RealClearSports: The Best of Sporting Times and Tigers
Our Aprils, contrary to the T.S. Eliot poem, never are cruel. In the space of a few days they give us a sporting mixture that is irrepressible, full of baskets, fast balls and here, beneath the pines of Augusta National, 300-yard drives that confirm, no matter what the conditions, spring has arrived.
The NCAA Final Four, with its oversized crowds came first, and were followed by the baseball openers teasing the long season to come. Now, at a site as legendary as the men who have competed here, the Masters.
Now Amen Corner, Hogan Bridge and the man whose very presence has transformed golf into more than a weekend pastime, Tiger Woods.
Have we come down from North Carolina’s brilliant victory over Michigan State? Or Francisco Rodriguez’ excellent relief performance in his first chance for the Mets? It is time to get up once more, to follow Phil and Padraig and particularly, Tiger. Time to pay attention to the 12th hole, called by some the most difficult par-3 in golf, and to greens that as Dan Jenkins once wrote, are as slick as the top of Sam Snead’s bald head.
There is a special fascination with the Masters as the first major tournament of every year. The name itself lends a cachet not found anywhere else in sport.
Golfers last a lifetime. Jack Nicklaus won a Masters at age 46 and was playing the tournament well into his 60s. Greg Norman is back this time, and even the most callous of individuals finds sympathy for a man in his 50s known less for success than for his failures, including that 1996 Masters, when he blew a six-shot lead the last day.
We are familiar with so many of them -- last year’s winner Trevor Immelman, and Vijay Singh and names which persist like the blooms of the dogwood trees.
We remember when Tom Weiskopf took a 12 on that 13th hole, and when Mickelson made that winning putt on the 18th and jumped, what, all of three inches? And we remember when, in 1997, Tiger crushed the scoring record, sending a signal that golf would never be the same, as he became the first African-American to win the Masters.
Since then, it’s been all about Tiger, and this year -- the year of the great return -- the focus is even greater. From his first shot in Thursday’s opening round to his last, he will be the focus, and perhaps the champion. He was gone eight months after surgery on that anterior cruciate ligament and legitimately or not, because we should be wary of doubting the great ones, there were questions of whether he would be his old self. They were answered quickly enough.
Tiger stood over that 15-foot putt nine days ago on the 72nd hole at Arnold Palmer’s tournament and seemingly as if predestined, knocked the ball into the cup to win. The way he had done before the layoff. The way he always will do.
“I really wanted to get into contention,” Woods said Tuesday of his victory, “and feel the rush again on the back nine. I was not in it at Doral; I was on the periphery. The past week at Bay Hill was great to feel that, and to see how my body would react again. It’s been a while and a lot of uncertainty over the months upon months of rehab. And it felt great to hit shots.”
Uncertainty? With Tiger Woods? Deep down, he knew. So did the rest of us. He was going to win again. It was inevitable. That he needed only three tournaments was maybe a surprise. Or was it?
I learned not too long ago, never to be unsure of Tiger. It was the 1996 U.S. Amateur, his last before turning pro a few days later. He was 5-down in the final, at match play, and on a radio broadcast I declared his reign, after winning the previous two years, was at an end.
Not at all. Woods caught Steve Scott and won on the second extra hole, the 38th. Scott could only sigh, “Against Tiger Woods no lead is safe.”
A couple days later, Willie McCovey, the Hall of Fame baseball player, confronted me and said, “How could you give up on Tiger? I don’t care how far teams and players get behind, when they’re good you have to believe in them.”
I believe. Tiger may not win this Masters, but who wants to pick against him? In these wonderful few days of April 2009, not me.