AUGUSTA, Ga. – I feel like I am going to play. With those words, Tiger Woods signaled his intent to tee it up at the Masters Tournament, his first official PGA TOUR start in roughly a year and a half. Should he do so, Thursday would be his first official competition in 508 days, going all the way back to the final round of the (November) 2020 Masters. It is the second-longest hiatus of his career. No one who has watched him this week doubts he can hit the ball well enough. “Flushing it,” Fred Couples said after playing with Woods and Justin Thomas on Monday. Added Rory McIlroy, who is making his 14th Masters start: “I’ve spent a little bit of time with him at home, and the golf is there. He’s hitting it well. He’s chipping well. He’s sharp.” No, the question this week is whether Woods can walk. The five-time Masters champion said doctors considered amputating his right leg after a single-car accident in Los Angeles early in 2021. Now, 14 months later, he hopes to put one foot in front of the other for 72 holes. It’s harder than it sounds. Other than the Plantation Course at Kapalua, site of the Sentry Tournament of Champions, Augusta National presents some of the hilliest terrain in golf. As they might say at nearby Fort Gordon, it will be all about left, right, left as Woods walks through hill and dale, navigating slippery sidehill lies, loose pine straw, and pitched bunkers. Cameron Davis, who joined Woods during his Sunday practice round, said he was “a little slow” going up the steep slopes on 17 and 18. Davis, the Rocket Mortgage Classic winner, prefaced it with the observation that Woods is – all together now – hitting it great. Before the accident, the best way to read late-career Tiger Woods was to watch his speed. These days everyone is watching his gait. “It’s just the physical demand of getting around 72 holes here this week,” McIlroy said. Not that he would be surprised if Woods can meet that demand. Max Homa said essentially the same thing, that he was less surprised than amazed that Woods is back, adding that the arduous physical therapy he’s had to undergo just to be here brought to mind the 2015 Showtime documentary “Kobe Bryant’s Muse.” Specifically, the part after Bryant injures his Achilles. “It’s just him picking up marbles with his toes,” Homa said. Again and again. To repeat such a monotonous task takes incredible discipline. What can we expect from Woods this week? Excellence? Mediocrity? A bit of both? “I do,” Woods replied when asked if he thinks he can win. You want to doubt him? In December of 2019, Woods went 3-0-0 as playing captain of the winning U.S. Presidents Cup Team, becoming the first in the history of that event with 27 victories. He was coming off his 82nd win at the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP in Japan in the fall, his Masters victory the previous April, and an electric TOUR Championship win before that. Alas, that flurry of excellence took a toll, and Woods soon reverted to the player whose 1,322 rounds on TOUR had come with four back surgeries – spinal fusion in 2017 – and four knee surgeries. He had one top-10 finish in the 2020 calendar year, and skipped a handful of his favorites, including the Arnold Palmer Invitational presented by Mastercard, The Honda Classic, and THE PLAYERS Championship. Then came the pandemic. Returning at the Memorial Tournament presented by Nationwide (T40), Woods was a non-factor, and his T72 at the ZOZO CHAMPIONSHIP @ SHERWOOD, a course where he’d won the Hero World Challenge five times, said it all. At the November Masters he was tied for 10th after an opening-round 68, but on Sunday made a 10 at the 12th hole, hitting three balls in the water. It the highest score of his career. He bounced back with birdies on five of the last six. On the plus side, Woods’ ability to summon that much game over the closing holes on the back nine showed it’s still in there. On the minus side, he shot 76 and finished T38. “I haven’t put all the pieces together at the same time,” Woods said. He also wasn’t 100%. Two days before Christmas in 2020 he had a fifth back surgery, another microdiscectomy. And less than two months later he would nearly lose his leg in the terrifying accident that left him bedridden for months. He measured progress in tiny increments, starting with being able to sit in the backyard and listen to the birds. He went from chipping and putting to hitting full shots. He posted a swing video that set the internet on fire. He hit balls in public as he hosted but did not play in the Hero World Challenge in the Bahamas in December. Taking a cart, he played in the father-son PNC Championship with son Charlie later that month, finishing second to John Daly and John Daly, Jr. “I can play hit-and-giggle golf,” he said. As for competing against the likes of McIlroy and Justin Thomas, his neighbors in Jupiter, well, progress was slow. At The Genesis Invitational, another tournament Woods hosts, in February, he could offer no timeline. He said he wasn’t sure when he might be able to walk 72 holes again. Will this be the week? And what else might he be capable of doing? He’ll tee it up with Joaquin Niemann and Louis Oosthuizen for the first two rounds, and then, assuming he’s still able, he’ll play into the weekend. Hanging in the balance are potential alterations to his career totals, the 82 victories – tied with Sam Snead for most ever – 31 seconds, 19 thirds, 199 top-10 finishes in 368 starts, 11-1 playoff record, and earnings of nearly $121 million. Oh, and the 15 major championship titles. Left, right, left, one foot in front of the other, Woods is playing again. He thinks he can win.
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