By JUSTIN JARRETT
jjarrett@islandpacket.com
jjarrett@beaufortgazette.com
By now you’ve probably noticed Tiger Woods did not make the trip down from Augusta.
And you know what? That’s OK.
From a purely selfish standpoint, it means we sports writers don’t have to devote half our manpower this week to the Tiger beat — no Twitter updates for the World’s Greatest Golfer’s every move (“OMG, Tiger just made 6-footer for birdie. Fist pump!”) — meaning we can seek out other stories to tell, stories that haven’t already been repeated time and again during last week’s wall-to-wall Tiger coverage at the Masters.
Don’t get me wrong, Tiger is the best in the world — perhaps even the best ever — and there is no such thing as too much Tiger, as far as the PGA Tour or its fans are concerned. Even my grandmother, who probably couldn’t tell you whether a pitching wedge is used to throw a baseball or hold a door open (but those would probably be her first two guesses), can’t get enough Tiger, though she marvels more at the way he fills out his shirt than the way he stares down a birdie putt.
But as much as the golf world needs Tiger, it also needs an occasional break from him. This week, on the heels of the Masters, seems as good a week as any to step back, take a deep breath and remember there are dozens of other great golfers with compelling stories, and a good number of them are here at Harbour Town Golf Links this week.
Tiger wasn’t here when Davis Love III ran in a 66-foot chip on No. 18 to claim his fifth Heritage title in 2003; he wasn’t around when Stewart Cink made a rather Tiger-like comeback from nine shots back in the final round to win in 2004; and he wasn’t lurking when a fella named Boo Weekley became a household name with a couple of crazy chip-ins on a wild and windy Monday at Harbour Town.
He was, on the other hand, hanging around Harbour Town for some serious drama in 1999, but he didn’t have anything to do with it. Glen Day took down Jeff Sluman and Payne Stewart in a playoff that year; Tiger tied for 18th, and he hasn’t been back since.
So, yeah, the Heritage will get by without golf’s biggest star. Heck, we might even be introduced to golf’s next big thing this week.
It simply doesn’t make sense for Tiger to come here. For starters, his schedule is designed to point toward the majors, and as long as the Heritage falls a week after the Masters, it will remain an afterthought on his priority list. And it doesn’t help that bombing it long is not the name of the game at Harbour Town, where accuracy and ingenuity are rewarded more than raw power.
With that said, don’t rule out the notion of Tiger returning here one day. Maybe he’ll decide green isn’t really his color and stop gearing his entire spring toward the Masters. Or maybe he’ll catch wind of the little running joke that started up a couple weeks ago among friends, who playfully suggested we’ll look back on Tiger’s unbelievable career and comment that the only thing missing was a tartan jacket.
Hey, many of the greats of the last 40 years — Arnold Palmer, Hale Irwin, Tom Watson, Jack Nicklaus, Nick Faldo, Greg Norman, Love, Stewart — have donned tartan.
Maybe Tiger will decide one day he wants to try to add his name to that list, or maybe he won’t. Either way, the Heritage will be OK.
