Tiger Woods describes life’s unexpected obstacles, creating doubts about the beginning of the future

Tuesday morning of the Hero World Challenge week has become a strange tradition in professional golf, because Tuesday morning of the Hero World Challenge week has become a window into the future of Tiger Woods.

For years, Woods has made this week’s 20-player showcase a platform for various career resumes, making his annual Tuesday morning conference his venue. we learning a little something about what the current perspective looks like. How is Tiger feeling? What is his hope for the future? Could he play five events next season, or five before the US Open?

Because he is Tiger Woods, his answers have long qualified as the most important information in the news. And, because he’s Tiger Woods, his answers have changed almost every year.

In this case Tuesday morning Hero World Challong, the tone was humble. Woods entered the interview room at Albany Golf Club as a tournament host but not a competitor, choosing to go public as he recovers from at least his sixth back surgery in the past decade, a microdiscectomy performed in early September.

The 15-time major golfer looked the part of a pro golfer, sporting the same cool body that has helped balance his swing in the years since a car accident robbed his lower body of strength. But as he spoke to the gathered media, it became clear that he did not to hear as one.

“I’m not sharp enough for the competition, no. I’m still not there,” he said. “These are the top 20 players in the world, and I’m not sharp enough to compete with them at this level. So when I’m ready to compete and play at this level, I’ll do it.”

Woods’ words belied the feelings he had last December, when he expressed his hope to play one event a month in 2024, starting with the Genesis Invitational in February and ending, possibly, with the Tour Championship in September. Tiger collected four starts in that span and recorded a 72-hole score just once, at the Masters.

On Tuesday, he revealed that the root of his struggles in ’24 was actually his back, where an unexpected blow caused pain emanating from his spine and leg in various places throughout the season.

“I didn’t think my back would go the way it did this year,” Woods said. “It was very painful at the end of the year, that’s why I had another procedure done to ease the pain that was going down my leg.”

A microdiscectomy in September, to reduce pressure caused by a herniated disc on the spinal column, should help Woods play near pain-free in the future. He underwent the same procedure in 2021, one of half a dozen spinal surgeries he has undergone since his famous spinal fusion in 2017.

Still, in the Bahamas, it was clear that the number of hours under the knife was starting to add up – both physically and mentally.

“The fire is still burning competitively,” Woods said. “But as far as the recovery process of going out there … and doing it at a high level, I don’t know. For some reason, the body will not recover as it used to. That’s part of the age and part of the athlete’s journey.”

Between his leg and back, Woods has had a dozen surgeries in the past decade, and that’s not to mention the knee procedures after his famous US Open victory in 2008. Many hours of discomfort filled the moments between these operations – painful. hours of rehab, struggling on the golf course, and, of course, developing new injuries.

“My commitment going forward is once a month, yes, I can repeat that, but I really don’t know,” he said. “I’m just trying to get it right and keep getting stronger and better and feel better, give myself the best chance I can going into next year.”

At Tuesday’s Hero World Challenge, the latest glimpses into Tiger Woods’ future weren’t pretty. His recent answers about his health and play schedule were extremely pessimistic. And yet there was the same, consistent drumbeat beneath his question-and-answer session — the same sense of unresolved tension that keeps us coming back to this golf tournament and this course every December. Hope is fading now, but you don’t have to look hard to find it.

“This year was kind of — I had to throw it away,” Woods said. “I wasn’t as sharp as I should have been and I wasn’t playing the way I needed to get into the big tournaments and I wasn’t playing well in it. I hope that next year will be better, I will be physically stronger and better. I know this process has helped, and I hope I can build on that.”