of the day.
Since starting bogey-double-bogey on Thursday, Woods has played the next 23 holes 6-under.
Tiger Ends A Scorching First Round At The PGA Championship At Even Par
ST. LOUIS – Tiger Woods dug a deep hole Thursday in the first round of the 100th PGA Championship at sweltering Bellerive Country Club.
He started bogey-double-bogey and seemed close to playing himself out of contention.
But there’s a reason he’s won 79 times on the PGA Tour, including 14 majors. In the opening round of the 1997 Masters, Woods shot 40 on the front nine, then rebounded with a 30. He wound winning by a record-breaking 12 strokes.
Woods was 21, but even at 42, and four back surgeries later, he’s still a fighter.
Thursday, Woods reminded playing partners Rory McIlroy and Justin Thomas, along with thousands of appreciative fans, that there is no quit in his game. Coming off a lackluster 73-73 weekend at the World Golf Championships-Bridgestone Invitational at Firestone Country Club, a place he has won eight times and can seemingly shoot under par in his sleep, many thought Woods was toast Thursday.
They were wrong.
No, he didn’t shoot 30. But Woods toured the last 16 holes in 3-under and shot 2-under 33 on the back nine. That helped him salvage an even-par 70, six strokes behind pacesetter Gary Woodland (64).
“I was trying to grind away at it,” said Woods, who is tied for 48th. “It kept me in the golf tournament. I could have easily gone the other way, but I hung in there and turned it around.”
An early back nine starter, Woods had to make a seven-foot putt on 10 to escape with a bogey. He wasn’t as fortunate at 11, coming up short of the green with his approach from 118 yards out of the rough and found water.
“I just stuck it in the ground,” he said.
Playing in the PGA for the first time since 2015 due to injury, Woods got one back at the par-4 12th, stuffing his approach two feet from the hole and converted a much-needed birdie. He made a great save at the par-4 15th after hitting trees with his first two shots, then another at the par-5 17th, getting up-and-down from a bunker.
Woods built back nine momentum by lofting a 7-iron from 185 yards to four feet at the par-4 18th and made the birdie putt. He turned in 2-over 37.
At the par-4 first, Woods kept it going with his second straight birdie. He followed with six consecutive pars, then added his fourth birdie at the par-5 eighth, crushing two shots before wedging to 10 feet. Woods two-putted from deep at the par-4 ninth to complete his comeback.
He hit nine of 14 fairways, 11 of 18 greens and used 27 putts.
Tiger is a finalist in the #MetLifeMatchUp where his shot was selected as one of the best recovery shots of the year. If Tiger wins, a donation of $750k will be donated to his charity, TGR Foundation. We ask that you help deserving scholars achieve a brighter future by voting for his shot. The contest runs from August 5th – 15th and you are able to vote up to 20 times per day. We thank you for your support!
“The main thing at major championships it to make sure you have enough energy,” said Woods. “This is a long run. These are marathons. These are four long days. They’re slow rounds.”
The heat index climbed above 100 degrees.
Typically, Woods packs an extra shirt in his golf bag this time of year and usually changes prior to the round. Starting on 10, he couldn’t do that. After his tee shot on 12, he switched in a port-o-potty and played 3-under the rest of the way.
“As you know, I sweat a lot, and lose a bunch of weight,” said Woods. “I have the hardest time during summer maintaining my weight. No matter what I eat, no matter what I drink, I just can’t maintain weight. So this heat is one of the issues I have.”
Woods still has major work ahead. A four-time PGA winner, he’s hoping for a fast start Friday to move up the leaderboard. The good news is that he is only four shots out of third place.
Woods starts second-round play at 2:48 p.m. ET on the first tee with McIlroy and Thomas.
“These guys have been basically at the top of the world for the last four or five years,” Woods said. “I play with J.T. at home in practice rounds, but haven’t played with Rory in a very long time. It was fun to get out there and compete.”
Players wore yellow ribbons to show support for beloved Australian pro Jarrod Lyle, who died Wednesday after a 20-year battle with cancer. He was 36.
“It’s so sad to lose Jarrod after all he went through,” said Woods. “I played with him once at Firestone and he had an amazing spirit. We’re all family out here and we support each other.”
Many PGA Tour pros have contributed to a fund to help support Lyle’s wife, Briony, and their daughters Lusi (6) and Jemma (2). The TGR Foundation contributed $10,000.
MORE ON THE GREATEST GOLFER OF ALL-TIME
Eldrick Tont “Tiger” Woods (born December 30, 1975) is an American professional golfer who is among the most successful golfers of all time, and one of the most popular athletes of the 21st century. He has been one of the highest-paid athletes in the world for several years. Woods is considered by some as one of the greatest golfers of all time.
Following an outstanding junior, college, and amateur career, Woods was 20 years old when he turned professional at the end of summer in 1996. By the end of April 1997, he had won three PGA Tour events in addition to his first major, the 1997 Masters. Woods won this tournament by 12 strokes in a record-breaking performance and earned $486,000. He first reached the number one position in the world rankings in June 1997, less than a year after turning pro. Throughout the 2000s, Woods was the dominant force in golf—he won the 2000 U.S. Open by a record 15-shot margin. He was the top-ranked golfer in the world from August 1999 to September 2004 (264 weeks) and again from June 2005 to October 2010 (281 weeks).
He ended a career-high winless streak of 107 weeks when he triumphed in the Chevron World Challenge in December 2011. After winning the Arnold Palmer Invitational on March 25, 2013, he ascended to the No.1 ranking once again, holding the top spot until May 2014, by which time he had been ranked number one for a total of 683 weeks, more than any other player in history.
Since 2014, Woods has been unable to recapture his dominant form, undergoing four back surgeries in 2014, 2015 and 2017. By March 29, 2015, Woods had fallen to #104, outside of the top 100 for the first time since 1996. In May 2016, Woods dropped out of the world top 500 for the first time in his professional career. After falling to #1199 in the World Golf Ranking in December of 2017, Woods showed signs of making a comeback in 2018, and rose over 1000 places to be ranked #50 in August of that year.
Woods has broken numerous golf records. He has been World Number One for the most consecutive weeks and for the greatest total number of weeks of any golfer. He has been awarded PGA Player of the Year a record eleven times, the Byron Nelson Award for lowest adjusted scoring average a record eight times, and has the record of leading the money list in ten different seasons. He has won 14 professional major golf championships, where he trails only Jack Nicklaus who leads with 18, and 79 PGA Tour events, second all-time behind Sam Snead(82). Woods leads all active golfers in career major wins and career PGA Tour wins. He is the youngest player to achieve the career Grand Slam, and the youngest and fastest to win 50 tournaments on tour. Additionally, Woods is only the second golfer (after Nicklaus) to have achieved a career Grand Slam three times. Woods has won 18 World Golf Championships, and won at least one of those events in each of the first 11 years after they began in 1999. Woods and Rory McIlroy are the only golfers to win both The Silver Medal and The Gold Medal at The Open Championship.
