{"id":1003,"date":"2011-05-11T07:52:23","date_gmt":"2011-05-11T14:52:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/davidhbarrett.com\/?p=1003"},"modified":"2012-03-06T07:20:30","modified_gmt":"2012-03-06T14:20:30","slug":"tiger-woods-coming-back-from-an-absence-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/davidhbarrett\/golf\/personalities\/1003\/tiger-woods-coming-back-from-an-absence-again","title":{"rendered":"Tiger Woods Coming Back From an Absence–Again"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Tiger Woods went four weeks without hitting balls after the Masters. Copyright Icon SMI.<\/p><\/div>\n

The biggest news from Tiger Woods\u2019 press conference at the Players Championship on Tuesday was that he didn\u2019t even hit balls from the end of the Masters until this Monday. That\u2019s four weeks without even a single shot on the range for what Woods describes as \u201cminor\u201d injuries to his left knee and Achilles that kept him out of last week\u2019s Wells Fargo Championship. And he\u2019s only going to play a total of 18 holes of practice for the Players, nine on Tuesday and nine on Wednesday. <\/p>\n

It\u2019s the latest in a series of absences from the game for Woods, beginning in 2008 when he had major surgery on the knee in question. He talked earlier this year about needing \u201creps\u201d as he tries to incorporate swing changes under new teacher Sean Foley, but he\u2019s not getting them. <\/p>\n

Frankly, a four-week hiatus doesn\u2019t really seem like a \u201cminor\u201d thing. If Woods were a baseball player, he would have been on the disabled list for a month. It also raises questions about the trip to Asia he took immediately after the Masters at the behest of Nike. He didn\u2019t play golf, but the trip was so full of activity that it was anything but a restful week for an injured knee. <\/p>\n

The timing of this latest setback isn\u2019t good, either. Woods finally looked comfortable with his swing as he made a run at the Masters on Sunday and then, boom, there he is on the sidelines again. Now, unless he unexpectedly adds a tournament to his schedule, he has only the Players and Memorial before the U.S. Open. <\/p>\n

A year ago, Woods had to withdraw from the Players during the final round because of a neck injury. Now he\u2019s coming off his latest knee problem. Is his body breaking down at the age of 35? That\u2019s hard to say for sure, but at the very least his body isn\u2019t cooperating. <\/p>\n

Woods has been going at it hard since his days in junior golf, and he\u2019s been on the PGA Tour since he was 20. He\u2019s certainly not a young 35. But he hasn\u2019t worn himself down from Tour golf, since he\u2019s never played a heavy schedule. Now his problem is that he\u2019s not playing enough to keep himself sharp, sometimes because of injuries, once because of a scandal that you may have heard about, other times because he shows no inclination to add events to his schedule that he doesn\u2019t normally compete in. <\/p>\n

Regarding Woods\u2019 future, I\u2019ve said it before, and I\u2019ll say it again: I have no idea what\u2019s going to happen. Neither does anyone else, really. Maybe he\u2019ll be great again, maybe he\u2019ll merely be good, maybe he won\u2019t win again. Let\u2019s just see what happens. <\/p>\n

Regarding Woods\u2019 present, well, it doesn\u2019t look good at the moment. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The biggest news from Tiger Woods\u2019 press conference at the Players Championship on Tuesday was that he didn\u2019t even hit… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":1004,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[252524,7],"tags":[6844,53],"class_list":["post-1003","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pga-tour-2","category-personalities","tag-players-championship","tag-tiger-woods"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/davidhbarrett\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/21\/2011\/05\/WoodsContemplative.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/davidhbarrett\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1003","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/davidhbarrett\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/davidhbarrett\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/davidhbarrett\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/27"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/davidhbarrett\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1003"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/davidhbarrett\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1003\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1528,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/davidhbarrett\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1003\/revisions\/1528"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/davidhbarrett\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1004"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/davidhbarrett\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1003"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/davidhbarrett\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1003"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theaposition.com\/davidhbarrett\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1003"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}