Is His Return Realistic?

We haven’t seen him play in so long we’ve almost forgotten what it was like. Those drives, the control, the dominance. The red shirt he wore on Sundays for the final round of tournaments seemed to signal victory.

That was Tiger Woods … before the back injuries and the surgeries and the continuing rehab and work on his golf game.

Cherish the memories. They may be all that’s left.

The PGA Championship let it be known on Tuesday that Woods had withdrawn from next week’s final major of the season. Later, Woods’ agent told the Golf Channel in an email that Woods was “continuing to make progress, but simply not ready for PGA.” He went on to write that Woods would “continue to rehab and work hard to then assess when he starts play for the ’16/’17 season.”

Three back surgeries in 20 months can do that to a fella. The last was in October. He has not played competitively in nearly a year.

Once, the question was whether Woods, who won his 14th (and last) major in 2008, would break Jack Nicklaus’ record of 18. Now it’s fair to wonder when he will break par again.

Golf isn’t suffering without him. Not with a resurgent Phil Mickelson, Henrik Stenstrom, Jordan Spieth, Dustin Johnson, Rory McIlroy and Jason Day, currently ranked No. 1 in the world. But imagine that group competing with the Woods of yesteryear. For now that’s all we can do.
 
 
Post By: Larry Weisman, a longtime sportswriter for USA TODAY, blogs for Twistity.com. Follow him on Twitter @MrLarryWeisman