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Should Tiger Woods have played The Masters this year?
Ian Smith • April 15th, 2024 10:01 am
To play or not to play? That is the question.
I'm talking about the greatest golfer in the history of the game right now, Tiger Woods.
Should he have played The Masters? Yes, certainly he made the cut, there's no doubt about that - but now you get the sad sight of Tiger Woods. He's going to finish last of those players that made the cut, and do we want that?
As fans of golf and Tiger Woods, do we want to view the best struggling and finishing last in a tournament of this nature?
The TV companies love him, absolutely love him. Even when he's making bogeys and double bogeys, we're still watching Tiger do it. So he rates through the roof still, and that is fantastic for them. But he had his game face on, but you wonder whether he truly had a game face on, or was it a face of pain?
The longer it goes around at Augusta National, the longer the walk becomes through all its undulations - you can tell he's struggling more and more.
Is it the Tiger we want to see? Is it the Tiger we want to remember? Scoring rounds of 73, 72, 82, 77 at this year's Masters to finish 16-over par. That third round was the highest score he's ever recorded at Augusta, meanwhile the 16+ is also Tiger's worst 72-hole score in a professional career that spans across almost three decades.
Vijay Singh is also in the same bracket at 61 years of age, he finished second to last of those players that made the cut at 14-over par.
And whilst they're great names and they might have a moment of brilliance every now and then, is that really the way that we want to see them on the greatest stage of all?
For me, I think I'd rather remember Tiger Woods in his heyday with that iconic red shirt on the last round of a tournament, striding up the 18th to the salute of the crowds, rather than the sympathetic applause of the crowds now.
Where do you stand on it: to play or not to play?
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