tim rosaforte
tiger’s cup runneth on empty
an unannounced visitor
showed up at the funeral of
bob o’meara 10 days ago
to pay his respects: tiger
woods. “i had no idea he
was coming,” mark o’meara
said sunday morning at
about the time woods was
making the turn at firestone.
“he was awesome. he said,
‘i know you’ve been my
big brother. but i’ve been
through this with pops. let
me be your big brother now.’
people don’t see that side of
him. i do.”
needs a break—not from
the game of golf, but from
the grief he’d get by telling
corey pavin not to make him
a captain’s pick for the ryder
cup team. “if he feels like
his game is not in a position
to help the team, that he’s
too much of a distraction,
then maybe it’s good to step
aside,” o’meara said. “that’s
for him to decide. but if tiger
wants to play, he plays.”
will not be pavin’s. it will be
woods’. but as tiger said
himself after his final-round
77 at the bridgestone, “i
wouldn’t help the team if i
were playing like this.” he
did add that the process
wasn’t over, that there was
enough time between the
completion of the pga
championship and sept. 7,
when pavin’s picks are due,
for tiger to find his game.
bank championship, the
event held immediately
before pavin’s decision.
by then his ryder cup fate
might be sealed, and tiger
could be out of the picture
until he gets paid to play in
the wgc-hsbc champions
and australian masters.
“i’d leave it up to him, but i’d
try to pick his brain,” cook
said. “he may just want to
shut it down, i don’t know. i
wouldn’t be surprised.”
the side woods showed at
the wgc-bridgestone in-
vitational was sympathetic
figure. after repeatedly say-
ing, “i plan on playing myself
onto the [ryder cup] team,”
he shot 18 over and finished
next-to-last, falling to 10th
in the cup points standings,
two places out of automatic
selection with one tourna-
ment remaining, the pga
championship at unforgiv-
ing whistling straits.
John cook, who has evolved
into tiger’s 2010 big broth-
er because he’s around isle-
worth more than o’meara,
believes the call shouldn’t
be made on woods’ cup
candidacy until after the
pga. “if it comes down to
tiger woods and so and so
and so and so, i’m picking
tiger,” cook said. “but i’m
also going to watch next
week and see. if it looks like
he’s still out of sequence
and out of sorts, i’d give him
the year off. why force the
issue?”
“i think i can turn it around,”
woods said. “but we’ve got
a lot of time between now
and then, which is good.”
in o’meara’s mind, woods
the decision, ultimately,
professionally, woods may
face bigger issues than the
ryder cup. at 119th in the
fedex cup standings, he
is currently eligible for one
playoff event, the barclays.
and if he drops seven more
spots at the pga he’d miss
the playoffs altogether. (it
could happen. he fell eight
spots from 111th after the
bridgestone.) any early
playoff exit means he would
not qualify for the deutsche
contents //10 things // wgc-bridgestone //pga tour //champions tour //equipment // tim rosaforte
