Tiger Woods hasn’t played since the Masters, and golf has survived. The discerning golf-watcher might have even noticed there are as many stories every week on the PGA Tour as there are players. Woods rightly dominates coverage and it’s never less than fascinating to follow him. But his absence has led to presents, as in gifts.
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Now, much of the talk the week of the Verizon was about Woods’ surgery on the Tuesday following the Masters. There was speculation then as now as to how the third procedure on his left knee might affect his play. Meanwhile, a youngster named Anthony Kim tied for second at Harbour Town with Aaron Baddeley, a slightly older youngster.
Kim was golfing his ball. He’d taken advice from, for one, Mark O’Meara, and he was letting his golf talk. As it became obvious that planet golf would have to find more to discuss than Woods, Kim started to come into focus.
Meanwhile, we were starting to truly appreciate Lorena Ochoa’s special qualities. Golf loves a superstar—hmmm, Woods enters the conversation again--and she won her fourth straight LPGA Tour event the week after the Masters, at the Ginn Open at the Reunion Resort in Orlando. Ochoa was handling the spotlight beautifully. The golf world was the more interesting for what she was doing, and for the attention being paid her.
Next up on the podium of most attention came Adam Scott. His swing reminded everybody of Woods’ action, especially when the world number one was working with Butch Harmon. Scott works with Harmon, and two weeks after the Masters he won the EDS Byron Nelson Classic in Dallas, in a playoff with Ryan Moore.
Maybe some people who follow golf only when Woods is in a tournament hadn’t followed the Verizon and the Nelson, two tournaments he doesn’t play. Would they also stay away during the Wachovia Championship the week after the Nelson? If they did, they missed another Anthony Kim show, and this one lit up the Quail Hollow course in Charlotte. Kim was a month and a half short of his 23rd birthday, yet he played like a veteran in winning by five shots over Ben Curtis.
That same week Ochoa was going for her fifth straight LPGA win. She didn’t win. Paula Creamer did, in a playoff over many-major winner Juli Inkster. Ochoa tied for fifth, five shots out of the playoff. She’s a superstar all right, and people were starting to talk about her as the LPGA’s equivalent of Woods. But it’s also good to remember that there’s more to women’s golf than Ochoa, or Annika Sorenstam, for that matter.
Sorenstam was about to inform us that she would be “stepping away” from competitive golf at the end of the season. She didn’t entirely rule out competing again, but as her friend Woods said, it’s hard to see her playing without being able to give her all to preparation.
We were starting to have our eyes wide open, if we didn’t close them because Woods wasn’t playing. Would Kim have won the Wachovia had Woods been playing? Who knows? A player can only beat the golfers in the field. Similarly, one can wonder whether Sergio Garcia would have won the Players had Woods been in the field. Again, who knows?
But Garcia did win. Like Scott, he’s yet to win a major. But he holed a big putt on the 72nd green at TPC Sawgrass and gave himself a chance to get into a playoff with Goydos. Goydos needed to par the difficult last hole and couldn’t manage. Garcia won the tournament on the first extra hole, the 17th, when he stuck his tee shot three feet from the hole after Goydos hit the water.
Now Garcia was in the spotlight, and there was also plenty of talk about Goydos. Observers liked his friendly demeanor and sense of humor. Garcia showed a sense of humour himself when, holding the trophy, he said, “I’d like thank Tiger for not being here.”
Still, Garcia had to gain confidence. He’d gain more confidence if he beat Woods, and that would also be true of Ryuji Imada. You might not have paid much attention to him unless you were a golf aficionado, but Imada has been another of those many younger players who have lots of game. In the Woods era we rarely look closely enough at them. But Imada won the AT&T Classic in Atlanta in a playoff over Kenny Perry.
We also got to know Parker McLachlin in Atlanta. Sure, he had his problems coming in after taking the lead, and tied for fifth in the end. But McLachlin can play, as anybody who could take his eyes off Woods in the last couple of years might have noticed. This wasn’t the first time he’s played well. But again, without Woods in the forefront, we could see some of the players lurking the background.
Ochoa? Right. She won her sixth tournament of the year the same week Imada was winning. The LPGA Championship was around the corner, and Ochoa would be going for her third straight major and second in this calendar year. There was plenty to appreciate in the game, plenty to follow. Most of the talk was about Sorenstam retiring, but the LPGA was learning that it could survive.
Then, what do you know, a superstar on the PGA Tour asserted himself. That would be Phil Mickelson, who won the Crowne Plaza Invitational at Colonial in Ft. Worth. He won it by hitting a wild and wonderful shot over the trees from the left rough on the 72nd hole and then holing an eight-foot birdie putt. Mickelson reminded us that he’s in the game big-time, and pointing towards the U.S. Open this week at Torrey Pines.
Then came Perry, winning the Memorial and staking a place for himself on the U.S. Ryder Cup team. Woods has long been a lock for the team, so the chase for other places is of interest. Perry’s win and his decision not to play the U.S. Open generated lots of talk. A week later Trevor Immelman served notice that his Masters win was no fluke, as he birdied the final three holes at the TPC Southwind in Memphis to get into a playoff with Justin Leonard and Robert Allenby. The run of closing birdies included a 30’ must-make on the last hole. Leonard won the playoff. He sticks around, doesn’t he?
While the Memphis tournament was winding down, so was the LPGA Championship. Ochoa and Sorenstam came up a shot short, the Taiwanese player Yani Tseng won in a playoff over Marla Hjorth. A surprise? Sure. But there’s no sure thing in golf. Never was. Never will be.
Tiger Woods’ absence served up a lesson. The lesson is that exciting tournaments occur even when he’s not part of the competitive scene. There’s not a player in the field who isn’t looking forward to taking on Torrey Pines and Woods, should it come to that. If it doesn’t, the U.S. Open will still be gripping. Tournaments are more appealing when Woods is in the field, but if our eyes and minds are open, they’re pretty good even when he’s not.
